Fulfilling your life’s purpose may look a little different today than it did 5 years ago. Let's be real, it probably looks different than it did 2 years ago, or even 6 months ago. What I am learning is that the key to finding purpose and living a more fulfilling life is to fall in love with the process rather than the product.

OK, who else is a huge Timehop fan? Timehop is an app that captures photographs from your phone and social media “on this day” and shares them with you every morning. My kids check it every single day on my phone and we always share moments together reminiscing about what we did on this day years ago. 

What’s so ironic is that we usually do the same things at the same time every year. But the reason I’m sharing this story is that on this day 5 years ago I sent a photo of myself to my best friend with my new hairdo before school. I wrote the caption in the text that said “wow, 5 years ago today and I was so skinny.” She responded, “and so unhappy, look at your face.”

Fulfilling your life’s purpose Can Change Everything

1. Prioritize your life.

It sounds silly and almost non-negotiable but so many people don’t do this. Not even kind of. When you don’t make a plan for your life, your life will make a plan for you. 

So – let me put the ball back in your court for just a second. What are you putting first in your life today? What have you said yes to that made you say no to something else? One of our core values as a company is family first and family always. It’s taken years to get comfortable with that, but we live and breathe it now. Don’t put work before family. 

2. Forget material possessions.

When I first began this CEO Teacher® journey (and making money online doing what I love, sharing my passion for education) my goal in life was to live on less. Hence the original Teaching on Less logo days. Have you been around since then? I wanted to travel the world in my camper and experience life. Now the day-to-day of life may look different because I have 5 kids, a job, and responsibilities, but the basis of the goal has not changed or wavered. 

Experience life! What is the actual saying? Experiences over things! That’s something that will help you not only at home but in your classroom as well. Offer rich experiences for your students to learn the material, and spark some joy back into the teaching day. 

It’s a love-hate relationship with Amazon because it gives us everything we’ve ever wanted/needed right at our fingertips. Add on to that the ever increasingly popular world of social media and influencers and we feel the need to buy a lot of things we don’t need. I once heard the saying money talks, wealth whispers and I started looking for signs of that in life and absolutely love this mindset. 

A lot of extremely wealthy people drive old vehicles, live in modest homes, and dress in a basic fashion. They are more fulfilled with richer life experiences rather than possessions. How can you stop the cycle of buying in your life so that you can lead a more fulfilling life? 

3. Find 3 things outside of the classroom that bring you joy.

Although I’m sure family does bring joy, I’m talking about things that are just for you. Call them selfish if you must, but I prefer the term “self first.” If you don’t put the oxygen mask over your own face, you won’t be around to save your family. I’ve verbally said out loud, I’d get my kids situated first, but I have 5 of them and I can literally ONLY hold my breath for 2 seconds. So if I don’t take care of my oxygen first, I won’t be able to save them. 

It’s the same situation with your life and the things that recharge your batteries. What are 3 things outside of the classroom and work that bring you joy? 

• Walking? 
• Reading? 
• Beaching? 
• Tea? 

And if you’re anything like I was in the classroom, I remember listening to a podcast and someone asking me what brought me joy and I started crying. I started crying because I honestly couldn’t name anything that made me happy when I was depressed. 

Nothing. 

So it took time to develop a love for small things again and that’s okay. Do a lot of things until you can find the things that do bring you joy. It could be blasting Taylor Swift in your car as loud as you can while dancing and singing. Going through the car wash in the quiet. Eating a cinnamon doughnut from Dulce Dough on your favorite island. Or watch the sun setting on bare pecan orchards as the sky is painted an assortment of bright cotton candy colors. Maybe it’s smelling BBQ as you ride by your favorite BBQ spot. Okay, I’ll stop sharing all the things that bring me joy. 

4. Become disciplined in your habits.

Reading books is one of my favorite ways to uplevel my mind and spirit. And the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People changed the game for me. Nobody is saying you’ve got to do all the things that you see OTHER people doing. Here’s where I want to help you finally get this one right. 

It doesn’t have to be all the habits – it’s 1% better each day. 

It’s not 50 new things tomorrow. It’s this week, let’s work on drinking more water. Next week, we will drink more water and eat one healthy snack. Next week we will drink more water, eat one healthy snack and walk 4,000 steps. It doesn’t have to be deeper than that. 

5. Fall in love with the process.

I went into detail about this in my latest podcast episode: How do I Overcome the Fear of Failure as a CEO Teacher®? But the thing I want you to remember is that the moments are fleeting. And if you can reprogram your thoughts about what failure actually is, you may just find joy in the process. Find your why, and learn to make lemonade out of any situation, with one simple mindset shift. 

6. Focus on becoming 1% better than you were yesterday.

Remove toxic relationships from your life with people, food, environments, and more. Who do you have in your life right now, in your text messages, at school, on your plate, that is toxic? Let me preface this by saying I loved the people I worked with in my cluster specifically, but I didn’t love everything about my hallway culture at times. Some people liked to walk into the room, sit down, and spread the toxicity. During my planning, I’d go for a walk, or put black paper over my classroom window when I needed to remove that vibe from my life. The black paper hack wins at life by the way. 

7. Become a lifelong learner. 

The idea of lifelong learning is to participate in the voluntary, ongoing, self-motivated pursuit of knowledge. You can do this for personal or professional reasons. I am a huge fan of Masterclass. Have you seen it? You get to choose the classes you take and uplevel your life. Whether that's in gardening, learning to travel in an RV, or becoming a home chef! 

Lifelong learning can and should be fun, especially if you want it to stick. Now, what does that mean? It means you can Google all the things, and try to make sense of them. But doesn’t it make more sense to learn from someone who has gone before you? Done the hard stuff so you can reap the reward? You can level up your lifelong learning opportunities, and listen to what these awesome ladies have to say! 

8. Challenge yourself

I don’t mean jumping out of airplanes, traveling to see the world, or doing big scary life-changing things (unless of course, that is what YOU want). This is about finally realizing your potential. I don’t want you to dream of a life that could be, I want you to live in the life that you have now. Because if you don’t begin to enjoy the here and the now you won’t be happy when you get to the new life you are going to build to realize all of your goals and dreams. 

I’ve been where you are. Stressed out and overworked. Giving everything I had to my students and school. Spending my evenings' grading papers, and my mornings planning classes. Wishing I had more time for my babies and husband. All while living off of our credit cards and wondering where my next student loan payments were coming from. 

When I discovered the secrets to making more money as a teacher, and finally earning my worth, I had to step out of the classroom and do everything I could to help you do the same. My mission is NOT to pull you from the classroom, but to empower you to step into your truth – whatever that might be. But Kayse, how do I even get started? I’m overwhelmed with all the to-do’s, burnt out from the constant changes, and cannot imagine ONE MORE THING on my plate. 

Friend, I’ve got you. 

I am going to help reignite your passion for teaching, and support you while you share your gifts with the world. How are we going to do that? First, we need to find your unique CEO Teacher® type (basically your teacher personality type) and unlock your limitless potential. Are you ready to join me on the teacher path to limitless success?

And because you know I want to offer even more viewpoints, as you are wondering how fulfilling your life’s purpose will ultimately impact your decisions…

11 Rewards of Being a Teacher

5 Steps to Fulfill your Life's Purpose

Tips For Finding Your Purpose In Life