Cathedral Thinking

Our family went on a Mediterranean cruise a few years ago that started and ended in the city of Barcelona.  We spent a day visiting the sites in Barcelona.  I remember visiting the Basílica de la Sagrada Família, which currently holds the distinction as the largest unfinished Catholic church in the world.  The church was designed by the Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí and is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site.  Construction began on the church on March 19, 1882 under the direction of the architect Francisco de Paula del Villar y Lozano, though Gaudí took over when Villar resigned in 1883.  The project would become Gaudí's magnum opus, and he would devote the remainder of his life to the project.  At the time of his death in 1926, only about a quarter of the church construction was complete.  Gaudí is buried in the church's crypt.  Construction has continued since that time, and the hope is to finish building the church in 2026 on the 100th anniversary of Gaudí's death.

One-hundred and forty-four years seems like an awfully long time to finish a construction project, at least until it's realized that most of the famous churches and other structures from antiquity took far longer to complete.  For example, the Great Wall of China took over 2,000 years to build (and contrary to common belief, you cannot see the Great Wall from outer space).  Angkor Wat, the temple complex in Cambodia took over 400 years to build.  Westminster Abbey in London required nearly 500 years to build.  St. Peter's Basilica in Rome required 120 years of construction. The Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris required over 100 years to finish, while St. Paul's Cathedral in London required only 35 years to build.  It's clear that even with modern construction and engineering, 144 years is not too far out of the ordinary.

I can imagine that it would be hard to oversee the design and construction of a building knowing that you won't be around to see it finished.  I remember when my last hospital started building a new critical care tower and how disappointed I was when I realized that I would never be around to work in the new Pediatric Intensive Care Unit that it housed.  It's a common sentiment, but it raises an issue that I think is relevant to leadership in general.  

The concept is known as "cathedral thinking", which is commonly defined as a mindset in which 'long-term projects or goals are initiated for the sake of or for benefit of future generations.  When Christopher Wren started work on St. Paul's Cathedral, he envisioned a church that would be around for future generations, long past his own death.  Similarly, when Donato Bramante, Michelangelo, Carlo Maderno, and Gian Lorenzo Bernini designed and built St. Peter's Basilica, they knew that they wouldn't be around to see the end result.  

"Cathedral thinking" means thinking about the long-term future.  Jonathan Thompson recently proclaimed in his TED talk that "cathedral thinking is dead".  He argues that we have somehow lost the ability to take pleasure in doing things that do not immediately benefit us, even though we know that future generations will be able to enjoy the fruits of our labor.  He suggests that we can recover the lost art of "cathedral thinking" by focusing again on purpose and how we can connect what we are doing today towards a better future.  "Cathedral thinking" also involves a certain degree of selflessness and prioritizing the the well-being of future generations over personal and immediate gratification.  "Cathedral thinking" depends upon a far-reaching vision, a well thought-out plan, and a shared commitment to long-term implementation.  

The 20th century French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry wrote in his memoir Flight to Arras, "A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral."  What are you doing to transform that rock pile in your organization today to the cathedral of tomorrow?

"Never stop fighting until the fight is done!"

Movies are magic.  I'm not talking about what the film industry does with special effects and CGI, which is incredible.  What I really love is how a motion picture soundtrack just completes a scene and makes it so much more memorable.  There are a couple of iconic scenes that I will watch over and over again because of the music playing in the background. The opening sequence with the 1924 Olympic British Track and Field team running along the beach with background music by Vangelis in the 1981 movie "Chariots of Fire" is a great example.    The Promontory sequence (composed by Trevor Jones and Randy Edelman) in the 1992 film "The Last of the Mohicans" is another one.  I can watch Pickett's Charge in the 1993 movie "Gettysburg"  (also composed by Randy Edelman) over and over again.  Pure magic. But my absolute favorite and likely the most iconic scene I have ever witnessed is the bridge shootout scene in the  1987 movie "The Untouchables".  

First of all, whoever thought of including a scene in which the four main protagonists ride horses and charge across a grassy plain in a mobster film about Al Capone and Eliot Ness in 1920's Chicago? I I don't Regardless, it just seems to fit perfectly.  Brilliant.  Add the musical score to the scene (the song playing in the background is called "Victorious" and was composed by Ennio Morricone) and it becomes pure magic!

I recommend reading today's post while listening to "Victorious" in the background!  "The Untouchables" was a great movie with an incredible cast, including Kevin Costner (as Eliot Ness), Robert DeNiro (as Al Capone), Sean Connery (who won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor that year for his role as Jimmy Malone, an Irish police officer), and Andy Garcia.  There are some great lines and memorable quotes from the movie that are relevant to the topic of leadership.  

It's interesting that most of these quotes come from Sean Connery's character, Jimmy Malone, as he mentors Eliot Ness on how to fight crime the "Chicago Way".  For example, when Malone is asking Ness if he really understands what it's going to take to capture Capone, he asks simply, "What are you prepared to do?"  He even asks twice and then cautions him, "If you open the can on these worms you must be prepared to go all the way. Because they're not gonna give up the fight, until one of you is dead."  In other words, achieving something special and unprecedented requires dedication, commitment, and focus.  You must commit 100% of your efforts and resources to achieving that goal.

Later, Malone again tells Ness, "If you're afraid of getting a rotten apple, don't go to the barrel. Get it off the tree."  In this case, Ness is worried about putting together a team of "untouchables."  He doesn't want to have corrupt police officers on his team who might be working for Al Capone.  Malone recommends that they go straight to the local police academy and find an individual there who hasn't started working for the Chicago police.  However, I think there is another way to look at this quote, which is more relevant to leadership.  

Al Capone (Robert DeNiro) even has a memorable scene with a leadership "tip" about teamwork.  In this case, he is using the sport of baseball as a metaphor for teamwork.  He says, "Baseball! A man stands alone at the plate. This is the time for what? For individual achievement. There he stands alone. But in the field, what? Part of a team. Teamwork... Looks, throws, catches, hustles. Part of one big team. Bats himself the live-long day, Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, and so on. If his team don't field... what is he? You follow me? No one. Sunny day, the stands are full of fans. What does he have to say? I'm goin' out there for myself. But... I get nowhere unless the team wins."  It's all about the team.  Of course, shortly after his soliloquy, he beats one of his henchmen over the head with a baseball bat, so maybe it wasn't the best metaphor for teamwork and leadership.

The last memorable quote occurs towards the very end of the movie, after Al Capone was convicted of tax evasion.  Ness goes up to him and says, "Never stop fighting until the fight is done!"  Ness, of course, had learned this lesson earlier in the movie from his partner Jimmy Malone.  It's related to the earlier comments about dedication, commitment, and focus on the goal.  Never give up.  Keep trying.  Keep fighting.  And if you get knocked down, get up and fight again.

"Here endeth the lesson..."

"Have a bias towards action..."

I don't remember the exact dates or even how old I was at the time, but our family once took a summer vacation to a number of historic sites, including Mount Vernon, Williamsburg, Monticello, and the Yorktown Battlefield.  It was a great trip, and besides the memory of getting into a long "discussion" with my older sister on whether Thomas Jefferson's home was pronounced with a "Ch" or "S" sound, my favorite memory was the trip to the Yorktown Battlefield.  For those of you who don't know, General George Washington's defeat of the British Army under General Charles Cornwallis at the Battle of Yorktown in October, 1781 was a major turning point in the American Revolutionary War.  While the War didn't formally end until the Treaty of Paris was signed on September 3, 1783, for all intents and purposes the war was over after Washington’s victory at Yorktown.

I learned a lot about the Battle of Yorktown during our visit, but one of my most vivid memories involved the attacks on the British Redoubts No.9 and No.10.  Some additional context is required to fully appreciate the story here.  In the summer of 1781, British General Lord Charles Cornwallis had started raiding parts of Virginia in order to reduce the amount of food and supplies that were being provided for Washington's Continental Army.  In addition, General Sir Henry Clinton, who was the overall British commander of all military forces in North America, ordered Cornwallis to capture a coastal area where British naval ships could harbor safely.  Cornwallis chose Yorktown and Gloucester Point, a peninsula that was nearly half a mile across the York River from the town of Yorktown.  The British Army built a series of fortifications to defend the town, including a series of Redoubts (earthen forts), two of which (#9 and #10) were located at the extreme left of the British line.

At the same time, Washington and his French allies saw an opportunity to trap the British Army at Yorktown (take a look at the map above).  He moved the Continental Army in secret towards Yorktown, while the French navy fought a decisive battle against the British navy, thereby taking control of Chesapeake Bay and cutting off any chance that Cornwallis could escape or be reinforced by sea (the Battle of the Chesapeake was absolutely key to Washington's plans and is the subject of an excellent book by the American author Nathaniel Philbrick, In the Hurricane's Eye). 

The main Continental and French army, numbering over 17,000 men arrived in late September to find that the British had abandoned most of their outermost fortifications (except Redoubts #9 and #10) to pull their defenses close to the town of Yorktown.  Washington laid siege to Yorktown and constructed the First Parallel, a trench and series of fortifications approximately 2,000 yards in length to the south of Yorktown to protect his artillery during the bombardment of Yorktown.  As British resistance flagged, Washington began construction of a Second Parallel, within 300 or so yards of the main British line.  However, the Second Parallel could not be completed until Redoubts #9 and #10 were captured from the British.  Washington ordered the French to attack Redoubt #9, while the Americans under Lt. Colonel Alexander Hamilton would attack Redoubt #10 (note that this story didn't make it into the musical!). 

What I distinctly remember from my childhood tour, and what my subsequent research now has confirmed, is that the French attack was more planned and sequenced.  French military engineers first removed some of the defense works and were shortly followed by the main attack numbering about 400 soldiers.  The French captured Redoubt #9, which was defended by about 120 British and Hessian troops, within approximately 30 minutes.  In contrast, the American forces, also numbering about 400 soldiers were led by Alexander Hamilton captured Redoubt #10 in less than 10 minutes.  The American attack was less coordinated than the French, or at least that's what I was told so many years ago.  Once Redoubts #9 and #10 fell, Washington was able to complete the Second Parallel, and the defeat of the British was only a matter of time.  Cornwallis saw the futility in continuing the fight and surrendered his forces.  

I talked several years ago about one of my favorite quotes from General Dwight Eisenhower, who said, "In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable" (see my post from August, 2017).  I recently learned that Winston Churchill said something similar - "Plans are of little importance, but planning is essential."  I don't doubt that both the French and Americans planned ahead of time for the attack on Redoubts #9 and #10.  However, I can't help but think that perhaps the American forces better adapted their tactics to the immediate situation, allowing them to be more agile and accomplish in less than 10 minutes what the French accomplished in half an hour.  I am also reminded of an online video that went viral, which was the subject of my post LeeeeeeeRoy Jenkins (the video was spoofed by the television series The Family Guy - see video here)!

Please don't misunderstand me.  I don't think we should dive headfirst into any unknown situation without thinking about it (similar to what LeRoy Jenkins does in the video game).  It's important to have a strategy and an agreed upon a set of tactics ahead of time.  However, it's just as important to have the agility to be able to pivot when those tactics aren't aligned with the particular situation at hand.  Flexibility, adaptability, and agility are the watchwords for today's VUCA world.  As former Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi said, "Have a bias towards action - let's see something happen now.  You can break that big plan into small steps and take the first step right away."

I want to end this post, as I frequently do, with a few quotes that I believe help drive home today's message.  John F. Kennedy said, "The time to repair the roof is when the sun is shining."  The author J.R.R. Tolkien (author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy) said, "It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near one."  Finally, American writer Claire Cook said, "If plan A doesn't work, the alphabet has 25 more letters..."  In other words, be proactive and plan ahead.  But don't be paralyzed by your plans if you find that they aren't working.  Have a bias for action!  Oh, and by the way, it's Monticello with a "Ch" sound, and I was right!

Don't be a chronic firefighter!

I talked about the tendency for organizations to adopt the bad habit of operating continuously in crisis mode in a recent post, "Never let a crisis go to waste...or maybe not?"  I specifically mentioned a LinkedIn post by Andre Ripla ("Navigating the Storm: Identifying and Overcoming Continuous Crisis Mode in Business Leadership").  I also mentioned that what Ripla calls continuous crisis mode, the two High Reliability Organizations experts Kathleen Sutcliffe and Karl Weick call chronic firefighting and collapse of sensemaking, respectively.  

There's no question that today's environment requires (maybe forces is a better word) organizations to be agile.  Becker's Hospital Review recently published an article calling agility the new C-suite buzzword for 2025!  The article asked several hospital and health system executives about the need for agility.  For example, Biju Samkutty, Chief Operating Officer at Mayo Clinic said, "The most valuable lesson I learned in the past year is that agility in decision-making is just as critical as having a well-defined strategy...In a rapidly evolving environment, lengthy planning cycles [see below] and excessive consensus-building must give way to iterative execution, data-driven insights, and cross-functional collaboration."  

Dr. Steve Davis, President and CEO at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center added, "The pace of change in healthcare is accelerating, making traditional change management approaches inadequate.  Instead of rigid, top-down strategies, we must foster agility, resilience, and adaptability within our workforce...Thriving organizations will be those that cultivate a culture of adaptability, empowering teams to navigate uncertainty, embrace innovation, and iterate quickly...Our focus must shift from managing change to building the capacity to sustain it."

While I agree with both Mr. Samkutty and Dr. Davis (full disclosure, Dr. Davis is actually a former boss), I do think that organizations have to be careful to avoid spending too much time in continuous crisis mode or what Dr. Sutcliffe calls chronic firefighting mode.  Becker's Hospital Review also interviewed Dr. Cliff Megerian, CEO of University Hospitals in Cleveland, Ohio.  Dr. Megerian emphasized the importance of balance, stating, "...while agility and resourcefulness are crucial, they are ideally utilized in a measured manner...We've seen that it is best to avoid being overly reactive...A disciplined approach to prioritizing is vital so that critical objectives will receive the necessary resources and attention."

With Dr. Megerian's comments in mind, I wanted to re-visit this particular topic in today's post, specifically to answer the question, "How do I know if my organization is operating in chronic firefighting mode?"  Ripla lists several organizational signs that suggest a pattern of continuous crisis:

1. Decision-making is largely reactive.  While he didn't use these exact words, the management guru Peter Drucker described the key differences between reactive versus proactive decision-making in a 1967 Harvard Business Review article, "The Effective Decision".  When decisions are made primarily to address immediate and pressing issues at the expense of longer range objectives, an organization is likely to be stuck in chronic firefighting mode.  Similarly, if tactical decisions override strategic ones, then an organization is being reactive more than its being proactive.  

2. The so-called planning horizon is shrinking.  A planning horizon is the length of time into the future that a plan or strategy considers when making decisions.  Organizations that are operating in chronic firefighting mode focus more on short-term outcomes (days to weeks) than long-term outcomes (months to years).  Leaders in these organizations simply do not have the time or energy to focus on long-term initiatives or to engage in strategic discussions.

3. Allocation of resources become erratic and often haphazard.  Organizations that are always operating in chronic firefighting mode tend to abandon initiatives, shift priorities, and re-direct resources to address emergencies and short-term problems.  

4. Meeting patterns shift.  If meeting agendas are dominated by problem-solving and/or rarely involve discussions about long-term strategy, then it's likely that the organization has fallen into the habit of chronic firefighting.  Similarly, these organizations tend to cancel regularly scheduled meetings in order to hold emergency ones.  For example, if hospitals are always activating Incident Command (a formalized system used by organizations to effectively respond to emergencies, such as mass casualty incidents, natural disasters, and pandemics), it's likely that they are stuck in chronic firefighting mode.

5. Communication changes.  There is a nuance to crisis communication that is distinctly different from regular communication within organizations.  If an organization is always operating in chronic firefighting mode, this style of communication becomes the norm, rather than the exception.

6. Rules around governance change.  Standard decision-making protocols, approval processes, and governance structures are routinely bypassed in organizations that are operating in chronic firefighting mode.

7.  Innovation declines or is absent.  True creative problem-solving rarely occurs when organizations are constantly putting out fires.

8. Organizational learning declines or is absent.  Related to the point immediately above, when organizations are constantly in chronic firefighting mode, key learning cycles, post-mortem reviews, root-cause analyses are often abbreviated or eliminated entirely.  As a result, the organization loses its ability to develop shared learning, which in turn, adversely impacts development of an organizational memory.

W. Edwards Deming was one of the early founders of the quality improvement movement.  He disagreed with chronic firefighting too.  Deming said, "Putting out fires is not improvement of the process.  Neither is discovery and removal of a special cause detected by a point out of control.  This only puts the process back to where it should have been in the first place."

As I mentioned in my last post, when chronic firefighting becomes the default mode in an organization,  the organization will suffer.  Acting like there's a crisis when there isn't one is exhausting both mentally and physically.  It can tax human resources, impair effective decision-making, destroy organizational culture, and ultimately threaten the long-term sustainability of an organization. The important point here is to recognize here is for leaders to recognize these signs of chronic firefighting mode and change their approach accordingly.

Ikigai and Meaningful Work

The American author Mark Twain once said, "Find a job you enjoy doing, and you will never have to work a day in your life."  While I understand the sentiment, I am not sure that I fully agree.  Some of us our lucky enough in life to have a job, career, or profession (and I do think that the three of these are all different - more on that shortly) that we enjoy - maybe even love.  Even those of us who are lucky to be in that situation will have days (or weeks) that we really just don't want to go to work.  We will likely even have days where we will come home at the end of the day and say, "I had a miserable day at work."  We may even occasionally say, "I hate my job."  What's important in the end is that the good days outnumber the bad days.

As I wrote in my post, "Are you happy?", which I based on the wonderful book by the Harvard Business School professor Arthur C. Brooks and Oprah Winfrey, Build the Life You Want, happiness is not a destination.  It's a direction.  People can even be happy and unhappy at the same time.  Happiness is not the opposite of unhappiness.  They are two distinct emotions.  I think the same is true when it comes to work - you can be happy with work and unhappy at the same time.  Our happiness at work will depend upon having (1) a sense of purpose, (2) a sense of community (i.e. the personal connections that we have with our co-workers), and (3) a sense that we are valued.  Similarly, as I wrote in my post, "The Five Pillars of Happiness", whether we our work is meaningful is also important.  Again, Arthur Brooks defines meaningful work as work that yields both earned success, which he defines as a sense of accomplishing something valuable and work that involves service to others.

As I mentioned above, I agree with many others that having a job, career, or profession means three different things.  Simply stated, a job is a specific position of employment or task that someone is paid to perform, a career is the progression of jobs and roles throughout one's working life, and a profession is a career that requires specialized knowledge and training, often with ethical standards and societal respect.  Importantly, we can be happy at our job, career, or profession, as long as we have the three senses of purpose, community, and value discussed above!

Lastly, you've probably read articles or posts on the Japanese concept of ikigai.  The Japanese word ikigai has no direct English translation, but it roughly means "the thing that you live for" or "the reason for which you get up in the morning."  Ikigai is the intersection, overlap, or common ground between (a) what you love, (b) what you are good at, (c) what the world needs, and (d) what you can get paid for:

I think we all strive to find ikigai.  However, I think ikigai is an ideal that is close to perfection.  The legendary NFL football coach Vince Lombardi once said, "Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence."  To that, I would say, ikigai may not be attainable for all of us, but if we strive for ikigai, we may find meaningful work, as defined by Arthur Brooks.  And that is probably more than enough!

How to be happy at work...

I just finished reading a book by Annie McKee called How to Be Happy at Work: The Power of Purpose, Hope, and Friendship.  I was interested in how to improve workforce engagement in general, and I thought that this book would provide some helpful insights.  I thought that the overall themes discussed in the book were helpful.  McKee emphasizes that happiness is an active choice that requires both individual effort and a healthy, supportive work culture (see my posts, "The mathematics of happiness", "Attitude creates reality", and "Success is not the key to happiness" for more on this point).  To that end, generating happiness at work is all about developing the right mindset and cultivating a positive work environment.  

McKee discussed three key drivers of happiness: 

1. Meaning and purpose: McKee argues (convincingly) that when you can connect your work to a greater cause or vision, work will be more fulfilling

2. Self-awareness: We need to understand our own emotions, strengths, values, and motivations in order better align our work with what is important to us.

3. Positive relationships: We need to build and develop supportive, collaborative, and trust-based relationships with our co-workers and managers.  Working in a positive social environment improves motivation, satisfaction, and engagement. 

Richard Clarke writes a blog called "Boosting Happiness at Work" and posted "The real secret to being happy at work - Understand your own needs..." on LinkedIn last year.  Importantly, he suggested that we need to be asking ourselves the question, "What do I need to be happy?"  If we find it hard to answer that question, perhaps we can get some help from the following fourteen statements that are used in the Indeed.com Workplace Wellbeing Survey:

My work has a clear sense of purpose.

I feel happy at work most of the time.

I feel stressed at work most of the time.

I am paid fairly for my work.

There are people at work who give me support and encouragement.

There are people at work who appreciate me as a person.

I can trust people in my company.

I feel a sense of belonging in my company.

My manager helps me succeed.

My work environment feels inclusive and respectful of all people.

My work has the time and location flexibility I need.

In most of my work tasks, I feel energized.

I am achieving most of my goals at work.

I often learn something at work.

It's striking to me that several of these statements involve McKee's purpose, self-awareness, and positive relationships!  Similarly, the U.S. Surgeon General released a report in 2022 entitled "Workplace Mental Health and Wellbeing") that highlighted five essentials to finding happiness at work - safety, community, autonomy, opportunities for growth, and purpose.  Again we hear about the importance of having a sense of purpose and being part of a community.

I don't know if reading Annie McKee's book or even perusing the U.S. Surgeon General's special report will help you unlock the key to workplace happiness.  However, I do think that both the book and the report provide some important insights and are great places to start.  Given that we spend nearly 1/3 of our lives at work, we should be happy at work!

What is your lighthouse?

In a recent post ("A life with meaning and purpose..."), I mentioned a recently published study that found that having a purpose in life was the key to living a longer, healthier, happier life.  How can we find our purpose?  I also mentioned the neurologist, psychologist, and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl, who wrote perhaps one of the greatest books that I've ever read, Man's Search for Meaning.  Frankl wrote, "Those who have a why to live can bear with almost any how."    

It's helpful to define "purpose" at the outset.  Dr. Leah Weiss, who teaches about compassionate leadership at Stanford University's Graduate School of Business writes about the need for "Purpose with a capital P" in her book, How We Work: Live Your Purpose, Reclaim Your Sanity, and Embrace the Daily Grind.  While "purpose could be any direction in which we're heading with some degree of intention", "Purpose with a capital P" describes a far-reaching goal that is "personally meaningful and self-transcending that, ideally, shows up in our lives every day."  She writes on that "Purpose has impact only if we sincerely care about it."

Jane Ferré defined "purpose" in a slightly different way in her blog post, "What is your lighthouse?"  She mentions the lighthouse in Albion on the western coast of the island of Mauritius (recently proclaimed as "the most beautiful lighthouse in the Southern Hemisphere") and reminds us that the word "lighthouse" is defined as "a tower or other structure containing a beacon light to war or guide ships at sea."  She then asks the question, "Have you worked out what it is that guides you when you are out at sea?"  The lighthouse is a beautiful metaphor for our purpose in life.  Even during the most difficult times, our purpose, just like a lighthouse, will serve as a beacon of hope to guide us to safer waters.  Unfortunately, not everyone can confidently say that they have a clear sense of purpose in life.

According to a study ("Well-being assessment: An Evaluation of Well-Being Scales for Public Health and Population Estimates of Well-Being among US Adults") published in the journal Applied Psychology: Health and Wellbeing, only about 1 in 4 adults living in the U.S. strongly endorse having a clear sense of purpose in their lives, and almost 40% of adults are either neutral or say that they don't have a clear sense of purpose.  Given what we know about the impact of living a purpose-filled life on health, this seems like an incredible opportunity.

Amy Morin, writing for Verywellmind.com provided seven tips for finding your purpose (note that Dr. Weiss provides a very similar list of steps in her book):

1. Donate time, money, or talent.  Spending time helping others is a great way to add meaning to your daily life.

2. Listen to feedback.  Sometimes, our friends and family can help us identify what we our passionate about doing.

3. Surround yourself with positive people.  We can draw inspiration from the positive people that we associate with in our personal and professional lives.

4. Start conversations with new people.  Establishing connections with others can help inspire us to be better as individuals.

5. Explore your interests.  Morin (and others) recommend cataloging our activities or journaling to help us identify what we are good at and what we are passionate about - hopefully those two things overlap.

6. Consider injustices that bother you.  Identifying with an important cause can help us find our purpose.

7. Discover what you love to do.  Try to identify what type of skills or special talents that you have and whether these can be aligned with your passions (see the Japanese concept of Ikigai).  Then think about how you can turn that passion into something meaningful to you. 

Dr. Dhruv Khullar, writing for The New York Times ("Finding Purpose for a Good Life.  But Also a Healthy One"), adds the important caveat that "finding purpose is rarely an epiphany, nor is it something you pick up at the mall or download from the app store.  It can be a long, arduous process that requires introspection and conversation, then a commitment to act."  At the end of the journey, you will likely find that "the key to a deeper, healthier life isn't knowing the meaning of life - it's building meaning into your life."  

How do we know when we've finally found our purpose in life?  Amy Morin writes, "Ultimately, you've likely found your purpose if you've stopped asking whether you have."  Once you find your lighthouse, you've found your way home.