Finding Purpose
Some people go through life following a clear path laid out for them. Attend school, most likely go to college to get a degree, get a job and work for the majority of your life, then retire. Along the endless path, however, the scenery can get boring. Your brain switches to autopilot. You can tire out. And when that happens, you ask yourself: “Why am I doing this? What's the point of all this?”
Idleness
What are you supposed to do every day if you don’t have any goals to work towards? Sure, you have responsibilities that’ll pile up if you don’t get them done. Sure, you may have a project due in a few weeks and you want to work on part of it today. However, that’s different from something long-term—gaining wealth, giving back to other people, or achieving some other life goal. And the next question is, “How do I find something I can work towards, some life purpose that will truly fulfill me?”
Open-Mindedness
I’ve thought about this a lot, probably more than I should. For the vast majority of my life, the goals I set for myself were simple: get into a top university, become successful, and make money. At the time, it seemed like enough to be happy, but as I’ve grown older, I’ve started to realize how incomplete it feels, and frankly, how silly I was.
I’m sure there’s nothing inherently wrong with wanting academic success or financial stability, but there’s something dangerous about attaching your sense of purpose and fulfillment solely to external achievements. I’ve noticed that it becomes a cycle: you hit one milestone only to immediately raise the bar again. The scary part is that this cycle can continue for years before you even stop to question it. That’s exactly what happened to me. I was so focused on getting into a top university that I didn’t stop to ask myself why. I never paused to consider what I actually wanted to do there. I thought I was chasing fulfillment, but I was actually chasing validation, which is something temporary, fragile, and honestly, pretty exhausting. I wanted to impress others and show them that I was capable, and it mattered to me too much.
Numbness
I think that's why so many high-achieving students, despite their accomplishments, feel lost or tired at times. You can check all the boxes, meet all the expectations, and still feel like you’re falling behind. I’ve experienced that feeling firsthand; the constant working towards these achievements that still left me unsatisfied and tired. It’s in those moments of burnout, of questioning, that the absence of a deeper purpose becomes obvious. The tasks start to feel mechanical. Life starts to feel repetitive. And the dangerous part is, without something bigger to serve as your lighthouse, it’s easy to drift into that numb state of idleness.
And that state is what causes complacency and stagnation.
Clarity
Purpose isn’t the same for everyone. For some, it might be building something innovative. For others, it’s teaching, creating something to share with others, supporting their family, or even exploring the world itself. But I think the common thread is that purpose connects to your abilities, your values, and the world around you.
It’s the union of what you’re good at and what you care about. But that’s easier said than done, obviously. Sometimes, you don’t even know what you’re good at yet. Or your values shift as you grow. That’s happened a lot with me, personally. Finding purpose isn’t linear, and it’s a constant process of discovering what you want and what you care about.
Closure
I’m probably not doing better than a decent chunk of the population. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that blindly following a pre-hiked trail your entire life rarely leads to real satisfaction. At some point, you have to step back and ask yourself the uncomfortable questions. “What do I want if there were no expectations? What impact do I want to leave on others? How do I find joy and meaning in the process, not just the outcome?”
The answers aren’t always clear, and they never fully will be. The answers will be constantly changing, which only makes it more confusing. But asking yourself questions and reflecting is the first step in finding a purpose that’s worth chasing, and living for.
Life Update!
HCSSiM is so fun! Other than barely getting enough sleep, I’ve met so many amazing people, and the program has only started. I don’t know how I found enough time to write this, since I rarely spend my free time in my room. But this is just something I wanted to think and write about after hearing Po-Shen Loh’s Prime Time Theorem. I’ve learned so much in this program so far, even outside math. I’ve enjoyed meeting so many students, but there are so many students I have yet to meet. I want to make friends and hang out with people instead of spending time in my room. But who knows? It’ll work out. Hopefully.
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