So, you have worked hard over the past few years and earned yourself a good degree with strong results. You had dreams of getting your career started, buying a nice car and saving for a big travelling experience in a few years but this has all come to a halt as you have graduated during a pandemic. The economic world has literally come to a halt! What are you supposed to do will all these hopes and dreams now?
The anxiety of having no purpose can have harmful effect on one’s mental health and their ability to be resilient. Research by Bronk, Leontopoulou and McConchie (2019) has shown a link between a strong sense of purpose and resilience. They found that “youth with high purpose scores were resilient enough to look past the present challenges”. Furthermore, Hill and Turiano (2014) found that having a sense of purpose in life led to better physical health, and as a result, longer life expectancy.
So here lies your answer: a pandemic is out of your control, but you can focus on what you can control, and that starts with finding yourself a purpose amid a pandemic, a purpose that will complement your qualifications and enhance your CV so that when we emerge from the fog of this pandemic you are ready to build your goals.
Now, do you feel empowered? Or has your chest started to tighten with the thought of the elusive question “how do I find my purpose”? This is called Purpose Anxiety- What? Yes, there is a name for it! Rainey (2014) defined Purpose Anxiety as: “the negative emotions experienced in direct relation to the search for purpose.” She continued to state that this can occur at two stages 1) while trying to identify what your purpose might be 2) while trying to apply this purpose to real life.
My advice:
Stop over thinking! In my opinion, this type of anxiety is formed from a belief that a sense of purpose is something randomly found or a moment of enlightenment that is then a long-term commitment. This is not the case, firstly your purpose now during this pandemic can be short term, something that makes you get up in the morning, something that keeps you thinking in the present and avoids focusing on the unknowns of the future. It does not have to be something you do until you are 95. Secondly, unfortunately is it not something that just appears magically one morning, you need to explore and research opportunities, put yourself out there (virtually in some cases), make an achievable plan and give yourself structure. Warning: a major source of purpose anxiety is scrolling through Instagram so DO NOT go there in search of your purpose. Here are 4 tips on finding a purpose in a pandemic:
- Time for Lists
We can’t travel very far (currently 5km from your house), there is no socializing with others (unless you want a fine), there are no shops or venues open (except your weekly wander around Lidl or Aldi) so you have time on your hands. Let’s get to work on getting start, as the author James Clear states in his book Atomic Habits “stop worrying about how long it will take and get started. Time will pass either way”.
Get yourself a diary, notebook or copy and a pen, next print out or open your most recent CV on your laptop. Start by writing today’s date and the words “my unique selling points” on the top of your notebook. Using your CV and your thoughts, write a list of what you make you different to another random individual, what have you achieved, what interests you, what have you been involved in that someone else might not have been.
Next, write the word “Gaps”, write down a list of what you see as gaps which are holding you back from being successful (in your view). These gaps could be technical skills, softs skills based around confidence, they could be lack of relevant education or work experience etc.
Next, write the word “brainstorm”, and write a list of ideas that could possibly bridge those gaps e.g. work experience which in a world struggling with a pandemic may not be achievable today but we need to be flexible; are their virtual internships out there? How can I increase my chances of getting this work experience after the pandemic? Have we broadened our search outside of Ireland with regard virtual work or even contemplate a location move? Have we explored volunteering?
- Volunteering
Volunteering is one of the best ways to start your search for purpose, giving your time to someone who cannot do something for themselves is rewarding, develops essential employable skills for examples you can develop your technical skills as a marketing graduate who volunteers to manage a social media page for their local GAA club and it helps develop a network whether it be for a strong reference on your CV or a connection to a potential employer. Try Volunteer Ireland – Connecting Communities Through Volunteering to search some opportunities in your area or contact your local GAA club, community development committee or social voluntary groups.
- Online Courses, Conference, Seminars
The world is so much more accessible now. Only recently, I started a short course based in St Mary’s University in Twickenham London, I have wanted to do this course for the past two years but never had the spare time or spare cash to fly over for two weekends, pay for the course, flights, accommodation and everything else that goes with it but this year I simply just had to pay for the course and log in virtually. So make the most of it before world returns to face to face everything. All colleges have short courses or longer course which you can pay for but also there is so much out there for every all interests for free. Start with MOOC (Massive Open Online Courses), the stroll through Eventbrite for workshop, seminars and some short courses all online. If you are thinking of a longer commitment to education for example an undergraduate or postgraduate degree try Springboard first. This is a website with government funded courses, it is constantly being updated with new courses and currently there are 5,994 places available for FREE. The government also released a July Stimulus package in 2020 where they fund modular courses e.g. one module of a postgraduate course this can firstly give you a taster (for free or 90% funded) of what the full postgraduate course is about and will enhance your CV. Every college in Ireland has these funded courses but check out examples on DCU and DBS
- Research and Social
What ever your interests might be there is academic research out there linked to it, so get researching, your old college library will give you access to a lot of research journal but so too will Google Scholar. The objective is to find out who are the lead researchers in your field of interest and learn more about who they have collaborated with what tools or techniques they have proven etc. Pick up on what they haven’t researched, is there a gap? Maybe you have some ideas of applying this research to Ireland or a different age group etc? Open a blank word document and start writing how you might like to apply this research to shape your own.
Then, if they are modern day researchers you can go on LinkedIn and connect with these people as they will like and share information which is relative to your interests. If a PhD is something of interest you can also reach out to ask them if they would be interested in being a supervisor or even if they ever take on research assistants for a few months. The worst they can say is no!
If your struggling to sit and read try a podcast from sport psych to medicine to marketing to education there are podcasts on everything so login to your Spotifty or your Apple podcasts and get search for an informative listen that will feed you interests.
If successful and unsuccessful people share the same goals then the goal cannot be what differentiates the winners from the losers (James Clear, Atomic Habits). The difference is the strategies we use, the ground work, the preparation, the mindset we create, the knowledge we apply, the difference is the lessons we learn and apply along the journey.
- Kendall Cotton Bronk, Sophie Leontopoulou & James McConchie (2019) Youth purpose during the great recession: A mixed-methods study, The Journal of Positive Psychology, 14:4, 405-416, DOI: 10.1080/17439760.2018.1484942
- Hill PL, Turiano NA. Purpose in life as a predictor of mortality across adulthood. Psychol Sci. 2014 Jul;25(7):1482-6. doi: 10.1177/0956797614531799. Epub 2014 May 8. PMID: 24815612; PMCID: PMC4224996.
- Rainey, Larissa. (2014). The Search for Purpose in Life: An Exploration of Purpose, the Search Process, and Purpose Anxiety.
- Carriedo A, Cecchini JA, Fernández-Río J, Méndez-Giménez A. Resilience and physical activity in people under home isolation due to COVID-19: A preliminary evaluation. Ment Health Phys Act. 2020;19:100361. doi:10.1016/j.mhpa.2020.100361
