Uncovering The Simple Meaning Of Purpose With Nick McGowan

Nick McGowan (00:58.13)
Hello and welcome to the Mindset and Self Mastery Show. I’m your host, Nick McGowan. And today on the show, I want to talk about something that has basically been talked about on most all of the episodes in some way, some sort of variation to it, but it’s purpose. I want to talk about purpose today. And I want to talk about what our purpose is, what.

people think purpose can be, what is actually the purpose of our life, what does purpose mean, all of that. So this is going to be all things about purpose. Now again, we’ve talked about this on the episodes with guests and even some of my solo episodes about purpose, but haven’t actually directly talked about purpose. And this is incredibly near and dear to my heart because this is something I’ve been searching for for my entire life, something I’ve been looking for. What the fuck am I doing here?

What am I supposed to be doing here? Is there a supposed to be? Is there something that I should be doing? Is there something I should not be doing? Is there a way I should be living my life that would actually help me feel fulfilled and accomplished and like I’m doing something instead of just fucking meandering and wandering through life? And in a sense, a lot of that needs to happen. But let’s start with what is.

purpose. And what is the purpose of life? So the dictionary definition of purpose is the reason for which something is done or created, or the reason for which something exists. So when you think about the purpose of your toaster, I’m just going to use that as a dumb example, the only purpose for that thing to exist is to toast things.

Now don’t fall for that old joke of what do you put in the toaster? Because we automatically want to say toast. It’s always bread. The answer is always bread. The reason why I bring that up is because we can often think that something has a different purpose for what it is. And we can just get used to the thing that we call its purpose. Now with a toaster, its job is to toast things, but you don’t just toast bread. You can toast whatever you want in there. Really, I guess.

Nick McGowan (03:23.506)
whatever would fit in there that’s not metallic. So kids and adults who are listening to this, don’t stick knives or forks in your toaster. Just never a good time. Your toaster’s purpose is to toast things. We as humans don’t think as black and white in that sense very often. We can at times, and yes, there are different people that can look at things more black and white and other people that look at things as more colorful or gray or whatever.

And there are variations to all of that and we all bring our own stories and our own burdens to the concept of purpose and what my purpose in life is. So when you think about that dictionary definition, what are you created for? What are you here to do? If you were a toaster, your job would be to toast things. Pretty easy, but you’re not a toaster and you’re not here to just do the thing that you’ve been told to do by other people.

Now, some of that may actually be of a benefit to you, where some people may have been a guide in certain ways to be able to help you with your purpose. And of course, there are certain times and certain people and situations that will kind of move you away from your purpose. But purpose is really about the reason that you exist. And it’s very simple, very, very simple. It can be hard to grasp and hard to really dig into, but it…

is very, very simple at the core of it. It’s for you to show up, be you, be authentically you, and do what you feel called to do every moment of every day. And being in that space of just doing what feels right for you to do. And it’s about contributing. It’s not just a selfish mission. There are times where I’ve thought, well, if I do something that’s about

my purpose and that feels like it’s something that I want to just go do on my own. Is that not my purpose? Is that a selfish mission? Or is that something I need to do? Is that how purpose works? It’s all just selfish based. This is my purpose, mine. That’s not really the case because purpose has contribution built into it and being able to contribute to your community, the sphere around you, the people that you’re with.

Nick McGowan (05:49.106)
the environment, the world as a whole, and being able to contribute is a major portion of everybody’s purpose. There’s no other way around that. But it doesn’t have to be at a scale that you think or that you feel like you’ve been told by social media that things need to be at. I’ve talked with tons of people about purpose. Some of it just BS conversations, you know, just shooting the breeze, talking about things, some real in -depth.

Some here on the show and throughout every single one of those conversations, there’s been this sort of fight within the person or struggle, I guess, of how big is this purpose supposed to be? Like I know for myself that I feel like I’m here to do incredible things. Those might look incredible in my lifetime. They might look incredible 200 and 300 years down the road.

They may not look incredible at all to anybody else. And that doesn’t really matter. It’s not about the scale to it. So people have brought up to me, like, I feel like I’m supposed to do something. I’m here. There’s a purpose for me to do something incredible in this world. And they speak of it from a level of, if I’m not going to be Steve Jobs or someone of that stature, then it’s just worthless. And that’s really not the case at all.

If we step back to contribution and think about contributing, Steve Jobs, as the example here, really contributed. He contributed to a lot of things. I mean, I’ve been using one of these since the first one came out. And right now I’m recording this on a Mac. So thank you, Steve. Um, well, thank you, Steve or wherever, but realistically Steve’s purpose was a big, big, big purpose to some.

to others, somebody else’s purpose, like maybe his mother’s purpose. Maybe her purpose was to have kids and help those kids be able to learn and grow. And look what happened with Steve.

Nick McGowan (08:01.362)
That may just not be what it looks like for you. Your contribution may be different. And your way of contributing and your way of living your purpose may look different. So right up front, the beginning of this, just a handful of minutes into this episode, I want you to think about whatever purpose or idea of your purpose that you have or that you’ve tried to act upon, I want you to remove scale from it. Just like,

removing the result from it Sit in that feeling of what it is and if you’re not sure what your purpose is, that’s fine think about and feel into what feels really great for you to do or even just that feeling of being Accomplished and being able to serve and love and do what feels right for you to do and in the way of contributing with that That’ll show up the way that it needs to so when we think about

What can we do in our lives and throughout our lives that’s important and purposeful as humans, we need to have purpose. We need to have a direction. We need to know that we’re heading somewhere. We’re doing something that we’re really making some sort of headway or at least being vulnerable or not vulnerable, valuable, being useful. And I guess vulnerability does work into that because.

being vulnerable with yourself to be able to step outside of the systems and to be you. If we removed all the systems, all the social media, all the norms, all the things that we’re used to and feel like we should be doing throughout life, we would probably have a little bit more of a clearer time to be able to think about and feel into what our purpose is.

But we may not have the intake that we need to be able to think and feel about different situations or scenarios or ways of living out that purpose. And so there’s kind of a double -edged sword in the sense with all the intake that we have that can kind of muddy us up, but it can also help us to be able to figure out what is it? What am I supposed to do here? What’s important and purposeful for me to do? And we’re wired.

Nick McGowan (10:22.642)
for evolution and contribution. That’s just how we are at our core. That’s, that’s what this is all about. And when we don’t feel like we’re having an impact and we’re not doing something that makes us feel useful or valuable, then it feels like we’re dying or we’re not living up to what we should be doing. And really at the base of that, it’s, it’s meaningless. We feel like we’re meaningless and that word meaningless.

makes me think of the Bible verses. I think it was David who wrote, everything’s meaningless. And I remember reading that years and years ago, and not to bring just religion or Christianity specifically into this, but thinking about how things are meaningless. They are, and they’re also not. And if life is meaningless, we get to give life meaning that means something to us.

instead of just taking the meaning from somebody else or accepting it from somebody else. And I want you to think about the contribution and meaningless and the meaning that has to do with your day to day. If you have thought in the past, anything that I do that’s of purpose, that has to do with my reason for being alive and for being here,

And it must be at this certain level, like the Steve Jobs level or something like that. If we remove that and make it so that you don’t have that feeling or that thought, you’re then left with what feels right for you to do. What are you called to do inside? And again, that might be a situation like, um, technology wise, you might figure out some new way to do some new thing.

or a new spin on something we’ve done for years and years and you might change industries for generations to come. That may also not be your purpose. Your purpose may be to be the best mom or dad that you can be. And it’s not for us or anybody else to tell you otherwise. I had a conversation with somebody years and years ago that I was in a relationship with and they told me that for them, what

Nick McGowan (12:44.658)
life looked like now that they had a child. It was specifically for them to live for that child. And I remember thinking and had a little bit of conversation with them about this, that it’s not just about the child. The child needs to see that you’re doing incredible things that feel right for you to do. That person, from my perspective then, seemed to just push that to the side. I’m not sure if that has changed or not, but I believe both of us were kind of close in what we were talking about. It is.

for that parent to be able to take care of their children. It’s part of their purpose to be able to do that. It’s probably not their entire purpose, but it could be. And some people are like that. That person I was with, that may be how life looks for her. That that’s her purpose to be able to really feed her kids wisdom and knowledge and understanding and helping them have an incredible life and do some incredible things. For others, it may be having

those kids and being able to then show them this is how you can do things by doing their purpose work and their meaningful work throughout life. To others, it may look like not having children and being able to help kids in certain ways, but be able to help people in different ways. And that might look different throughout the course of time. So similar to Dharma, how your Dharma changes and the way that you can look at things and

Operate within the different situations you have and what your purpose is in those times your overall core purpose I believe is actually there it comes into this world with us. So it’s about being able to understand that there’s no scalability to it. There’s no Competition or race even or anything like that where you’re trying to be able to build the biggest purpose that you can And it’s just not how this works and there’s no contribution. That’s too big or too small

So if you think about that scale, doing something at such a giant level, that obviously is a big ordeal. If you look at something like your purpose is to stay within four walls within a lab and try to figure out how certain plants operate within a certain type of environment. Though you may be in those four walls and though it may feel small just because of the location you’re in,

Nick McGowan (15:10.866)
That is potentially big work. And there’s a lot of life -changing events that can happen from either of those types of work, something that’s large, something that’s small, but there’s really no size comparison for contribution and for your purpose. So when you think about the size of what you want to do,

that can potentially muddy up or at least cloud your vision of what it looks like to be able to do the thing you are here to do. So what you feel called to do actually matters. The size of it doesn’t really matter. It’s what you’re here to do that matters the most out of that. And we must take the time to really lean into what feels right for us and what tugs on us.

because you may have a thought right now where I could do this thing and it could be X amount large. And that could happen. You could also have the thought of I’m going to do this thing and it could be X, X, X, X amount large. And that may happen. But none of those may also happen at all. You may just have this idea and this thing that feels right and tugs on you.

And you might start to push that ball right now. And then a few hundred years down the road, somebody else picks it up, moves along or somebody else may not, but it doesn’t matter the scalability or the size. Again, there’s no size of purpose or contribution that is too big or too small. It’s really for you to lean in with everything you have to what feels right for you to do and what tugs on your heart. Now, along those lines, I want to talk about.

the difference between purpose and your expression. Your purpose is something that’s hard -coded into us. Again, I believe it comes into this world with us. In some ways, it’s kind of like we bring baggage, but this is good baggage in a sense where your purpose is already hard -coded. It’s deep inside of you. It’s part of who you are as soon as you’re born. And we’re here to be our unique selves.

Nick McGowan (17:26.45)
because that purpose is part of us and again, hard coded into us. But we can’t change what that purpose is supposed to be, even if we really wanted to, because it’s our unique version of it. And I think as a little bit of a side note, if you really wanted to change that thing as uniquely and so intimately you, there’s some deeper things to be able to do.

Work -wise subconscious work some trauma work that has happened to be able to go through and figure out why that is and I bring that up because I’ve experienced some of that where I thought well I feel led to do these things but the world is telling me to do this just like how some people will say Well, the market told me to change or this told me to change. So I just jumped and I did There’s a difference I think between being real with yourself and seeing what is coming in and

being able to do something with that and then making just abrupt changes because you’re looking at kind of the tree instead of the forest per se. And if we really think about the uniqueness that we bring to this world and what we’re here to contribute in that unique way, it’s up to us to just be able to be us as uniquely us as possible and expect that we’re able to do incredible things.

with what we already have inside of us, but not expecting some crazy different result of something that shouldn’t really come out of it. Now that might sound a little strange or might be a little convoluted, but I’m going to think about if you were to plant seeds for corn.

those seeds aren’t going to grow into anything else other than corn. There’s just no way. It’s not like you’re going to plant the corn and go, you know what? I really hope that this corn becomes tomatoes.

Nick McGowan (19:22.898)
That just doesn’t make any sense. And you may be listening to this right now going, yeah, of course that doesn’t make any sense. Why the fuck would anybody plant corn and expect it to be tomatoes? Just no matter what, it’s just not going to happen. So good. We’re both on the same page with that. Even if you change conditions, you change conditions of the soil or where it’s grown or how it’s treated, the corn is still not going to become tomatoes. It’s just going to become corn.

And you’re here, you are here just like the corn to become you, nothing else and nothing outside of that. But take, take a, take a bit of a relaxation moment in that space of knowing that you’re here just to be you. And that’s it. And it’s up to you to be able to help that come out at its fullest expression. So our purpose expresses itself based on really just two things.

It’s the times we live in and how life shapes us. So when we think about the times that we live in, here we are, it’s 2024. There’s a lot going on politically, economically, environmentally. There’s a lot of technological changes and things that are happening. And all of this is for the most part, vastly different than it was 50 years ago, 100 years ago, 300 years ago.

So when we think about the times that we live in, think about COVID and how that drastically changed the way that we interact with people and how we interact with ourselves and the environment and pivotal social justice movements and things that are just changing how we as people view things and how we treat other people. Again, this is different in different times. So with the times and overall,

having the space that we’re in, we’re here right now, we’re alive right now, you’re listening to this, maybe somebody in 200 years from now will listen to this and go, wow, the times are vastly different than they are now. Or it might be times are basically about the same. Either way, it’s the time that we have that we’re living in. It’s like the confines that we get to be able to operate within. And then how life shapes us is really the things that have happened to us. I often think about how

Nick McGowan (21:46.642)
siblings can grow up in the same house with the same family going through the same situations in a sense and become totally different people. I’ve had that experience with my siblings. We’ve had different times where we’ve lived together because my siblings are actually half sibling. And there have been times where I’ve been at my mom’s or with them at our dad’s and just growing up and experiencing things. And even my siblings that have been

really with each other for their entire lives, they look at things differently because it’s how we relate to the situations of life. Like grief, loss, trauma, marriage, divorce, relationships as a whole, business, illness, jobs, hobbies.

different situations that just happen that we look at and interpret and process Vastly different than somebody else does or even if it’s slightly different. It’s still going to affect us differently and therefore we express ourselves differently because of that so if we take a little bit of a step back the expression that we have in life and how we express our purpose is shaped by

by the times that we live in, where we’re at right now, and the situations that have happened to us, and the overall life analysis, let’s say, where we can think about the times that we’re in, and we can think about everything that we’ve gone through, and then we get to be able to express how we want with.

those situations that have happened to us. It could be difficult and probably not a normal thing, let’s say, for us to really compute all that all at one time, verbally especially. That’s why, like, even now I’m kind of chunking it out because we’re getting macro with it. Because these are things that are typically just part of our subconscious. Like, we’re here in this life, these are the things that we work with. Like, we’re all used to technology at this point.

Nick McGowan (24:08.562)
Some people that are right now in their 80s, 90s, whatever, they may still not be used to technology, even though it’s been around for a long time. But it’s not been around their entire lives. There’s more time they’ve spent on this planet without the types of technology that we have. So that’s just an example. That five or seven or 10 -year -old that can code something real quick or fix all the devices in the house that…

They can do that because this is just part of the times that they live in. What happens in those situations when they go through and do those things, be it a five or 10 year old or an 85 year old or somebody who’s 40 years old. It’s what we do when, when it comes to getting that information in, and then back out to the world in a meaningful way that looks appropriate for us. Here’s an example.

part of choose your calling is a digital marketing agency. There are pieces of it that we do, uh, paper products, uh, business cards, postcards, brochures, things of that sort. But for the most part, we’re digital marketing agency. If the internet wasn’t around, this podcast wouldn’t be around. My business wouldn’t be around, or at least that section or that piece of the business wouldn’t be around. But the purpose work of what we do within choose your calling would absolutely be around.

it would just express itself differently. Does that make sense? So the things that we’ve done and what we have in front of us, the tools that we have and all the situations we’ve been through as people that are part of the company and people that are just purpose driven people, we then get to express ourselves through the lens of all of that. I hope that’s making sense. I hope that this is also landing and helping you think a bit more about what you are here to do.

I also hope that some of this has given you some solace in a sense to be able to understand like, I don’t have to do this crazy big thing. And especially because some parent or some family member or some teacher told you that you need to, or God, even some psychic told you you’re here to do incredible, massive things. Great. You just need to do you. So being able to do you in the way that is most uniquely you is what your purpose is.

Nick McGowan (26:32.548)
at the core of your purpose. So I want you to be able to take all of that, understand that your steps in life are gonna look however they’re gonna look. The way that you express yourself, it’s gonna look however it’s gonna look. You can start to comprehend how things are coming out of you by understanding what really drives you and what is tugging on your heart.

I often think of the thing that really just pulls you ahead. It’s like grabbing your rib cage or grabbing your heart and just pulling you along. Um, and there are different symptoms that come along with that. Like if you can get into a flow state with different things, if you get really excited about something and you dive deeper into it, then you typically do other things there. There are ways to be able to look for that, but ultimately being able to live at the core of who you are and the purpose that you have is just being all of who you are and uniquely you.

and not putting constraints to that, either time constraints or size constraints or anything of the sort. So really, follow what lights you up, no matter how crazy, how wild haired, any of it may seem.

Nick McGowan (28:21.49)
All right. Three, two, one. So how can you know who you really are? I want you to follow what lights you up. That’s what this is all about. Really following the thing that feels right for you to do and that pulls you ahead. No matter how crazy or wild hair it seems, you want to quit your job and go start a band somewhere and move cross country, your friends, family.

your coworkers, your partner may think you’re crazy. That’s fine. They’re going to think whatever they’re going to think. And I’m not telling you to just go out and make some impulsive decision, but I want you to follow what you feel lights you up, no matter what age you are. And being able to unlearn everything that you’ve been taught from the world that tells you you should be a certain way.

is going to be a major step in that. Maybe you don’t just listen to this and go, cool, I’m going to move to New York. I’m going to start playing music and do all these incredible things. And God only knows how long we make money or survive or do anything. It doesn’t matter. That may not be the best step, but it may be a step in the right direction and being able to unlearn from the things that you’ve been taught over the course of time. And

how the systems have really trained you to live a certain life and be able to feel into what feels right for you to do. In that case, if it’s music that you’re really aiming for, then what feels right for you to do with music? Do you need to just play guitar or piano at home and start to kind of figure out what is it that’s making you feel a certain way and be able to dive deeper into that? And understand that…

With all the systems and all the things that we’ve been taught throughout the course of our life, it can help us shape our expression of our purpose, but it can also hold us back from being able to look at what the purpose should look like from our perspective. Now I use that word should loosely because again, this is a unique thing to each of us, but for each of us to be able to figure out how do I just show up being me?

Nick McGowan (30:42.771)
is something that each of us can only figure out on our own. I can talk to you about these things. We as a company could coach you on these things. We could give you different worksheets and processes and programs to be able to go through and all of that could be helpful.

It may also just be a piece of it. Because really, it’s up to you to know and feel and be honest with yourself, what’s moving me? What actually makes me fired up? What lights me up in life? And what do I do from here? So two last things I want to talk about before we wrap this episode up, because I know we’ve covered a lot. There’s a whole lot that’s been covered in on this. And we’re going to spend more time over the course of a handful of solo episodes. And of course,

guest episodes, unpacking more of this and getting into deeper pieces of purpose. But if you have specific questions about purpose, or how do you find your purpose? Or how do you get through the things that have led you to where you’re at today to be able to get back to your purpose? Shoot me a message. I’d love to be able to hear from you and help in any way that I can. And maybe there’s resources that we can pass your way that can be really helpful in the moment. Maybe there’s just also kind of listening and understanding where you’re coming from and

and shining light on something. But if you’re in the spot where you’re trying to figure out what do I do with my purpose, we have resources and ways that we can help. Please don’t hesitate to reach out. So I want to get into what the difference between a calling and a whim is as we start to wrap this up, tying back into the New York move and leaving your job and getting into a band and all these things. Doing that right this second is more, more or less.

All right, three, two, one. Doing that right this second is more or less a whim. It may be something you’ve been thinking about and working on for a while and now’s the time to be able to do it. But there’s a difference between a calling and a whim. If your calling is here that is ingrained in you and something that is actually calling you to do something that’s got contribution tied to it.

Nick McGowan (32:59.378)
that’s different than just being like, Oh, I want to go do this thing right now. Totally different. Sometimes it can be easily construed that they’re part of each other because there are times where you go, Oh, I don’t want to do this thing. I really want to do this because it’s part of your purpose. So understanding that callings are about contribution that can help you understand if you want to go do this thing and you’re like, Oh, I really want this right now or I want to go do this thing right now. Think about is that

Does that have contribution in it? Is it something that is just a part of what you like to do, but isn’t actually a part of your purpose, not a part of your actual calling in life? And callings are clear. They’re deeply rooted. They may not be 100 % clear all the time, but they’re there. And the reason why they’re not 100 % clear all the time, a big categorical reason why is because of the systems and the way that we’ve been taught to live throughout the course of our lives.

And breaking out of that, breaking out of that matrix in a sense, to then look at what am I here to do? What feels right inside of me to do? And that may look and kind of change over the course of time, but the core of it is still there no matter what. And lastly, what you’re good at isn’t necessarily your purpose. It’s just not. Some people think,

I got into this role and this sort of company and doing these things in this industry, that must be my purpose. Steve Jobs may have thought his purpose was to bring technology into the world. He may have thought his purpose was to be able to help the world communicate. He may have thought different things. And for those of you that maybe have read his biography and maybe he said it in there, I haven’t. So I don’t know exactly what that purpose was, or if he’s even really even talked about that. But understanding that.

What you’re good at isn’t your purpose will help you navigate life a little bit more easily because then you can remove like, I’m just good at these things. That’s fine. But what actually makes me feel like I’m being lit up? And then you can look back at those things. Quick example of myself. I thought my purpose for a long time was to just be in sales. That wasn’t the case. Mitch is not the case at all.

Nick McGowan (35:22.642)
I’m really good at being able to talk to people. I’m good at being able to communicate. That’s why I think this podcast has become a success. We’re also real with what we talk about. And I’ve used all those things within sales, but I understand that sales isn’t the end goal. It’s not what my purpose is. My purpose is to live a mission filled life that helps others live rich, incredible lives, living their purpose and being able to do that.

at times looks like communicating and speaking in different ways, selling ideas or with what we have on the agency side of our, our, uh, our company, it’s actually selling projects or they’re pieces of things, but I don’t, I don’t want to get lost in the minutia of it. Just keep in mind that your thing that you do really well may not be your purpose, but it may be closer to your purpose than you think. So again,

There’s been a lot that’s been covered on this episode. I really appreciate you being with us today. I really, really hope that you keep keeping on with figuring out what your purpose is and diving deeper into your purpose work. If there’s any way that we can help, please feel free to reach out. We have resources, we have programs, we have worksheets, we have coaches, we have experience, and we are not afraid to be able to help however we can because that is our purpose here at Choose Your Calling.

Thank you so much for being with me today.