Council for Health and Human Service Ministries

Word and Deed: Thoughts on Faith-Based Leadership

Ten Provocative Perspectives for Vocational Guidance

Some of us long to do work that we feel we have been called to do, while others work unceasingly doing the work they love and fulfilling their calling. Regardless of where you are in the continuum of life, your willingness to serve is what matters. In his book entitled Let Your Life Speak - Listening to the Voice of Vocation, Parker J. Palmer discusses his longing to discern divine guidance that embraces and integrates all aspects of his being. "To embrace weakness, liability, and darkness as part of who I am gives that part less sway over me, because all it ever wanted was to be acknowledged as part of my whole self."

Palmer's story is deeply personal and for some it can be unsettling. However, his quest for spiritual revelation through a challenging depression is a story of transformation and spiritual revelation. Palmer reminds us that our gifts come to us in many forms but are not easily recognized if they're not beautifully wrapped. Palmer's provocative reflections may inspire you to look at your own gifts in a totally new way:

  1. Ask yourself the question: Is the life I am living the same as the life that wants to live in me?
  2. Before I can tell my life what I want to do with it, I must listen to my life telling me who I am.
  3. Before you tell your life what you intend to do with it, listen for what it intends to do with you.
  4. Before you tell your life what truths and values you have decided to live up to, let your life tell you what truths you embody, what values you represent.
  5. Vocation does not come from willfulness. It comes from listening.
  6. Learn to listen for guidance from within.
  7. The soul speaks its truth only under quiet, inviting, and trustworthy conditions.
  8. If we can learn to read our own responses to our own experience - a text we are writing unconsciously every day we spend on earth - we will receive the guidance we need to live more authentic lives.
  9. The deepest vocational question is not "What ought I to do with my life?" It is the more elemental and demanding "Who am I? What is my nature?"
  10. Vocation at its deepest level is, "This is something I can't not do, for reasons I'm unable to explain to anyone else and don't fully understand myself but are nonetheless compelling."

Shirley Nelson

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