The Path Made Clear: Discovering Your Life's Direction and Purpose(3)
CHAPTER TWO
THE ROOTS
I don’t believe in coincidence. I know there is a divine order to the magnificent mystery of our lives.
—Oprah
One of my greatest joys is watching someone experience an aha moment.
I delight in seeing that person’s eyes light up with the spark of understanding. Especially when that recognition might change the trajectory of his or her life.
My hope at the start of every conversation is to expand hearts and to create an open space for learning. This is because I have always known that teaching is my true calling. It is the taproot from which all of my other skills and talents grow.
I felt this even when I was a little girl playing school in my grandmother’s yard, trying to get my cousins Willie Mack and Lonnie to spell the Bible names Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego correctly. Any chance I got to play teacher, I took.
Author James Hillman calls this the “oak within the acorn.” We were created as individual acorns, in need of nourishment and proper conditions to help us grow into mighty oak trees.
I firmly believe it is no coincidence that I ended up sharing wisdom with millions in what became the world’s largest classroom: The Oprah Winfrey Show. It wasn’t kismet, serendipity, or even plain old luck. I don’t believe in luck. For me, luck really means preparation meeting the moment of opportunity. I was born to teach. My only job was to listen, trust, and obey the call. The same is true for you.
In the following pages, you will read the stories of others who tapped into their unique essence, took a leap of faith, and now have a clear understanding of who they are and why they are here. Like me, they have come to know that there is no moving up and out in the world unless you are fully acquainted with the person you are meant to be.
What an unbelievable world we would live in if everyone were doing exactly what they were created to do.
A few years ago, I was talking about this very idea with Amy, my chief of staff. Amy’s job is to keep all of the trains in my life on track, while at the same time juggling a wide assortment of daily curveballs thrown our way. It involves a whirlwind of multitasking. As Amy and I talked about recognizing one’s early unique gifts, she had her own aha. She told me that when she was young, all she wanted for her eighth birthday was a filing cabinet. She just loved the idea of labeling the files and managing paperwork. She also had a calendar before there were events to write in it, and printed rainbow business cards so that people knew she could organize their lives. Now Amy’s job is to organize me, and it makes me smile to see her delight when she’s checking off a list. She followed her calling all the way to my office in Hollywood.
Of course, your purpose doesn’t have to be tied to your career. I have many friends who told me they knew they were meant to have children before they even understood what it was to conceive. I’ve always believed that accepting the call to be a mother is the choice to become the ultimate spiritual teacher. Because mothers live in service and sacrifice to their children.
Whatever your calling, it’s already rooted within you, and those roots can be trampled or tugged at but never removed. They grow stronger only when tended, nurtured—and, most important, shared with others.
My deepest desire is for people to get still enough to identify what makes them unique and connect to hope, possibility, and fulfillment in all areas of their life.
As author and spiritual trailblazer Gary Zukav so brilliantly taught me, when you align your personality with your purpose, no one can touch you.
—Oprah
NATE BERKUS
NATE BERKUS: I was the kid that cared so much about the things around me, cared so much about the way things looked, and more importantly the way things felt, that I was tortured by sharing a bedroom with my younger brother. For me it was my space, and my mother knew that. I don’t think she knew that I would end up working in design. I don’t think she knew that I would end up being on your show. I don’t think that anyone predicts or dreams for that. But what she did know was that her son was the kind of person that had to control the way a space felt and the way a space looked. I would get great pleasure out of not just the privacy—that wasn’t the point. It was the selection. It was the process. It was watching a space that was raw concrete walls in a basement be transformed into a space where I could live out my daily life.
OPRAH: Because the space around you reflects your inner spiritual space.
NATE: And I think it’s universal. I think no matter who we are or what we have or we don’t have, everybody wants to live better.
BRIAN GRAZER
OPRAH: So, you weren’t a great student.
BRIAN GRAZER: No.
OPRAH: And your mother was really upset with you because you were failing the third grade. Which is reason to be concerned.
BRIAN: Yes. I was totally failing the third grade.
OPRAH: But your grandmother wasn’t worried.
BRIAN: My grandmother wasn’t worried. She liked all the questions I asked. And would always give me an answer. And she’d always say, “Brian, you’re going to be special. You’re going to use this curiosity. You’re going to be a special kid.”
And I was often looking at my report card while she’s saying, “You’re going to be special.” My report card said all F’s and D’s. And I’m thinking, What does she know? What’s going on here? I’m getting all F’s and she’s telling me I’m going to be special. But she just had this sustained belief in me and validated me for asking questions and for my curiosity.