Our inward journey

I have written some blogs about my travels recently, and more have yet to be written about Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Karachi, etc.  But as I near an important milestone in aging, I am reflecting more and more on my inner journey.  Recently, I got to attend the Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association’s luncheon in New York City, and one of the speakers – a partner from Ernst and Young, who also teaches at Columbia – spoke about the assignment she gives her young students at Columbia: think about your purpose, and why you were put on this planet, and then design a 2 year plan to move forward towards that purpose.  Like her, I also led a fantastic life full of variety and challenges, from career switches, to working mother, to community leader and globe-trotter at times.  I do not recall ever thinking about my purpose in life as a twenty something or even later.  We were juggling roles and responsibilities, and just juggling seemed to be a big enough purpose for me!  Now however, that question makes a lot of sense.  It causes me to sit back and think very hard: what gifts do I have that the Creator endowed me with, and how am I honoring that trust? Am I wasting that talent or using it? And to what end? Where is my focus – on me and mine or the big picture?  Really powerful questions that confront and shatter our neatly packaged self-image, and have us step out of our comfort zone.  What is most exciting about our inward journey is the discovery process.  As we peel away the layers of self-deception and self-elevation, more unknowns surface and demand to be inquired upon.  We begin to see when we took the easy way out, and it is never too late in my view, and when we worried about others and not the inner compass.  That is what I am looking forward to – at least this whole year- to discover the universe within me.  And I am profoundly grateful that I even get to have the luxury to do that.  I pray and wish more for all of us on this planet, not more in terms of material things, although each of us only wants a small piece of land to leave in peace with their family – is that not doable? is that not desirable? But more in terms of discovering and unleashing their own potential for their own good and others.  I want to modify what Ervin Laszlo wrote in “Macroshift”: “Live so that others live” (instead of the traditional live and let others live) to “Live so that others live and thrive to their fullest and noblest potential. Ameen.