What Is YOUR Driving Force In Life?

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“You were put on this earth to achieve your greatest self, to live out your purpose, and to do it fearlessly.” 

~ Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth and Being Free 

My cousin just asked me; "It seems you deeply feel what you write or support, what do you think motivates you or triggers you? Is it an experience you had? Or an ideal you dream of? Or to make sense of life and find purpose. I don't know what I'm asking, perhaps I'm asking you what makes some people active and others passive... Why are some leaders, others followers and yet others neither. I guess, all one can do is theorize... But it all boils down to me again asking, what is your particular driving force?"

I ended up writing her an essay. At first I didn't know what to say, but I think it's a question I needed to answer for myself too. So thank you for asking Achai. I thought it was worth sharing (or maybe not. but either way, it might help one person out there so here goes it)

"Is it an experience you had? Or an ideal you dream of? Or to make sense of life and find purpose."

^^^ All the above. I think we are all born leaders. Some embrace it, others don't. Leadership I think, takes courage, it takes eliminating fear and having a cause. As my friend put it, "when you have a cause, you don't fear". Thing is, it takes hard work, it's a learning curve. You can't speak from mere opinion or just write from mere opinion. You make informed choices, but to do that, you have to refer to the great men that lived before you(wisdom). Read widely and read on all sorts of theories(knowledge). 

Today our generation is blessed, we have the internet. We can travel from just behind our computers, learn a lot, visit places and the best part about it, as yet another friend once put it to me, it is the "cheapest and safest way to travel - the power of browsing". It means taking anything at face value is an option. We don't have to take what we see on the t.v or others' opinions as facts. We have the choice of learning more, and then forming our own judgements. That however is the harder path. To sit and spend hours reading different theories, learning new things, listening to different people instead of watching twerk videos, or posting them for that matter or sitting to watch celebrities and other people to simply judge their lifestyles without any particular message(hating). The latter is the easier option. It's worthless and it doesn't take hard work because judging, is easier than understanding.

I personally don't consider myself a leader(in terms of changing the world leadership), and not a follower either. I'm just that person who thinks/knows life is greater than me and that there's so much more that I don't know. So as I slowly learn, I share that, hoping that someone too can learn from it(or perhaps correct and teach me otherwise).

When it comes to my drive, it is all the lives I could potentially change, simply from the life i'm blessed with. I know change begins with one and if I can lend a voice to someone, give food to another or simply educate someone from the little I know, then why not? After all, life's purpose is unknown, but one thing is certain, if you leave it better than you found it, whatever little or big a difference you've made, then you can say you have done something for humanity. 

And all this, I have learnt from my father. Now he's a leader, no doubt. And for that i'm thankful. Because he's taught me values and principles all the riches in the world can never buy. So I can't say I understand life or my drive precisely, but i've just decided to lead a 'good' life(whatever that means). Do good unto others and just be human. I might err sometimes, but at the end of the day, to err is to man, what matters most is usually the intention behind our mistakes. They should just be that; mistakes. Not self-centred, maliciously driven intents. 

*** I guess my point for sharing this is just to let you all know, we have a choice. Ignorance might be bliss, but it does more harm than good. Have that thirst for knowledge and that thirst to learn, that it actually scares you how insignificantly significant you are in this life(just accept that, it made sense in my head :p) We are ALL born leaders, some just embrace it, while others ignore it. And we are, everyday leaders, sometimes we just don't see it(watch the clip below) So, what is YOUR driving force in life? *** 

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