3 Questions to Find Your Purpose with Annette Sharpe

My guest is Annette Sharpe. Annette is a longtime entrepreneur. She is a business strategist, a culture builder, and a sacred gifts guide. We’re going to be talking about what a sacred gift is here. But she helps people to identify what their sacred gifts are. Then she helps them apply that knowledge so they can feel more on purpose in their lives. She’s been doing it for years. She’s obviously having an impact on a whole lot of people including Rock Thomas. I wanted to dive in, find out more what these sacred gifts are, see how we could use them to apply them to dreaming bigger, thinking better and doing more of what we were put on the planet to do. So, let’s get to this. Annette, welcome to DREAM THINK DO.

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Your Sacred Gifts

Twitter: @annettegfs

TRANSCRIPT: 

Annette Sharpe: Hey, Mitch, thank you for having me. I’m so excited to be here today.

Mitch Matthews: Absolutely. I’m so excited to get to finally hit record and do this conversation with you. But I know people were leaning in during just that introduction going, okay, “sacred gifts.” That sounds interesting. How do you describe the sacred gifts to someone?

Annette Sharpe: Well, we have a definition, actually, of what sacred gifts are and what they’re not. But sacred gifts are unexplained abilities that we have, from birth till death, that allow us to do ordinary things extraordinarily well. There’s a lot in that definition. When we talk about unexplained abilities, they really are that. There’s a lot of mystery to them. But what’s important, I think, in the definition is that we have them from birth, and we have them till the day we die. They’re not things we learn, they’re things that are innate in us and they’re part of a bigger part of us. These sacred gifts reside there. We have them as our way of giving back and being a contribution to the world.

Mitch Matthews: Absolutely. If we had them from birth, and we have them all through life, I would imagine that as people start to get clarity on that, though, it probably still feels pretty revolutionary, or at least reinforcing to be able to say, oh, yeah, that is something that I do well. As you help people figure this thing out, what do you see happen in people?

Annette Sharpe: Oh my gosh, yeah. What do we see happen? Well, first of all, thousands of people have been through the program. We have, I think, two things that people say the most. Number one, why didn’t I know this information before? And number two, thank God, I didn’t have that gift. There are a couple of things that people really come to understand. Number one, they get a better understanding of who they truly are at their core of their being.

One of the characteristics of sacred gifts that we teach is that we are made up of our humaneness and our beingness. Our humaneness is everything that makes us human. That’s our thoughts. That’s our beliefs, that’s our feelings, that’s our ego. It’s everything that we see. If we were to meet each other face to face, we’d have some ideas about who we are. But our sacred gifts are inside of us. They’re part of our beingness. They are something that basically we have, that we can’t explain, that allow us to do seemingly ordinary things in revolutionary types of ways.

There’s some people who go through the program, like you said, and they say, “Yeah, I was really good at that. It’s very affirming.” But for others, they realize that something that they’ve been very good at actually is a sacred gift, and it gives it more reverence. It’s something maybe they took advantage of or took for granted maybe and also helps them to reduce judgment on other people who they may have thought should be able to do things the way that they do. So, there’s just a whole bunch of different things that people get when they start to realize who they truly are and why they’re here.

Mitch Matthews: That’s awesome. Give us some examples of some sacred gifts.

Annette Sharpe: Okay. Well, one sacred gifts that I have that is alive and well in my life right now is the sacred gift of teaching. One thing I want to say about gifts is because they are in us from birth till death, it doesn’t mean they’re always active in our lives. But if we’re looking back over our lifetime, we’ll see evidence and clues of the gifts that we’ve had right from childhood most of the time, but they do go dormant. They can be active or dormant in our life.

Right now, the sacred gift of teaching is very active in my life. When I look back, though over time, and I look back to when I was a little girl, I was always playing school instead of house. Guess who was the teacher? It was me. I had my little chalkboard, I always had my students. We had our exercises. As I went through elementary school and into high school, I was tutoring, I was asked to teach a class in my high school math class. Went into university and then I was teaching rehabilitation exercises at a local pool. Then just throughout life, I can see evidence of different places where I was teaching and helping people to understand different things. But it was teaching different topics.

When you have a sacred gift, in this example, I’m using teaching, it doesn’t mean you use it in the same way throughout your life, but you’ll see evidence of it throughout your life. Another sacred gift that you probably have maybe would be the sacred gift of encouragement, or even facilitation. Where you’re holding the space for people to learn and to grow.

But there are 24 sacred gifts. As we go through, I’ll pull out some stories and some ideas of what gifts might be just depending on the questions that you ask and give your listeners some different ideas.

Mitch Matthews: Absolutely. I love it. DREAM THINK Doers as you can imagine are hungry for this kind of thing. I would imagine a lot have done strength finder type exercises. I know a lot are in the Bible. So, they’re diving into the spiritual gifts. How would you compare the sacred gifts to spiritual gifts, or the things listed in the Bible?

Annette Sharpe: Sure. Okay I love that question. The idea of sacred gifts actually comes from the spiritual gifts in the Catholic Church actually. The founder of the program, her name is Monique McDonald, she’s the creator of the Discover Your Sacred Gifts Program. She studied in California and went through a whole series of teachings and trainings about spiritual gifts and got a very clear download, a very clear message that she was to take all the religion out and make this accessible to everybody.

That’s what she did. She essentially took all the religious connotations out so that every single person on the planet would feel this pull or this call to understand what their sacred gifts are. The foundation of it actually comes from that. Where sacred gifts is different to something like strength finder, or the disc profile, or even Myers Briggs, those types of things is this because strength finder Myers Briggs really focuses on your personality; how you show up, how you problem solve what you do when you interact with other people. It’s more of a personality piece. Where the sacred gifts can be completely and actually often are completely in contrast to your personality. They have nothing to do with that whatsoever.

You can have sacred gifts that show up in a very different way than your personality. I’ll give you an example because this is another example of a gift. Is that okay with you, Mitch?

Mitch Matthews: Yeah, absolutely. I was just about ready to ask you, give me an example. I love it. So yes, absolutely.

Annette Sharpe: I’m going to give you an example of an old neighbor of mine. He was a kind man. But on the outside, he was very introverted. He appeared a little grumpy, he didn’t really look up too much when you’d pass him. He waved, but with his head down when he was walking his dog, that kind of thing. But this man had the sacred gift of service. It was so evident to me that he had this gift because anytime somebody in the neighborhood was out in their yard, doing some construction, working on anything, even gardening, whatever, he would literally walk into the yard, open up the gate and offer to help. This is something that people with the sacred gift of service will do. They see what needs to be done, and they go and they simply do it.

People with the sacred gift of service are the backbone of any organization. They’re the doers, they are the people who clean up the messes. They’re the people who see things that need to be done, they get the chairs, they don’t ask where are the chairs, they just go get the chairs, they set them up for people, that kind of thing.

In this case, in the personality, the humanness, beingness kind of piece with this neighbor of mine, his personality was introverted, quiet. I wouldn’t actually define them as friendly. But in his gifts, activating that sacred gift of service, he helped so many people. Knowing and understanding people through the lens of sacred gifts, releases any judgment that you might have towards them, and you see them as a sacred being doing their work in the world.

Every time he would come through the gate, if we were working on something, I was like, “Come on in, what do you want to help with?” He felt on purpose doing that. That’s just one way that you can use this work to actually improve your relationships with other people too.

Mitch Matthews: Absolutely, and understand others. I love that, and extend the grace. Absolutely, because it might be that okay, you may not have the sparkling personality but if you dig down yeah, that service is there and oh my gosh, what a generous person. Even though maybe generous with the smiles or whatever. I love that.

Well, rapid fire some of the other examples of gifts and then we’re going to go back through because, I’m guessing that some people will be like, I’m loving this, how do I figure mine out? But hit us up with just a few more examples of the sacred gifts and then we’ll dive into how people can start to figure that out for themselves.

Annette Sharpe: Sure. Actually, instead of going right into some gifts, I’ll give some tips in this example, but how about if I share this feel on purpose formula with your listeners? Because I think that that is the bigger piece. That is the piece that your listeners will start going, right, okay, I understand how to have myself feel on purpose using my gifts. The gifts are only a part of right of-

Mitch Matthews: Right on, I love it.

Annette Sharpe: If we start there, if we say that our goal is to help people to stop finding or searching for this one big purpose in life, and instead to look at how you can feel more on purpose in your life every single day, utilizing your gifts. We do that through something called the Feel On Purpose Formula, and there are four parts to it. The first part, of course, is to know what your gifts are. We’re going to start there because that is the program that we teach.

When you know what your gifts are, you know which of the 24 sacred gifts you have, you probably have a handful. It’s not like we spit out the top five gifts, but don’t get attached to the number, but maybe somewhere between four and eight. Some people have nine, some people have 10, it doesn’t really matter, but you’ll have your handful of gifts. When you apply your specific gifts to something that is meaningful to you, that’s the first step of feeling on purpose.

Let’s use an example. Let’s say you have the sacred gift of writing, and you desire to write great pieces of fiction. You have so much imagination, you want to write fiction. You know you have a gift in writing. But what you’re doing for work right now might be writing let’s say marketing copy for a shoe store. You’re writing the design or the descriptions of the different shoes, but you’re not feeling on purpose. Because what you want to be doing is applying that gift to the fictional writing.

The second piece of the Feel On Purpose Formula is to apply your gifts to something meaningful to you. Vice versa, you might be working in an organization that is meaningful to you, but not utilizing one or many of your gifts, and you won’t feel on purpose in that scenario either. So, you need to know what your gifts are, you need to apply them to something meaningful to you. The third part of the Fell on Purpose formula is to know who is benefiting from the use or the expression of your gifts. One of the characteristics of sacred gifts is that they are for the benefit of others. They’re not necessarily for us even though we feel energized, and we feel more on purpose when we use them, but when we know who is benefiting, and we hear the feedback from others, it helps us to feel more on purpose in our lives.

If you don’t know who you’re benefiting through your gifts, you can ask, is it people? Is it animals? Is it the planet? There’s a lot of great examples of one woman who has the sacred gift of compassion, and she uses that gift, which is a hands on gift to help those who cannot help themselves. She uses that sacred gift of compassion with plants. Everybody who has a dead and dying plant and admittedly I don’t have the greenest thumb, I’m really working on that. But, she has a couple of my plants. I take them over to her, she nurses them back to health, I bring them back, they look beautiful, and then I take them back again, a little while later because that’s not my gift.

Mitch Matthews: Yeah, if you’re like me, you’ve got a black thumb. My wife has a green thumb, I have a black thumb.

Annette Sharpe: I’m really working on it, Mitch. I’m really working.

Mitch Matthews: Yeah, I hear you.

Annette Sharpe: But I know she has this gift. When I bring a plant or anyone … Honestly, her house is like a jungle. You bring over this plant to her, and she welcomes it with open arms. She feeds it, she nurtures it. Anyway, who’s benefiting or what’s benefiting from her gift is in this case, plants. It could be puppies. It could be people, it could be specific sector of our population. Maybe it’s the elderly, maybe it’s children. So, you need to know who’s benefiting from your gifts.

Mitch Matthews: I think that’s huge. I want to interrupt for just a second because I love that knowing your gifts and applying your gifts. I think that is absolutely. But knowing who is benefiting, what’s benefiting, I think is huge. I think especially in the world that we live in now. Whether you’re working in technology or … There’s just a lot of times where a person’s removed from the audience they’re benefiting. They don’t have that feedback loop where they’re actually getting to connect and hear the impact, all of those things.

I can only imagine. I come across a lot of those folks that really are not feeling satisfaction, they’re doing an amazing job, but because that loop doesn’t exist, or because they’re not connected with who they’re benefiting, or are getting that feedback, they really feel unsatisfied. I think that’s really huge.

Annette Sharpe: I love that you brought that up, because sometimes I do trainings with organizations. One of the key pieces that I tell the leadership team. If there are any leaders on this call, or CEOs or anybody who’s working with a team, your job, really, if you want your team to feel more engaged and more inspired in their work and you want to have the retention of the people in your team, in your organization, they need to hear the feedback that what they’re doing matters in order for them to feel on purpose and connected to their work.

If you are top line and you’re receiving the thank you cards and you’re receiving the feedback, hearing from people that what you’re doing makes a difference, and there’s somebody in the back, who is let’s say, working in technology and isn’t hearing that feedback or isn’t receiving that type of affirmation, then it is your job as a leader in the organization to let them know. Share those things with them. Tell your people what they’re doing matters. Because that is where we see turnover in organizations that when people aren’t feeling on purpose in their work. It’s a great point. I’m really glad you brought that up.

Mitch Matthews: Yeah, absolutely. Well, bring us home. When [inaudible 00:19:37] apply the gifts to something meaningful … I do think that that’s an important differentiation to. It’s not just applying your gift, it’s not just working that muscle, but knowing it’s connected to something meaningful for you, and then also know who or what is benefiting from that-

Annette Sharpe: Actually, let me clarify one thing on the meaningful piece. If you’re sitting there listening to this and saying, but I don’t know what’s meaningful to me, here’s some questions you can ask yourself. What are you excited about? What are you passionate about? What would you like to do that would make a difference in the world? Who would you like to help? How would you like to help them?

Those are all some little trigger questions that you can ask to figure out what you’re passionate about. There are many ways that you can figure out what you’re passionate about, but it’s applying your gifts to that thing. That is important. The last piece of the Feel On Purpose Formula is to take all of that, everything that we’ve just talked about, and to apply all of that through a vehicle that makes sense to who you are as a person. When I say vehicle, I’m talking about a business, being a full-time employee, a part-time employee, a contractor, freelancer, volunteer, or even less formal, through our parenting, through our friendships, through our relationships.

Other vehicles might be, well, this is a vehicle, a podcast. Speaking engagements, blogging, all those types of things, the list is endless. But the vehicle needs to align with who you are and your humaneness. There are many people who simply love building a business, they are so entrepreneurial, they’re so excited to get out there and build their business and make that impact. Then there are others who really, really don’t want to do that.

We need to know ourselves, we need to know ourselves well enough to find a vehicle that works for the expression of our gifts. I think that’s where some people don’t feel on purpose is when they’re doing something that just doesn’t fill them up, or it might even completely drain their energy. So, you need to find a vehicle that works for you.

Mitch Matthews: I think that’s a huge awareness too, and it’s something we came across in a complimentary version of that when I did all the research for my latest book called, Dream Job Redefined. I interviewed about 200 people that were in work that they loved. They’ve either found or created jobs and work that they love. But what was interesting was a number of those folks, probably about 40%, they were doing work that was satisfying, but it wasn’t necessarily work that they loved. The satisfaction and the purpose actually came from where they were volunteering, or what they were doing outside of work. That was enough for them. That carried them.

We had one extreme athlete who went and did swimming all around the world. He was really good at what he did. But it wasn’t necessarily his passion, because he knew that his work allowed him to do some of the things outside of work that he loved to do. He felt just really on purpose. So, he could sit through just about any meetings about any task with a big smile on his face because he was on purpose in part of his life. I think that that’s a really important point that sometimes the vehicle is our work, it’s our career. But sometimes it’s finding that other thing. Maybe it’s outside the job, but that will fuel you so that you can do some of the things.

Now, obviously if you can get both at work and in volunteering and all of that and all of its in alignment, then you’re on fire.

Annette Sharpe: You know what, I think the goal really is, Mitch, to find a way to feel on purpose more often. That is really the key. It’s not about having everything working all the time perfectly, because we all have to do things we don’t necessarily love to do sometimes. We have to do these things where we’re part of a community, we’re part of life. But the goal is to feel on purpose more often, to find ways to apply this Feel On Purpose Formula, more often in your life. To know all of your gifts, to understand all of them and find different ways to apply them in in your life.

It’s not one formula for the purpose. I want to go back to that. It’s not you’re finding one purpose in your life. Because if you’re in that mindset of I need to find my purpose. And if I don’t find my purpose, then my life is meaningless. Well, that would mean that everything you’ve done up until now in your life had no purpose. We know that that’s not true. Because everything that you’ve done up until now has brought you to where you are today, which will bring you to where you’re going tomorrow.

Our job is to find a way to feel on purpose more often so that we can be of greater contribution to others, so that we can be of greater service, so that we can benefit the people who we are helping when we’re utilizing our gifts whether we’re being paid or not.

Mitch Matthews: Yeah, absolutely.

Annette Sharpe: It’s the whole life idea.

Mitch Matthews: I think one of the big challenges that we talked to you too, especially as people, they’re dreaming bigger, thinking better and doing more of what they were put on the planet to do. A lot of times though, one of the big interrupts that happens when people are searching out and saying, okay, I want to find a career where I truly feel on purpose and feel satisfied, all of those things. I think you’re right. I think one of the big challenges, and I can speak to this personally because I’m also a recovering perfectionist. This is one of the things that I wrestle with from time to time is that whole thing of like, honing in and saying, all right, I’ve got to figure out the one thing. The one path, the one option.

Then you’re always wrestling like well, is this the one? Is this it? If it’s not, then oh my gosh, you can get stirred up, you can feel stuck, all of those things. What I love about what you’re talking about with uncovering those sacred gifts, is that it’s really a combination, and ebbing and flowing of these gifts, as opposed to saying all right, teaching. Teaching, is it, that is the one and only. I’m going to do that in every facet of my life.

Because I’m guessing with you, it’s teaching and a number of your other gifts that then make it truly complimentary, truly satisfying, and allow you to really feel on purpose.

Annette Sharpe: Yeah. Sometimes the gifts that we have … I love how you articulated that, by the way, it was really poignant. Actually, it sounds like you know exactly what I’m talking about, what we’re talking about here. But it is an ebbing and flowing of the gifts. Sometimes it’s not even a seeking out opportunities to use our gifts. Sometimes we do, we seek out opportunities to use our gifts. But sometimes the opportunities just present themselves.

When that happens, and you know what your gifts are and you take the opportunity, you seize the day, you seize the opportunity, you do. That’s the doing part.

Mitch Matthews: Yep, absolutely.

Annette Sharpe: You feel more alive because you’re activating those gifts. Let me ask you a question, and I don’t know if you have this gift. But if you or someone you know, had the sacred gift of encouragement as an example, this is a listening gift. Let’s imagine that you had the most draining, exhausting day of your life. Nothing went right. It was just a terrible, difficult day. You get to 10 o’clock at night and all you want to do is just lie on the couch and recover, because it was that kind of a day.

But at 10 o’clock at night, the phone rings, and it’s your closest friend who needs an ear. Do you find that if you have this gift, that you perk up, and you’re able to be there for your friend despite what was going on for you during that day. Sometimes those opportunities, we don’t seek them out, but they find us and people who know and understand your gifts, they do so sometimes inherently, you know who your listening friends are, you know who the people are who you go to for advice, you know, who you go to, when you need planning of some sort, you need something handled. We all have these gifts, and they’re called out in us based on life circumstances.

I think that’s an important piece too, is to grab it.

Mitch Matthews: I love how you even talked about, or mentioned Myers Briggs as an example. Very powerful tool, very effective in certain areas. But I like how you’re talking about how this is removed from more of a personality based assessment, whereas this goes deeper than that. Because I am a lean introvert. As you were going down that trail, I’m like, is she going to ask me if I would stand in front of an audience of 300? It’s like, well, I could. But as for that introvert, all I want to do is that quiet, get away, all of that. But you can, especially if you’re pulling from your gifts, there’s a good chance that that tank involving your gifts goes deeper. Like, oh, I could scoop out a little bit more if I needed to truly encourage someone. If I called it that, if it was somebody I loved, all of that. You could you could find those reserves, especially if they relate to your gifts.

Annette Sharpe: Or they find you. They find you. It’s like you don’t even try, it’s just there. I’ll give you some clues of sacred gifts, because your listeners are probably wondering, well, okay, how do I find out what my gifts are? What can I start looking for right now for signs of sacred gifts? We have four signs, and one of them is that, that you feel energized. That you can scoop, as you said, scoop that energy out, and it just shows up.

But there’s an acronym we use, and it’s FREE, F-R-E-E. When you’re looking for signs of sacred gifts, the first thing you’re looking for is, the F is feedback. You hear feedback naturally from others, they’ll say things like, “I never thought of it that way before. Thank you.” Or, “I can’t believe you can do things that way. You make it look so easy.” That kind of thing.” You’re hearing feedback from others. The second is the repeated patterns like we talked about before, this gift of teaching throughout my life.

If you look back in your life, you’ll see repeated patterns of gifts in action in your life. Third is energizing, fills you up, makes you energized, even if it’s just lying on a couch at 10 o’clock at night and somebody needs you, it’s pulled out of you. So, it’s energizing to you. The fourth is the extraordinary results. You’re seeing results that not just anybody could achieve. Those four things together, if they’re all there, chances are, there’s a sacred gift in action.

Mitch Matthews: Yeah. That’s amazing. I love it. I want to keep going. We could talk for hours, we’re going to take quick break from this. We’re going to give a shout out to our sponsor. When we come back, though, I also want to talk about monetizing your gifts. Because I know you’ve got some wisdom to share on that front. I know we just got some people to lean in. Did I just hear a [inaudible 00:30:46] But it is that. It is important to talk about how do we monetize this and where is that important? Where is that relevant, and where maybe we want to stay away from it. So, quick shout from our sponsor, and then we’ll be right back.

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All right, awesome. We’re back. We’ve been talking about sacred gifts. This has been powerful stuff. I love it. Getting to know that on purpose formula, knowing your gifts, applying your gifts to something meaningful, knowing who or what is benefiting and then applying those things to a vehicle. We’ve been talking about how do you figure those things out to the feedback, the repeated patterns being energized by them, looking for those extraordinary results?

So, awesome. I’m guessing everybody’s like, all right, I am in but now, is it okay to monetize them?

Annette Sharpe: Yeah. How do I make money?

Mitch Matthews: How do I make that happen? What does that look like? Walk us through that part of this whole algorithm.

Annette Sharpe: Okay, I’m really glad you brought that up, because it is one of the most common questions that we get asked is, now that I know what my gifts are, and I understand this Feel on Purpose Formula, how do I monetize my gifts? I think we actually inadvertently answered the first part of this call because the gifts, if you’re really understanding what I’m talking about here, the gifts or monetizing the gifts is not a function of the gifts.

Monetizing the gifts is actually a function of the vehicle. We talked about people finding a job or finding work or career or business. Ideally, you’d be utilizing your gifts in a business that’s generating income for you, or in a profession or career that’s generating an income for you. Then you’re going to utilize other gifts to let’s say, feel more on purpose in your life. But the function of monetizing is the function of the vehicle. So, you need to be smart about which vehicle you pick and where you need to be working in order to monetize in the way that you want to monetize.

Some vehicles bring in more income than others. Volunteering, not such a high return on investment, but very fulfilling. That is where I think the focus needs to be if you’re talking money, is what vehicle are you going to use to generate that income and create that lifestyle that you want? Ideally, applying your gifts in that vehicle is going to help you to feel on purpose. But the gifts by themselves, they’re not meant to be monetized.

If we look at the characteristics of the gifts, one of them is that they’re our way of giving back, that they’re our way of being of service, and they’re our way of being of benefit to others. That is the function of the gift, not the monetizing piece. But I love it, and I think that it all goes together. That they’re not totally separate. But if you can focus on the vehicle as your way of monetizing whatever it is that you’re doing and applying your gifts to that, that’s where that focus needs to be.

Mitch Matthews: I think it’s a great point. Because it’s that whole thing of being able to say, what vehicles suit us best? Where can we be using our gifts so that we are doing something that’s meaningful? As an example, I was just thinking, yes, you nailed me. I do have that gift of encouragement. It’s something when I look back, there’s a lot of repeated experiences, behaviors there. Where I’ve been successful, has come from my ability to listen, draw out, reflect back, all of that.

Now, it’s been a big part of what’s made a lot of my relationships really satisfying in life. It’s been a big part of my faith walk, where I participate in church, but it’s also a huge part of my business. It is a part of the podcasting, but also I do a lot of coaching. I’m coaching executives, I’m the safe place. I’m at a place that they can share ideas and not be worried about being judged. I’ll be able to help them process through different ideas without bias, all of those things and that comes from my gifting.

Now, it’s also something I get paid really well to do. But at the same time, it’s like, I see that gift play out in so many different areas of my life. So, I’m grateful that part of that also brings in some good income and that kind of thing. But when I look at a number of the gifts based on previous conversations that we’ve had too, I know some of my other gifts, and those probably they play into other areas of my life, but not all of them play into my business, and all of that.

Some of them probably, depending on those gifts, depending on your combination of gifts, can apply to work, monetization, all of those things. Others might apply to other areas of your life where you just gain satisfaction or all of those things.

Annette Sharpe: Exactly. Encouragement is a great example of a gift that can be used in so many different ways. Because using that example I gave before about a friend calling at 10 o’clock and you perk up. The gifts you’d be using there might be encouragement. What’s meaningful to you is your friend who’s benefiting is the friend, and the vehicle is simply listening or friendship. That’s the vehicle, or even love in that case. Nobody’s getting paid for that.

But in your work, the gifts of encouragement and maybe wise counsel as well, maybe even challenge, maybe even some teaching gifts in there, those gifts apply to what’s meaningful to you is being of service to the greater good and helping people to grow and understand who’s benefiting. In this case, the listeners, the vehicle right now is the podcast, or the vehicle might be coaching.

Encouragement is a natural coaching gift actually. I don’t think I’ve met any coach personally, that doesn’t have that gift, although I’m sure there are. But coaching is a vehicle. It’s a beautiful vehicle. I’m a coach too. It’s looking at that Feel On Purpose Formula in different ways. If you’re listening to this, and you want to write that down, think about the different things that are meaningful to you. Because there’s got to be more than one. Think about the different people you benefit and the vehicles that really light you up and excite you, and then start applying your gifts in those ways.

Mitch Matthews: I couldn’t agree more. I think that’s brilliant. I do think, again, the On Purpose formula, I think that there’s a lot of folks that maybe have spent a lot of time, maybe even done some of the other Strength Finders and those kinds of types of activities, which are great. But it’s that diving down and saying, okay, wait, but are you applying them to something that feels meaningful? Can you get feedback? Are you connecting with people that benefit from it, or you can see the benefits of it in applying that vehicle?

I think the application … You know, I’m all about the doing part. Let’s make it happen. I love it. whether somebody knows all 24 gifts or not, they can walk through this and go, okay, I’m going to start looking for those things like you’re saying, looking for the feedback, waiting for those patterns. But I’m guessing if they’re feeling unsatisfied, if they’re feeling frustrated with their work, or their [inaudible 00:38:44], or maybe even in some of their relationships, I’m guessing that being able to dig into some of this stuff is really going to be able to help them say, all right, I either need to make some changes, or I need to change the way I’m looking at this. I think that’s huge.

Annette Sharpe: It is.

Mitch Matthews: I always love to wrap this up with one last, we call the wisdom of the week. What’s one last pearl? You’ve provided so much, Annette, I love it. What’s one last thing that’s helped you, whether it comes to the sacred gifts and living on purpose or not, but what’s something that helps you to stay on track and live more on purpose?

Annette Sharpe: Thank you for that question. I will relate it back to knowing and understanding gifts. Because every single day, because I live and breathe this stuff, I’m seeing gifts in other people where others wouldn’t notice. It helps me to walk through life with a very different perspective on who I am and how I’m showing up, and also who I can help. But also calling out gifts and fostering the gifts in others, which is so meaningful to me as a leader.

Even as a parent, my goodness, just to be able to foster those gifts in my children, to see the gifts in others, it’s a perspective shift. Knowing that I can tweak one piece of this formula and change everything, I think that might be the big takeaway is if you are feeling unsatisfied or disconnected or unhappy in any part of your life, to take a look at that formula. It might not be throwing the baby out with the bathwater, it might be you just need to tweak one element of the Feel On Purpose Formula. that can be so life changing for so many people. Again, it’s a perspective shift. I think that would be the piece that I would share as my takeaway.

Mitch Matthews: I love it. Annette, man, you have brought so much value. Rock was right on. Now, I can see why he was pointing us in your direction. How do people find out more about you and get to connect with you?

Annette Sharpe: Okay. Well, I think where I’d like to send your listeners is to the sacred gifts website to find out more about the program. You can always connect with me there too. The website is yoursacredgifts.com. If you’re interested in doing a self-study course, we do have that available online too. There’s a button there that says self-study course. But it’s yoursacredgifts.com/audioseries. You can find me on Facebook. I’m around. I would love to connect with anyone who has any questions and wants to know more.

Mitch Matthews: Awesome, we’ll put those links in with this episode as well.

Annette Sharpe: Thanks you.

Mitch Matthews: But Annette, thanks for doing what you do. You’re making the world a better place.

Annette Sharpe: Thank you very much. So are you, Mitch, it was a pleasure. I had so much fun.

Mitch Matthews: All right, DREAM THINK Doer, what do you think? I’d love to hear your thoughts on this particular conversation. Leave a comment on what stood out to you!