The Purpose Pyramid Is the Perfect Way to Identify Your Goals
This is how it works.
In his best selling book Bad Blood, John Carreyrou reveals the incredible story of Elisabeth Holmes. This Silicon Valley entrepreneur faked a blood-testing technology and made billions of dollars selling false hopes to patients and hospitals. When Holmes was a child, a family member asked her: “What do you want to be in the future.” “I want to be a billionaire.” She said.
Elisabeth Holmes perfectly embodies the ego-centred dreamer. Someone who uses whatever means to an end, even at the expense of their virtue.
Most of us won’t become criminals to achieve our goals. Still, a self-centred purpose can limit your growth and success. Suppose you don’t set your purpose the right way. In that case, you’ll quickly lose motivation and inspiration, especially when things get hard and obstacles grow in size and strength.
Do you want to be inspired every day and supercharge your life with meaning? The following system can help you. It will rekindle your fire: keeping you fully committed, inspired, and always motivated.
You Have Three Levels of Motivation
Your motivation falls into three categories:
- Self (you): getting a promotion, earning a lot of money, enrolling on a top university, be the best at something.
- Personal (your immediate connections): buying a house for my parents, helping a relative in need, sending my kids to college, advancing my local community.
- Global (everyone in the world): fighting climate change, educating the world, eradicating diseases, battling poverty.
Most people are stuck in level one. They picture themselves already at the top: leading, inventing, earning, graduating, winning the trophies and awards. It feels good to have selfish dreams. Your ego inflates, and your imagination runs wild. Self-motivation is a common trend in western people from high-income households (remember Elisabeth Holmes?).
The second level of motivation is personal. You’re working hard to help your family or build something external to yourself. This level is the gold standard of immigrants and low-income households. Many first-generation immigrants in any western country would tell you that their dream is to: “buy a house for my family” or “send money back to my country.”
The third level of motivation goes further beyond the self and closed relatives. At this level, you’re adding value at a dramatic scale. Your work impacts all of humanity. Your cause affects your immediate environment and goes further than that. Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King Jr., Jesus Christ, Mother Theresa and many more have unlocked this level.
When billionaire entrepreneurs and political leaders speak in public, they often refer to the third level of motivation as their greatest dream:
- Elon Musk wants to make humanity a multi-planetary species.
- Mark Zuckerberg wants to connect the world.
- JFK wanted to send humans to the Moon.
Do you know your personal and global motivation? Which one are you neglecting?
It Is Crucial to Externalise Your Motivation
When you’re working for something bigger than yourself, it’s easier to keep going after failing or getting ridiculed. “I want to be a millionaire, famous, smart” are legitimate aspirations, but without counterbalancing them with something bigger than yourself, you’ll take failure and setbacks very personally.
Studies have shown that people who are willing to do the work with the highest impact live happier and healthier. Researchers studied over a hundred entrepreneurs running various types of businesses. They found that the ones seeking to make a global impact were more likely to experience growth, joy, and success than leaders motivated by financial rewards and honorific titles.
“Who is counting on me to win today?” is a question that can propel you way far better than “How can I be happy, rich, or successful?”
Work from a Purpose Pyramid
To be fully committed, set a global, personal, and self-motivation. Call these three levels of motivation your purpose pyramid or GPS (global, personal, self) purpose. Define all three levels of your purpose pyramid. Why do you do what you do? Your career, next project, or any venture you set in motion should have self, personal, and global intentions.
For example, my purpose pyramid looks like this:
Global: Educate the world.Personal: Provide for my family.Self: Be my own boss.
The pyramidal structure reflects the number of people at each level. Level one (the self-motivation) is trendy. As you move to the top, you’ll find fewer people bold enough to set big dreams or dedicate their lives to global causes.
The key is to do work that benefits others and yourself. It’s okay to have selfish aspirations, as long as you support them with personal and global goals. This way, you’ll fulfil your desires, help other people, and provide value at scale.
If you don’t have a global or personal motivation yet, that’s fine. Fill in the levels with things you suspect are motivating you anyway. We’re all a work-in-progress. Adjust and refine your definitions as you move forward and grow. In the words of Bruce Lee:
“A goal is not meant to be attained but to be aimed at as you move forward.”
Tim Ferriss once said:
“If you’re making something and thinking about how famous it’s going to make you, how rich you’re going to get, you’re thinking the wrong way.”
That’s because true meaning comes from fully integrating your self aspiration to personal and global motivations.
Use the purpose pyramid to set your self goals, personal goals, and global goals. Build something that will outlive and outlast you. This way, you’ll unlock eternal motivation, stay fully committed to your work, and be inspired every day.
