Struggling to Answer the Question “What Can I Do with My Life?”—We Got You

At some point or another, we’ve all asked ourselves, “What can I do with my life?” And if we’re being perfectly honest, few of us—if any—have come up with a definitive answer. 

The truth is, there may not be one. Life is full of changes and surprises, and we are constant works-in-progress. What fits who you are today might not be in alignment with the person you become a few years from now. 

Instead of trying to find your one and only life’s calling, a better approach is to arm yourself with the tools that can help you take the next best step. See where that takes you, recalculate your course if necessary, and then take another step forward.

 

3 tips to help you answer the question “What can I do with my life?”

Here are three timeless and research-backed pieces of advice to help you decide what to do with your life:

 

1. Follow your passion—but keep in mind it may not be what you think

Passion is not the same as obsession

A now-classic 2003 paper by Canadian psychologist Robert Vallerand and his team showed that there was a big difference between harmonious and obsessive passions. 

While energizing, an obsessive passion can get out of hand. It can make you feel as if your mood, self-esteem, and even your worth as a person depend on it. This can easily lead to anxiety and burnout. In contrast, a harmonious passion feels more controlled. It may not even feel like passion at all—it’s more like a sense of quiet contentment, so it can be easy to miss. 

A telltale sign of a harmonious passion is that it nourishes and revitalizes you. It makes you feel stronger, healthier, more productive, and like a better version of yourself. It also complements other activities in your life instead of replacing them, like obsessive passions often do.

Meaning trumps pleasure 

More recent psychological research suggests that you may be more likely to find your passion by working toward something you care about, as opposed to simply engaging in activities you enjoy doing.

Surprisingly, people who did pleasurable work were less likely to report they had found their passion and were more likely to want to quit their jobs than those who thought passion comes from doing something that matters and aligns with their values. 

Hard work inspires passion—not the other way around

This eight-week survey of 54 German entrepreneurs found that the more effort they put into their businesses, the more their passion increased. Follow-up research confirmed these findings, suggesting that all this time, we’ve been wrong in thinking that passion is what leads to working harder. As it turns out, passion may be what comes after you put in your best effort.

 

2. Financial security is important, but wealth may be overrated  

Can you put a price on happiness? These researchers did just that. 

After analyzing a survey of more than 1.7 million people from all over the world, they found that once an individual’s annual income reached $60,000 to $75,000 on average, their emotional wellbeing stopped increasing. At $95,000, their life evaluation also plateaued. 

The researchers called this phenomenon “income satiation.” What it indicates is that money does make you happy—but only to a certain point. Once you start living comfortably, you may want to look for other sources of meaning and purpose. 

This viral blog post by Bronnie Ware, a best-selling Australian author and former palliative carer, confirms that. In it, she argues that her years caring for the dying taught her that their top five regrets in life have nothing to do with money or career success. 

In fact, most people wished they hadn’t worked so hard and regretted that they didn’t:

• Have the courage to live a life that was true to themselves
• Express their feelings more
• Stay in touch with friends
• Let themselves be happier

 

3. Don’t worry about finding answers

Learn to live the questions 

Life is one big uncertainty, and that can be overwhelming. However, instead of groping for answers in the dark, we may be better off learning to enjoy asking questions. 

The timeless classic Letters to a Young Poet is a collection of letters the Austrian-German poet Rainer Maria Rilke sent to his 19-year-old protégé, Franz Xaver Kappus. In a letter from 1903, Rilke wrote:

I want to beg you, as much as I can, dear sir, to be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer. (source)

Perhaps we could all take a page from the poet’s book.

Follow your curiosity 

Elizabeth Gilbert, author of the best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love, says she has always had a burning passion for writing. One day, however, she realized that not everyone was cut from the same cloth. Not everyone has a passion like that. 

So, she stopped telling people to follow their passion and urged them to explore their curiosity instead:

 

Need more advice on what to do with your life? 

Feel free to check out our related post, What Should I Do with My Life? These 8 Questions Will Tell You. 

And if you’re more of a visual learner or need something more bite-sized, take a look at this Instagram post.

 

We can’t tell you what to do with the rest of your life, but we can help you with the next step 

Working with Vector Marketing is a great way to work from home, meet amazing new people, and find a healthy work-life balance. 

Join our team—previous sales experience is not required. Best of all, you can start work within the week. 

Take the first step toward a more fulfilling life.