When the COVID-19 quarantine was declared and we were told to shelter in place, I decided I wanted to keep in touch with people while we isolated. Then I realize these are some funny acting clowns I been hanging around for years now seeing how crappy they are as people. During the quarantine and being at home, I took time to reflect on my current life and realized I was caught up and being distracted by a lot of people who just ain’t in my zone.

I get the same excuse “man, people are busy and worried about their situation” – don’t buy that excuse. Because the reality is people in this world today act very cold and stank towards other people. But my reflection at home forced me to realize the real problem was me – I was trying to force these people in my mind that they were good people but in reality, these people some garbage. I need to find my true people, my true purpose and my true path.

Some of you are in this same situation where you around people you see they looking out for themselves and you may not be following your purpose and path that you originally set out to pursue. So let’s talk about how to move away from being distracted and how to recalibrate your entire life to continue on your journey to find your people, your purpose and your path.

Finding Your Purpose

We all have a calling that is unique to ourselves. Our calling is based on our experiences and our perspectives and our drive to address something we want to see improved or changed. But your calling can be a threat to someone status quo. Don’t think status quo just means elitists; it can be your own family members who don’t you to be anymore than the family member title or people at your job who don’t you to be anything more than a co-worker title to them.  

The COVID-19 situation created rules where you should distance yourself away from family members and co-workers. You should see by now that mostly family members and friends were distracting you from your dreams now you at home alone. Think about all the times they brought things into your life you had to run focus on that had little to do with you. A lot of people are waking up to seeing that their life timeline was hijacked by someone else, mostly people close to them.

You are now seeing what really matters – what’s going on inside your home. The family you got inside your house matter. Some of you are probably with a boyfriend/girlfriend who is a major distraction to your purpose making up nonsense to make you argue with them. If you in this situation, last I check, it is very easy to find a new apartment right now and move out and be by yourself and get your private space back to yourself to pursue your purpose.

So to find your purpose, everything outside of your house you have to keep outside of your space. Reclaim your space and if you living with others you not obligated to like immediate family, they need to find their own space or you need to leave and find your own space. Let me explain something, the world is about to get real disruptive right now and new paradigm shifts going to change. You cannot afford to have ambitions about starting up an online car lot operation similar to Carvana in your hood and you got people living under the same roof is sitting on the couch staring at you while expressing these ambitious dreams.

Finding Your People

My constant mistake is a common mistake when it comes to black people – we around people that want to maintain a state of victimhood versus going out and getting something. Do not confuse fighting oppression with being a victim, you can still fight the system and go for yours at the same damn time. And we are around people who want to downsize us to their level and if we not going to stoop ourselves down, they will try to ostracize or alienate us to make us feel unwanted by their “collective” – but black folks are strong enough to give the middle finger to their clique and collective and handle our own.

You are likely not around your people – you are around people trying to make you conform to their level which is likely below your level. People at your work, they just there to collect a paycheck to bring home like you, they not there to be friends unless they colluding to create a system of privilege and elitism. Even if they are, that’s not what you signed up for and these aren’t your true people either. Even in college, you can be forced around people through artificial associations that are not your people as well.

Your people are those who you encounter during your journey – those are where you find your people. When you say you want to create a line of hair conditioning, the chemists with experience are your people, the marketing talent are your people, the beauticians are your people – these are people who compliment your purpose and you meet on the journey. In terms of relationships, if you read stories, ever notice the couple probably met while on a mission they are passionate about and eventually bonded together?

Stop forcing people that ain’t your people on yourself. You will begin finding your true people once you are on the path towards your goals and encounter like-minded people like yourself. This is the number one thing that have a person end up life disappointed at the end of day, wasted their time being around the wrong people. As a man I see this with women I grew up with who was compatible with me and my goals but she wants to mess around with the wrong people. She hanging out with them and most of them are ugly personas trying to pull her cute self down to their level and a man like me always have to walk away from a sista that had the potential. I mean, if you cute and your friends are ugly, you not around your people.

Learn to find your people along the way of your purpose and see where everybody fit in.

Charting Your Path

To know where you going you are going to need to write down some things and use a method to understand how to get from where you at right now to where you want to be.

Brainstorming. Get a pack of post-it notes and start writing down one thought about what you think you need to do and where you want to go. Do not try to organize just write down everything you can think of such as open a business account at bank, get a logo, create a mailing list and so on. Write down things you think keeping you back such as your lover keep making up petty stuff to argue about or family members acting indifferent hurting your feelings or the job is too demanding.

Gap Analysis. This is a three-column worksheet you can draw out. The first column is where you at and your current situation, the middle column is what it takes to move forward and the third column is where you want to be at. What you want to do is focus on the third column first of where you want to be at, then focus on first column of where you at. Then fill out the middle column of what it takes to get there.

Road Map. This is a set of phases along your journey. The first phase could be finding yourself/ground yourself and that is setup mental/physical/diet routines to keep yourself healthy and mentally grounded so you can move to the next phase with confidence. The second phase should be laying out the architecture, framework or groundwork. The following phases should be installing components on the foundation you build to build up a solution.

Use these three tools and methods to explore how you are actually going to commit to pursuing your path to where you want to be. I have done this exercise plenty of times and reach those goals I thought was hard until I planned it all out.

Carry Forward

We are in a major transformative period that is going to create massive changes and massive opportunities. The person mass-manufacturing face masks isn’t complaining right now, they making money. You need to tap into this rapidly changing environment where you know a side-hustle in addition to your job has to be the new normal to survive what is obviously going to be a serious economic downturn for those who are trying to maintain the old ways before COVID-19.

Don’t be like the fools still trying to run out and dine-in or run to the beach to live a normal life. Instead, use this period to focus on your life and your direction and where you headed, especially in the year 2020 and beyond. Realize you may have been distracted, wasting your time and misdirected chasing the wrong people and the wrong things.

Focus on your purpose, find your people and pursue the journey on the path you charted – because that is what you are truly living for.