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The Path Of Purpose

Living The Life You Were Born To Live

Brandon Grant

Published by Brandon Grant. Smashwords Edition Copyright Brandon Grant 2013. All ights eser!ed. "o part o# this written wor$ may be %opied or reprodu%ed by any other means #or %ommer%ial purposes without the prior written %onsent o# the author with the e&%eption o# 'uotations no longer than #our ()* paragraphs.

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'ntroduction &hat is (appiness)


ne of the hardest !uestions we are ever forced to ask ourselves is "#hat do I want$%& 't first, we&ll answer the !uestion with materialistic things like "a new car,% "a new house,% "a better job,% "a better spouse.% 'fter that, we ask the voice in our head that responded to the !uestion, "(eally$% and it thinks twice. This is the point where you reali)e that you don&t necessarily want things* you want what you think those things will bring you. Your brain reali)es that it does not posses happiness, and when it does that, it attaches happiness, an emotion felt by the soul and not a physical thing, to a number of other, physical things. Thus, by association, it thinks happiness is

achieved in the same way that everything else in the pile is achieved. The problem with this is that it&s a lie. +ave you ever known someone who doesn&t know what they&re talking about, but still wants to convince you that they&re right$ That&s what your brain is doing, and it&s likely causing you a lot of trouble and you&re not even reali)ing it, If you aren&t happy, then you&re likely falling victim to your confused brain, and the reason that you never reali)e it is because you don&t know anything other than what your brain is telling you. If what your brain is telling you is true, if happiness comes from having what you want, then wouldn&t the most fortunate people be the happiest$ #ouldn&t the least fortunate be the most miserable$ This obviously isn&t the case as it&s more than likely that one of the happiest people you know is

unfortunate, and you may also know a very wealthy person who isn&t really all that happy. The human mind is something that will ask for more and more, it can never be content. #ithout contentment, you can&t find happiness, because to be content is to be happy. The true secret to happiness is not fulfillment of the ego&s desires, but of the soul&s, and the desire of the soul is to fulfill your purpose. -od put you on the earth for a reason* and that reason isn&t to try to make your ego&s dream a reality, but to make your soul&s dream, your purpose, a reality. That soul&s dream, whatever it may be, will involve serving others. Service is the way to contentment and contentment is the way to happiness. nce upon a time, I was miserable. Then, I started doing the things I outline in this book, after that

everything changed. .ow I&m a bestselling author and have several world records. I&m helping and inspiring people by doing what I love to do, and most importantly* I&m happy. I want you to be, too.

Ta#le Of *ontents
Introduction What is Happiness? Chapter 1 Following Your Gut Chapter Having a Winner !indset Chapter " The #ower of Intention Chapter $ %ver& Issue is a 'piritual Issue Chapter ( #lan Chapter ) *are to *rea+ Chapter , 'u++ar& -fterword

-.out The -uthor

*hapter + Followin$ ,our Gut


#e all have a little voice in our head and there&s a reason people tell us that we should never listen to it. The problem is how remarkably few of us actually take their advice. #e all seem to think that that !uote applies only to the times when the voice tells us to do immoral things, or things that might get us into trouble later down the line. The problem is telling what those things are. Truth is, the person who our brain makes us think we are, isn&t who we truly are. The mind-body-spirit model is a classic model of the three parts to our being. The first two are the ones we trick ourselves into believing who we are, but at the end of the day, and by the day I mean our lives, the mind and body will cease to e/ist. The Spirit, however, the soul, the

eternal self, is our true nature. I&ve heard it called the -od-self before because that is what our true nature is, the essence of the 0ivine creator which comes to e/press itself as a human mind and body. The soul holds no judgments, it is pure energy. I have heard spiritual author #ayne 0yer make a comparison between the soul and a cup of ocean water* the ocean is the 0ivine* a collective consciousness of enough water to fill billions of cups and still be greater than all of them combined. The cup full of ocean water is your soul. It contains ocean water, although it is not as powerful as the full ocean, it is, nonetheless, the ocean. The water, the soul, in the cup is completely uni!ue. .o matter how hard you try, it is impossible to pour the cup back in the ocean and draw the same cup of water back out. .ow suppose you leave the cup of water out or pour it out on the ground. It will dry up, condense

as clouds, and eventually return to it&s source* the ocean. 1very one of us is the cup of water that was left out* all in the process of evaporating and returning to -od. That&s what real happiness is. That's the purpose of finding your purpose. It&s about enjoying your life by living it in connection to the source so we can make the most of it in opposition to hating our lives and just waiting to die to become connected. So how do you become connected to the source$ 2ecome happy$ 2ecome successful$ There are several parts to this, including listening to the soul instead of the mind, having a positive mindset, and manifesting goals via intention. I&m using this chapter to talk about the first one. 's I mentioned earlier, we should not listen to the mind. You&re probably pretty confused. #hat else is there to listen to$

0o you remember any point in your life where your gut told you not to do something, but your ego ignored it and you ended up suffering because of it$ 3hances are it&s happened more than once. That gut reaction, that instinct that something good, bad, or powerful in other ways, is the voice of our soul trying to make itself heard. 4nfortunately, the ego often covers it up. If you learn not to listen to the ego, the voice of the soul becomes much louder and easier to understand. This is very likely a foreign and scary concept to you because for such a long time, you thought that that voice is who you are. #hy in the world would you want to suppress it$ Truth be told, you don&t need to suppress it. 'll&s you need to do is reali)e that what it says isn&t necessarily true. The egoic mind is often afraid of what it sees, so it panics and makes up a way

around it. The soul is eternally calm and in any situation, always knows what&s best. The mantra of the ego is "#hat can the world do for me$% The mantra of the soul is "#hat can I do for the world$% and the mindset of the soul is re!uired in finding and following a path of purpose. I&ve found that the soul will always tell you to do what you love to do when finding a purposeful career path. If you aren&t following your passion, then you aren&t following your purpose. 0o what you have talent in doing. 3hances are, if you love doing something, you are likely pretty good at it. If you are good at it, and you love doing it, and you can help others by doing it, then it is why you are here, and your highest chance for happiness is in doing that. 'll together, the formula of this chapter goes like this5 6assion 7 Talent 8 6urpose.

*hapter (a.in$ A &inner !indset


(emember the formula that I ended the last chapter on$ I&m adding a new constant to that e!uation. The new one is Passion + Talent + Persistence = Purpose. The third constant is e!ually as important as the rest. ' person with an "I&m a loser% mindset will never be able to follow the path of their purpose. The path of purpose is never the easiest road, but it is the most rewarding and you have to have a confident mindset to follow it. I invented a little phrase awhile back5 "0on&t 9ust #ish :or it, #ork :or It.% .otice I didn&t say "don&t wish for it,% because wishing for it is also e/tremely important when it comes to manifesting a life of purpose, but you have to actually put some

work into it. You can&t say "I want to find love% and then look for it in your i6ad screen while watching T;. The universe will only fight half the battle. The other half is yours. ' winner mindset is not an "I want% mindset or a "I wish% mindset, it is an "I am% mindset. This is something that many spiritual teachers, including Iyanla ;an)ant, prah #infrey, 9oel steen, and #ayne 0yer, to name a few, teach about. #hen you talk about things that do not e/ist in your life as something that does, those things manifest. .o, I&m not telling you to lie to yourself. I&m telling you to invite emotions that you have every right to feel into your life. Your senses may try to tell you that you&re depressed, but if your soul doesn&t believe it, you can not be depressed. ' person who lets himself believe he is depressed, becomes even more depressed. 0epression is a superglue that can hold you back from living a purposeful life, and

when you say to yourself "I am depressed,% that glue becomes many times stronger. So instead of feeding the foe, you must feed the ally. Think to yourself "I am happy% "I am loved% "I am strong% "I am healthy% instead of "I am sick% "I am sad% "I am going to give up% ' winner mindset also consists of a vision. I talked in chapter one about following your gut. nce you think you know what you want, you have to create a vision of what you want in your head and think about it constantly, as well as make plans on how you can bring that vision to life. The header image on my :acebook fanpage is a picture of me with te/t spelling out another e/pression I made up5 "That on which your brain rests, manifests,% and it&s absolutely true. #ishing is half the battle, the other half is working. Your vision will drive you forward.

' winner mindset consists of one third vision, one third confidence, and one third motivation. 1ven with the first two thirds, without the final one, they are nothing. You could be the most talented person in the world, but if you don&t have the motivation to show your work to the world, you&ll live an unfulfilling life and the world will suffer a great loss from never knowing you, just because you didn&t follow their purpose. .o one wins in that situation. It can be hard to stay motivated sometimes, and that is why the "I 'ms% are so important. You need to constantly reassure yourself that you are willing and able to do what you are setting out to do, because after all, you are. 6eople have done things that most of us considered impossible, so no matter how much work it may re!uire, you can find a job you love. You can go back to school. You can write that book. Your life can be a success story.

*hapter / The Power of 'ntention


+ere I go again with the !uotes5 "If you can dream it, you can do it% -#alt 0isney. #hat a beautiful idea* that whatever we believe that we are capable of doing in our wildest, wildest dreams, we can do in real life. 1ven more beautiful is the fact that it&s true. #e&re right back at my !uote "That on which your brain rests, manifests.% .ow that you have the confident winner mindset, you need to learn to master the art of manifesting that which your soul so desperately wants, that which is your purpose. #hen trying to manifest a dream, it is e/tremely important that you have your mind on it constantly. In a recent blog post that I wrote on finding your

purpose, I said that a vision will build a road and working towards that vision will drive you down that road. #ithout a road, you have no where to drive, that is what makes your vision so important. It is very important, also that you regard your dream as more than a dream. Instead of saying "I want this to happen% say "This will happen% #hat you believe to be true, the universe will send to you. This will also cause you to become more motivated to work to make your dream a reality so you don&t have to admit to lying to yourself. I highly recommend you write down your goals and keep them in a place where you can see them regularly. #riting down your goals forces you to clarify on what you want, and seeing them regularly motivates you to take action to make them a reality. 1very time I find some goals that I wrote down

awhile back, they&ve all been fulfilled. #riting down your goals will make you better able to see, celebrate, and appreciate your success in the future. :or whatever reason, setting your goals in stone <or in paper= makes you more e/ited about them. #hen you get e/ited about them, you become motivated* when you become motivated, you fulfill them. #hen that happens, it&s time to right down new, bigger ones. >eep your written goals in a place you&ll be able to see them regularly. I&ve heard people say to keep them some place like your bathroom mirror. I used to keep my personal ones on top of my light switch. (ecently, reali)ing the amount of time I spend on the computer, put them into a .jpeg with some photo editing software and made them into my screensaver. ur thoughts are more powerful than most people

can even imagine, same with our dreams. #ithout dreamers with confidence, you wouldn&t be reading a self-help book on your e-reader right now, you&d be living in a time similar to the middle ages. 1verything would be about survival. You wouldn&t have time for trying to fulfill your purpose, no time for spirituality, no time for happiness. You can not be happy without a goal. ?ife will be empty and meaningless if you just run along without giving a thought to what you&re doing. ' chapter ago, I told you to dream big. .ow I&m telling you to support that dream with positive thoughts. Positivity is power.

*hapter 0 E.er" 'ssue 's A Spiritual 'ssue


I recently watched an episode of Super Soul Sunday on the prah #infrey .etwork <Yes, I&m a guy who watches prah, don&t judge= where she was interviewing 1d 2acon, pastor of 'll Saints 1piscopal 3hurch, 1li)abeth ?esser, and @ark .epo, talking about problems the modern world is facing such as prescription drug addiction, gun control etc. The thinkers& answers to the !uestions were all interesting as they all regarded the problems as not just legislative problems or mental problems, but spiritual problems. 's I -oggled the episode a minute ago to find the names of the people being interviewed in the episode, I found a book written by #ayne 0yer titled There's Spiritual Solution to !very Problem. I&ve never actually read the book, but the

title itself carries truth. If you&re not happy, it&s most likely not whatever you think is making you unhappy, it&s how you&re looking at it. This once again ties into the "#inner% mindset. If you view the world as an abundant, generally good place, that&s how your world will behave. I recently started writing a speech which opened with a more comple/ version of "#e should make our most stressful moments our happiest ones.% I wrote this because happiness is completely a choice. #hen you look at something from your soul instead of from your eyes, the soul can appreciate everything. ?ooking from your soul is relatively easy. 'll&s you have to do is stop yourself ne/t time you&re having a negative thought, reali)e that it it only your egoic mind and not your true self talking, and choose a better thought. This whole idea is why I like (eggae music, because that is the message that it

sends. ?ook at any issue, even nationwide issues* gay marriage, gun control, racism* they all have a spiritual basis. I&m under the impression that homophobia comes from an inability to relate, or a conflict between something that the soul, a part of the individual, understands, but the ego, another part of him, has been taught to ignore and despise those he has an inability to relate to. (acism, I believe, comes from a discomfort with trusting people who are unlike ourselves. 4nwillingness to receive even minimal amounts of gun control is also fear-based. The ego has a tendency to blow things out of proportion, and when a politician that an individual doesn&t like talks about keeping weapons away from cra)y people, their mind blows things way out of proportion, making them believe they are going to try to take them away from everybody, which is not

in any way the case. :ollow your stresses to their source. .e/t time you feel emotional pain, fear, or any other kind of stress, change your outlook, because your ego is most likely blowing it way out of proportion.

*hapter 1 Start Planin$


If you are going to fulfill your vision, that vision must evolve into a plan. That plan, mi/ed with dedication, becomes a reality. I spent the first few chapters talking about wishing for it. This one&s on working for it. You need an action plan. -od will open doors for you when you wish for something, but it is up to you to walk through those doors and into those rooms. I talked earlier about the importance of writing down your goals and dreams. It is e!ually as important to write down your plan. The purpose of writing down your goals is very similar to writing down your plan to fulfill your goals* it forces you to become clear.

If you just think about the dream, and never think about bringing the dream into reality, then that&s all it can be* a dream. #hen you write down your plans for fulfilling each of your dreams, you will be motivated to follow those plans, fulfilling those dreams. 4nlike writing down your goals, you actually have to do some research before writing down your plans, because not all plans are created e!ual. If your dream is to become a professional football player, you won&t get there just by carrying a football everywhere and hoping some .:? guy comes by and drafts you in <yes, people actually have tried that.= 2efore I published my first bestseller, a fantasy novel called The "unaways I did a boatload of research on kindle marketing and how to sell more books through 'ma)on. #ith the knowledge I had gained from many websites, blog posts, and books,

I formed a plan to getting the book to the top of search results so it could more easily be found. 2etween the luck that had come from wishing for it, and a logical plan of how I was going to work for it, I had manifested what I had dreamed about for such a long time. 's I did, you too will need to use logic when creating your plan. (ead books, read articles, take information from any accurate resource. #atch interviews with people who have made it* they often give tips and tell you how to reach levels of success similar to theirs. ne of the most dangerous traps that you can fall into is believing that just because lightning struck someone, it will strike you too. I hate that I have to say this, but that just isn&t how it works. There have been a lot of people who read the story of someone who had instant success and thought

that the same would happen to them, and when they didn&t get their lucky break like the person they read about, lost all faith in their dreams and went back to living a mediocre, unfulfilling life. If you pay attention when you hear people&s success stories, you&ve probably noticed a common theme* they&ve all failed miserably at some point. The difference between successful people and the rest of us is that successful people find a way to get back on the horse after they fall off of it. 6erhaps you&ve heard the proverb* #$all seven times, stand up eight%& If you stand up enough times, you&ll be successful. ?ife throws things at us to make us stronger. Your ability to become successful is like the skin on your hand. #hen hard things rub against the skin on your hand, the skin will likely split and blister the first few times, but after you&ve handled the hard surface a few times, your hand becomes tough.

#ith the tough skin, you are able to use the rough tool to do work. #hen your life comes in contact with rough e/periences <failures,= it becomes tougher, and you are able to be successful in whatever work you may be doing. @ake persistence a part of your plan. (emind yourself when things are tough that they are there for you to learn from. #hen you have those e/periences, look back on that failure and use it to learn from. ?et the number of times you stand back up always be greater than the number of your falls.

*hapter 2 3are to 3ream


#'t is not the critic who counts( not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood( who strives valiantly( who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming( but who does actually strive to do the deeds( who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions( who spends himself in a worthy cause( who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.& )Theodore (oosevelt

's (oosevelt said, If you want to be anybody who&s anybody, then you have to fight your battles and do whatever it takes to become successful. The people who change the world, who are truly loved by society, are not the people that crush the dreams of others because it&s "cool,% but the people who

dare to dream, and the people who dare to live out the dream they dreamed. 1ven if you&ve discovered your purpose, even if you&ve thought long and hard on what your plan is to live that purpose, no matter how much you&ve studied to find a route to the outcome you&re looking for, it&s all useless if you never actually make an effort to bring that dream into reality. You have got to stay motivated. If you let something discourage you and make the decision not to follow your dream, you&ll go right back to the mediocre life you may have been living before and keep wondering why you don&t feel fulfilled, despite the fact that you already know the answer. *ou don't deserve mediocrity. The reason that the creator put you on this earth was to fulfill a purpose and improve this place. #hen you refuse to

respond to your calling, you&re not only hurting yourself, but you&re hurting the do)ens, hundreds, thousands, or even millions of people that you could help or inspire by fulfilling your purpose. Serving others feels so good because service holds the essence of your purpose* the calling of every individual is based around somehow serving others. #hen you serve others* you connect to the 0ivine source that gave you the potential for a fulfilled life. If you really want to find happiness for yourself, you need to help other people find theirs* that is the reason I wrote this book in the first place, because I know that by helping you, the reader, find your happy place, I can become in more touch with my own. -oing out into the world and actually doing what

you want to do, even if what you want to do is something that comes spur-of-the-moment, not a long-term goal or dream, is the most important step to being happy that I can give you in this book. 3learing up your goals or even writing down hypothetical ways you can make them happen will do absolutely nothing for you if you don&t dare to live out that dream. 'll together, if the path to success laid out in this book could summed up into a sentence, it would go like this5 :ind what feels right, dream your dream, make the most of your mindset, lay it out in advance, then dare to live your dream. If you take this advice that I&ve given you in this book, this advice that I summed up in that last sentence, I truly believe in my heart that you have a serious shot at serious success. #hen the 0ivine being created you, it loaded in your mind and spirit

an infinite amount of potential. .ow, I&ve given you wisdom to help you tap into that power inside you, but please, don&t let the search for truth end in this book, or any book for that matter. +earing different ideas is essential to spiritual growth. It&s never too late to follow your calling. There&s nothing you can do about the past, but the future&s up for grabs, and the only way to sei)e the future, is to make the most of the present.

Afterword
I want to take this last page or so of this book not only to thank you for investing your money and time into purchasing and reading The Path of Purpose, but to share a little fun fact. That little fact is something that I pray you didn&t notice via my writing style while reading the book* I am a teen author. 's of the time that I write this sentence, I am fourteen years old. Those world records that I mentioned in the introduction$ They are the records for youngest published fantasy author, and second youngest novelist, which I broke upon the publication of my fantasy novel in ABCA at age thirteen. I am also the youngest author of spiritual books, a record which I broke when I published a guide to meditation last month, and when this book becomes available, I will also be one of the youngest self-help authors.

I don&t mean to sound boastful, but these e/amples of success show to what degree this advice can give you success. I&d like to use this last paragraph to thank you all for buying and reading this book. #hen you bought this book to help you fulfill your purpose, you also helped me fulfill mine. Thank you. I love hearing feedback and good book reviews are an essential part of spreading a book&s message, so please do me a favor and stop by this book&s 'ma)on page and leave a !uick review. I also enjoy reading emails and hearing feedback directly from readers, so feel free to drop an email to me at branglit)Dgmail.com If you like what I teach, also follow me on Twitter here, like my :acebook fanpage here, watch my YouTube channel here, or visit my website or blog. Thanks for helping me help others.

A#out The Author


2randon -rant, whose real name is 2randon -ilt), spent the first eight years of his life in small-town :armville, ;' before a move to ;irginia 2each shook his world. +is first two years in the city where rough* a neighborhood bully pulled apart his confidence and knocked him off of his spiritual path both at school and home. 2eginning middle school, however, was a turning point in the future author&s life. +e rekindled a lost love for reading and learning, and this time with it came a passion for writing. 't the age of CA, 2randon wrote his first full-novel. #hithin a year, it was published under the pseudonym, 2randon -rant. :ollowing its publication were a series of short stories and later spiritual self-help books. 2randon knew his books were only the beginning of his work. ' year after feeling the initial call to starting an Interfaith ministry, he became ordained by the 4niversal ?ife 3hurch in 9anuary ABCE, soon after, SoulShine Spiritual 3enter had its first meeting. 'side from preaching and writing, 2randon enjoys reading, playing flute, laughing, and making

YouTube videos.

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