3 Misunderstandings About Our Life Purpose That Can Lead to Burnout

In recent years, I’ve seen numerous instances where my clients and myself have felt burnout even though we were pursuing our purpose. Shouldn’t listening to your higher calling bring joy?! Instead, we may have felt frustrated, unfulfilled, unnoticed or wanting to throw in the towel altogether because it isn’t anywhere close to where we thought we’d be in our lives (or careers).

Have you experienced this too? If yes, this article is for you! I mesh together some practical experiences paired with the spiritual topics of karma, destiny and free will – all in hopes of helping you feel more empowered and with a deeper sense of alignment towards your life’s purpose.

Excited? Me too! Let’s unpack the 3 misunderstandings.

#1 – Our purpose is NOT time-bound.

Let’s say, you get a natal reading from your astral chart, or someone pulls a tarot card for you. The message revolves around your career – you are guided to work on things that create a bigger impact on the world.

You may see this as a confirmation to “quit your 9-5 desk job”. And then you take a leap of faith… but then months go by and start to feel enormous financial pressure to make money from your passion.

Or “you need to start that podcast you were thinking about”. And then you give it your all and hit launch, only to hear a lukewarm reaction from your listeners. This then leads to frustration and you begin to spend all your free time, working away to the point of exhaustion because the podcast isn’t reaching more people.

This is where we can internalize pressure and experience burnout from trying to fulfill our purpose. How?

Yes, actualizing our potential is important. But it isn’t an “urgent” task that puts our nervous systems into fight or flight mode!

What that means is, yes, you may eventually quit your job anyway, it doesn’t have to be now. You’re allowed to build your life purpose in parallel to your day job. (black and white thinking is an example of the ego-mind at play)

And yes, your podcast may not be a huge hit off the bat. But maybe it’s a simple strategy shift of collaborating with other podcast guests and hosts versus the old pattern of putting in more labour and working with intensity to bring results to your passion. (our fixation on healing our flaws is another example of the ego-mind at play)

Letting go of the false sense of urgency that our purpose is meant to happen on a certain timeline can both be liberating and ironically propel us forward, faster. After all, even this false sense of urgency is another fine example of the ego-mind demonstrating out its survival tendencies. And a true life of purpose isn’t survival-driven 😉

#2 – Our purpose is NOT a life sentence.

Here’s a client story, shared with permission, that I trust you’ll find just as fascinating to read about, as I did witnessing and writing about.

So, my client always seemed to put a lot of pressure on herself whenever she talked about scaling her business. While she felt passionate about having a large impact on the world through her work, very quickly, her dreams and ideas about her purpose in the world started turning into burnout.

She’d work hard and be motivated for a while, and then she’d resent the universe for not meeting her efforts. She was sure that this was it, but then why wasn’t it translating into something more meaningful?

After diving deeper, we discovered that there was a childhood wound waiting for her to heal, here.

When my client was a child, her mom became physically unwell and bed-ridden. Her mental health also declined as long periods of being bed-ridden brought up feelings of being a burden to the family, unworthy of so much care or for her husband to be spending all that money on medical bills, etc.

As a child, it had seemed that the client had no choice. She would help her father run errands, go to school, come back home to her mother crying in pain and frustration – the cycle would repeat itself.

She didn’t know it then, but that’s when the burnout and resentment began for the universe not meeting her halfway: with a parent that wasn’t healing fast enough and a home that wasn’t getting any more pleasant to live in.

As my client remembered this period in her life, she realized that there actually were more choices: she could have chosen to NOT take up that responsibility and allowed her father to be more resourceful in helping them overcome the daily challenges. 

Alternatively, she could have stepped away from her mom’s mental spiral by going outside to play, or being in her room with her toys instead.

Bottom line was that she didn’t have to be involved to the degree that she had been. Yes, it was the family’s karma to go through the mother’s illness and for the child to experience the lack of a mother’s emotional or physical support, but it could have been dealt with in a myriad of ways. 

She was NOT doomed, destined or “deserving” to suffer the way she had internalized this period to be. There was always free will.

Of course, as children, we may not have the nuance to know our choices. But as adults, it becomes pivotal for our growth (and sanity) to heal those younger parts that may misunderstand a challenge as destiny or “karma” and feel like we have to succumb to our destiny.

I have discovered time and time again, this path doesn’t require the degree of sacrifice we may assume we’ll need to make. So if you’re stuck trying to make something work and are getting frustrated with yourself or the Universe for not getting more results, this may be an integral part of your next steps: it’s okay to consider letting it go. There’s more than one way to live a purposeful life, it’s not a cookie-cutter approach. And you are definitely not required to slave through or martyr through this – you can create a reality where you can live and enjoy a life of purpose, not of life sentence. 😉

#3 – Our purpose is NOT set in stone.

This story takes me back to the very first year I was finding ways to do something with my spiritual inclination. I had developed an interest in the Chakra System, and had delivered many powerful workshops on the subject with pleasant feedback. So, the idea of writing a book about it felt exciting.

At the same time, I couldn’t understand why I wasn’t able to actually bring the project to completion. I began having a lot of anxiety that I am disappointing the Universe by not writing this book. Piggybacking off of the previous idea as well, the anxiety worsened because I also believed that by disappointing the Universe, I was bringing misery and suffering upon myself.

Then, as if by the Universe’s grace, one of my spiritual teachers shared this insight with me: she too had desired writing a book about Reiki at the peak of her youth. However, years passed and that desire never translated. She later discovered that one of her students had taken the initiative to write a similar book and it had become a best-seller! While this was a personal disappointment, it freed her up from the guilt that writing this book was her sole responsibility.

After this story, I’ve had a chance to witness many such projects come into existence by other great writers and teachers, that were once thought-seeds in my mind. And I want to deepen this understanding for you too.

If you feel passionate about working on something because it feels like your purpose, go ahead and do it. But please don’t let it turn into guilt that you’re wasting time, or you’re disappointing the Universe, or that you’ll be doomed if you don’t see this through.

Because the truth is, the Universe is abundant in ideas, and even more abundant in giving them to many people like us.

There will always be someone (most likely, many people) who feel attracted to working on the idea. The world will ultimately get what it needs. And you can always cheerlead those that made it happen, knowing that when the time comes, you’ll find an idea worth pursuing.

And incase you have found something worth pursuing but keep getting stuck when you try working on it, you can definitely work through your inner fears or blocks, in service to you and to the idea. Not out of the fear of missing out.

Concluding Thoughts

You’re allowed to create a cushion for yourself and take gentle, intentional steps that don’t have to mimic the childhood chaos and so-forth. We don’t have to perpetuate the “struggling artist” dynamic – you can experience joy on the way to fulfilling your life purpose. And it’s okay to change your mind over and over again about what feels purposeful to you.

In fact, I will be bold and even go so far as saying: If it’s burning you out, it’s not your true life purpose. Why?

Because joy isn’t something you get as a reward after living your purpose. The reason we feel pulled to live a purposeful life in the first place is that the journey is the reward!

So slow down and ask yourself this: what choices lead to a more joyful experience of your destiny and purpose? 

And if you wish to receive personal support in discovering those choices, I’d love to work with you. Let’s chat and see if this is a good fit.

Vasundhra is the Founder & Writer of My Spiritual Shenanigans. After seeing 11:11 on the clock one fateful night, her life turned around. Ever since, she has been blending modern psychology and ancient spirituality, to help herself and people around the world elevate the quality of their lives.

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