I’ve spent a lot of time over the years trying to figure out what I want to do with my life. I’ve worked hard, pursued an education, advanced in my career, started a business, raised a family, and experienced plenty of successes and failures along the way. And through all of it, I’ve continued asking myself some pretty big questions. What am I supposed to be doing with my life? What makes a life meaningful? How do I know if I’m making the right decisions? And perhaps most importantly, am I using the life God gave me to do something good?

For a long time, I thought success was the answer. I started my career in hospitality, worked my way into leadership and project management positions, and eventually reached a point where I was earning more money than I ever had before. I should have been thrilled. I had worked hard to get there! But instead, I found myself stressed, exhausted, frustrated, and wondering why I wasn’t happier. I had accomplished so many things I thought I wanted, yet something was still missing.

That experience sent me down a different path. I started reading more about psychology, personal development, motivation, and human behavior. I earned my master’s degree in psychology and eventually decided to pursue a PhD in Business Psychology. I wanted to understand why people make the choices they do, what motivates us, and why we sometimes spend years pursuing things that don’t actually make us happy. Of course, I was also trying to figure some of these things out for myself!

Over time, my understanding of success, happiness, and purpose began to change. More recently, as I’ve been growing in my Christian faith and learning what it means to put God at the center of my life, I’ve started looking at these questions from an entirely different perspective. What if my purpose isn’t simply about what I want to accomplish? What if it’s about what God has given me the ability to contribute?

I believe God created each of us for a purpose. I don’t necessarily believe that means we have one specific career, one special talent, or one big accomplishment we’re supposed to achieve. I think our purpose can be expressed in many different ways throughout our lives. We might be raising children, caring for family members, teaching, building businesses, helping neighbors, creating something useful, or simply being there for someone who needs us. Our responsibilities and opportunities change as we move through life, and I think the ways we serve God and others can change right along with them.

I also believe God has given each of us different gifts and talents for a reason. Some people are wonderful teachers. Others are natural caregivers, organizers, builders, problem solvers, or encouragers. Some people have incredible patience, while others have the courage to step forward and lead when something needs to be done. We all have different strengths, interests, experiences, and abilities. Imagine what we could accomplish if we spent more time discovering and developing those gifts, and then actually putting them to use!

For me, creating HyperStriver has become one way to do that. I’ve always enjoyed learning, organizing information, developing programs, solving problems, and helping people work toward their goals. Looking back at my career and education, I can see how many of those experiences have prepared me to do what I’m doing today. Instead of continuing to pursue the next promotion or paycheck simply because that’s what I thought I was supposed to do, I’m trying to use the knowledge, skills, and talents God has given me to create something that can help other people improve their lives.

And I want to make those opportunities to learn and grow accessible to as many people as possible. That’s one of the reasons I’ve decided to offer free personal growth programs through HyperStriver. I don’t believe someone should have to spend thousands of dollars to begin learning more about themselves, discovering their strengths, or making positive changes in their life.

Now, I certainly don’t have everything figured out. Not even close!

I’ve made plenty of mistakes. I’ve pursued the wrong goals, made decisions I later regretted, struggled with relationships, and spent time focusing on things that weren’t nearly as important as I thought they were. There have been times when I’ve felt completely lost and unsure of what to do next and I’m sure I’ll make plenty more mistakes in the years ahead. That’s another thing I believe deeply. Growth is a lifelong pursuit, and our mistakes don’t have to define us!

As Christians, we recognize that we’re all sinners. None of us is perfect, and no matter how hard we try, we’re going to fall short sometimes. That doesn’t mean we should stop trying to become better people. We can acknowledge our mistakes, ask for forgiveness, learn from our experiences, and make different choices moving forward. Sometimes we’ll make progress, and sometimes we’ll find ourselves dealing with the same challenges all over again. What matters is that we keep getting back up and trying.

I’ve learned that personal growth isn’t something we accomplish once and then check off a list. It’s something we practice throughout our lives. We can always learn something new, improve a habit, strengthen a relationship, develop a skill, or become more thoughtful about how we treat other people. Even small changes can make a difference over time.

Something else I’ve been thinking about a lot lately is how much we need one another. I don’t believe any one person has all the answers, all the skills, or all the resources needed to solve every problem. That’s part of what makes our different gifts and talents so important. We depend on farmers to grow our food, teachers to educate our children, healthcare professionals to care for us, and countless other people who contribute to our communities every day. We also depend on our families, friends, neighbors, and sometimes complete strangers to help us through difficult times.

I think it’s easy to get caught up in our individual lives and forget how much we’re all connected. We spend so much time thinking about what we need to accomplish, what we want to buy, where we want to go, or what we need to do next. But what if we spent a little more time thinking about what we could contribute? What problems could we help solve? Who could benefit from something we’re good at? Where is there a need that we might be able to meet? And just as importantly, where do we need help from someone else?

I believe we accomplish more when we work together. Not everyone needs to be a leader, a business owner, a teacher, or a public speaker. We don’t all need to have the same goals or make the same contributions. In fact, I think we’re stronger because we don’t. When we recognize and appreciate one another’s strengths, we can support each other in ways that none of us could accomplish alone.

As I’ve been learning more about Christianity, I’ve also been thinking about what it really means to serve God in our everyday lives. I don’t think serving God has to mean doing something extraordinary or receiving recognition for our efforts. Sometimes it’s taking care of our families, helping someone who is struggling, doing our jobs well, being honest, showing kindness, or using our abilities to make something better.

I want to live a life where I’m continually looking for those opportunities. I want to keep learning, growing, exploring, and enjoying the life God has given me. I want to be a good wife, mother, friend, and member of my community. I want to use my education and experiences to help others, and I want to encourage people to recognize that they have something valuable to contribute too. I know I won’t always get it right. But I can keep trying.

That’s really what being a HyperStriver means to me. It’s not about constantly working harder, achieving more, or becoming some perfect version of ourselves. It’s about being intentional with our lives. It’s about discovering who we are, recognizing what matters most, developing the gifts we’ve been given, and finding ways to use them for something greater than ourselves.

And that’s what inspired me to put together the HyperStriver Creed. These are the beliefs I want to practice in my own life and share through the work I do.

I don’t know exactly where my own path will lead, and I’m becoming more comfortable with that. I don’t think I need to have every detail of my future figured out to live a meaningful life today. What I can do is continue learning, strengthen my relationship with God, take care of the people in my life, and look for opportunities to use what I’ve been given to help others.

My hope is that HyperStriver encourages other people to do the same because imagine what our world could look like if more of us made an intentional effort to discover our gifts, develop our talents, support one another, and serve God through the way we live.

We don’t have to change the entire world by ourselves, but we can each do something to make our little part of it better than we found it and I think that’s a pretty meaningful way to spend our lives.