Hi Reader
Purpose Is a Privilege I Cannot Afford
That was the opening line of a conversation I had with a client.
Twenty-nine years in corporate. An extraordinary career. The kind of leader who quietly held organisations together while others took the credit. He had navigated roles, managed politics, delivered results, and built a reputation that most people spend entire careers chasing.
And then the question came.
What next?
He had started reading. The books, the articles, the LinkedIn posts. The ones that tell you to go after your purpose, follow your passion, find your why. And somewhere in all of that, he hit a wall.
"Purpose is a privilege," he said. "I can see where it comes from. But I cannot afford it."
I sat with that for a moment.
Because he was not wrong.
For many people, getting through the day is about putting food on the table, paying the bills, supporting a family, and getting to retirement with something left in the tank. For some, it is about breaking generational patterns. For others, it is carrying the weight of an extended family, depending on them.
When your survival is at stake, being told to follow your purpose can feel like advice from someone who has never had to choose between their calling and their rent.
That is real.
But here is what I said to him.
Purpose can only feel like a privilege if you do not have clarity.
The reason purpose feels out of reach for so many people is not that they cannot afford it. It is that they have never stopped long enough to get clear on what actually matters to them.
What is meaningful to them. What is energising. What they are actually building toward.
Without clarity, purpose becomes something that belongs to other people. Something you will get around to when the mortgage is paid off, when the kids are through university, when you have finally made it.
But that day rarely comes. Not because life does not get easier. But because without clarity, you keep moving the goalpost.
Jake Humphrey has interviewed some of the highest performing people on the planet. Premier League winners. Olympic champions. Multi-billionaires. And he said something recently that I have not been able to stop thinking about.
Watch this. It is 52 seconds.
If that landed, sit with it for a moment.
Because the question is not whether you recognise that pattern. You do. The question is whether you are still living it.
When COVID hit, and the world slowed down, millions of people suddenly had something they had not had in years: space to think. And what a lot of them realised was that what they were doing did not actually matter to them. Not in the way they had assumed it did.
People did not quit their jobs. They finally noticed the gap between the life they were living and the one they had intended to build.
The intention falls into the gap. And the gap quietly widens.
But here is what nobody says out loud about that gap. And this is the part that is particularly uncomfortable if you are reading this as someone who has already built something significant.
You cannot blame circumstance anymore.
The junior version of you had permission to say it was not the right time yet. Too early in the career. Too much to prove. Too many people depending on the next promotion, the next milestone, the next number. That story made sense then.
But you are not that person anymore.
You have navigated the politics. You have delivered the results. You have earned the room. And somewhere in the middle of all of that, the question you kept deferring became the question that defines everything else.
Not what am I building. But who am I building it for. And does it still reflect anything I actually believe in.
That is not a career question. That is a life question. And senior leaders are often the least equipped to answer it, not because they lack intelligence or insight, but because they have spent decades being rewarded for having answers rather than sitting with questions.
Clarity requires something that high performance actively trains out of you.
It requires stillness.
Nobody ever asks the person at the top "What can I do to help you grow?"
You are expected to have the answers, keep the momentum going, and deliver. And you do. Every single time. But when is it your turn?
That is exactly the conversation I want to have with you.
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I caught up with my client recently.
He stepped into a new role at almost 60. He has more time with his wife. He is thriving in a way he thought was done.
Not because he found some grand purpose statement. But because we sat down and deliberately designed what his life was going to look like. We got clear on what mattered, what did not, and what he had been carrying that was never really his to carry in the first place.
That is what clarity creates.
And here is what I want you to sit with this week.
Forget purpose for a moment. That question is too big and too abstract to be useful right now.
Instead ask yourself: what would I need to get clear on for my life to feel more intentional?
Not perfect. Not transformed. Just more intentional.
Clarity always comes before purpose. And purpose, when it is grounded in clarity, stops feeling like a luxury and becomes the thing you stop avoiding.
This Week's Reflection Questions
- You already know the thing you have been avoiding getting clear on. What would change if you stopped pretending you do not?
- Is there something you have been calling a constraint that is actually a choice you keep making?
- If you designed your next chapter intentionally, what would you keep? What would you let go?
- What is the one area of your life where a lack of clarity is costing you more than you are willing to admit?
If this newsletter made you pause, that pause is worth paying attention to.
The scorecard turns that feeling into clarity. [Take the scorecard here]
See you next Monday.
Closing The Intention Gap
Sope Agbelusi - Executive Coach, Facilitator, Strategist
