One of the things that I find quite fascinating is that every one of us is readily displaying our connection to life purpose in every moment. If you pay close enough attention, you can easily gauge how awake, generous, and present a person is to their life, even if you only catch a quick glimpse of their face or hear a brief comment that they have made. As my acupuncture teacher so wisely said, 'Everyone is showing you all that they are all of the time- you just have to have your senses open to perceive it.'
My wife and I had both gone through the Starbucks drive through this past week on separate occasions. We were both somewhat shocked by the behavior of several of the drivers as they were placing their orders. It wasn't anything terribly overt, but there was a definite quality of rudeness and entitlement in the way they were placing their orders. For instance, if the Starbucks employee would ask, "How are you today?", the customer would not even answer the question, instead just kind of impatiently placing their drink order.
Generosity, which is one of the main attributes of purposeful living, always begins as a subtle kind of energy and then extends out to our actions. The premise here is that generosity is part of the purposeful person's makeup. It is not reserved for special occasions. In every moment, we choose how generous we are. If we deny generosity to the Starbucks employee, then in that moment, we are denying ourselves life purpose. We are cutting ourselves off from the infinite stream of well being.
When we are generous, we are always in touch with the interdependence of all life forms. My sense after listening to so many people order their drinks is that many of them appeared to be talking to the employee as if they were a machine. It was like that person was no different from the big order board that they talked into. I was left with the unsettling feeling that so many of us feel separate from our own humanity. If we can't recognize the humanity of the person filling our drink order, the very one who is taking their time to help us get what we want in that moment, then when can we do it?
This weekend, I watched the movie Peaceful Warrior. While I liked the book much better, I did like the theme of Socrates helping Dan to see that there are no ordinary moments. Every moment matters. In fact, most of life is comprised of seemingly mundane encounters and interactions, such as going through the Starbucks drive through. As much as anything else, how we relate to these moments will determine how capable we are of accessing and expressing our life purpose.
You can start practicing generosity right now. Like anything else, it really is a practice. Next time you interact with a customer service person, take a moment to really feel their humanity- no cynicism, impatience, or hierarchy. Indeed, every single day there are countless opportunities to practice generosity.
Kevin Doherty is a licensed acupuncturist, life and business coach, and the author of The Purpose Principle: 11 Strategies to Help You Experience Ultimate Freedom in Your Health, Wealth, and Love Life. To get a free copy of Kevin's Purpose Principle ezine and to learn more about the book, go to http://www.PurposePrinciple.com
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