When starting the Shae organization, I explained our philosophy, that giftedness implies purpose, to a woman who told me the story of how her son loved to draw. She showed me some of his artwork from his toddler years to first grade. It was obvious he was gifted, not just technically, but expressively. There was an inspiring insight from his perspective on life. When I asked to see more, her emotions percolated up. There was no more. Turns out, her son was told by his father that all boys who grow up to be artists are gay. The young boy put down the pencil and didn’t draw again.

Our first reaction is, “I would never say that.” But do any of these sound familiar?
“You can’t make a living doing that.’’
“You need to follow in your father’s footsteps.”
“But we planned on you going to this school.”
“It was good enough for your parents.”
“You’re really talented, but at some point you’ll have to get a real job.”

We’ve unknowingly caused an epidemic.

Recently, I gave a trilogy of seminars about discovering your giftedness and purpose. I’m always amazed that the line of people waiting to talk with me can usually be divided into two groups: the happy group—people who are thankful that someone finally validated that being creative is a Divine gift; and the conflicted group—people who want a how-to recipe to discover their giftedness, passion, and purpose.

In today’s digital and information age, we think we should be able to find the answer by Googling or reading it on Wikipedia, through intellectual and analytical processes. But in reality, it is arguably the shortest recipe ever written. Simply put: If you want the answer, ask your Creator. He’s the only one who actually knows. He knows precisely why you came out of the womb the way you did. Your parents do not know. The Church does not know. Certainly, society does not know. Why then do we tend to self-choose our own purpose in life, or worse, feel we know better how to choose for others, especially our children? It truly shows where our faith walk is headed—down a path of discontentment.