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Dustin Peterson is a leadership trainer with Proof Leadership Group and works with organizations to help develop their culture. He is also the author of Reset: How to Get Paid and Love What You Do, and coaches individuals to help them get unstuck in their careers. He has served in a stake presidency in Houston, Texas, and also on a high council and as an early morning seminary teacher, and currently serves as a branch president. In this interview, originally recorded as a Facebook Live session, Dustin talks about clarifying personal purpose to better lead in all areas of your life.

Highlights

4:45 About Dustin and what he does as a leadership trainer and career coach

6:00 Where his passion for purpose came from

7:30 Research study: What makes you an effective leader? Identified the only commonality is a clear sense of purpose with a story to go with it

10:15 Transferring this knowledge into the gospel and the church

12:20 Most of us just want to help other people, but we need to get more specific

13:10 What purpose is: your intention to contribute to the well-being of other people

15:20 The concepts for individual and organizational purpose are the same

16:55 Purpose can be confused with goals or a mission; focusing internally is demotivational

18:00 Your purpose is Your Big Why: What drives you

18:35 To identify your purpose you first need to know three things

1. Purpose is broad and ambitious: a big, bold statement
   • It serves as an umbrella over everything
   • It’s what wakes us up in the morning
   • It’s what motivates us to move forward and pulls us through the hard things
   • “Be anxiously engaged in a good cause”
   • Example of hospital custodial staff who saw themselves as healers
   • 29:20 Macro-purpose, micro-purpose, nano-purpose: everything I do should have purpose
   • 32:00 Dissonance of having a strong purpose and having goals that drive you elsewhere: purpose is the unifying force
2. 33:20 Purpose is short: 10 words or less
   • Share it with other people
   • Edit it down
3. 36:15 Purpose comes from the ups and downs of your life
   • Draw a journey map line
   • Purpose lies in the past, not the future

39:00 Routines to keep your purpose top-of-mind: reading it out loud as an affirmation

40:30 Example of ward council/bishopric purposes: look at the evolution of the unit you are in

• Let it guide all your goals
• Let the goals then guide your agenda

44:30 When your calling seems to be outside your purpose: example of educator looking for a way to stop dreading cafeteria duty

48:15 A purpose can’t be identified in isolation; we can help others by being a listening ear and by reflecting what we see from the outside

50:10 What has helped shape who I am today? Questions to ask yourself to help identify your purpose:

1. What three people have most shaped who I am today, and why?
2. What are three experiences that have most affected you and why?
3. What are three interests that are most motivating and fulfilling?
4. Imagine you could write the script for you life, knowing everything would go as well as it possibly could. What is the story you’d like to see unravel before you?
5. What is a problem that you see in your family/church/community/city that really bothers you and you want to solve? What is a problem you see that you really want to get to the heart of, that’s near and dear to who you are?

52:05 Two forces push against us when it comes to the choice to step up and lead: resistance from the adversary telling us not to grow (fear, lack of confidence, self-doubt) and the reaffirming voice of the Lord telling us to lift where you stand

Links

Leading with Your God-Given Talents | An Interview with Dustin Peterson
Reset: How to Get Paid and Love What You Do
https://thepurposeblueprint.com/training
Email: dustin at proofleadership.com
Read the TRANSCRIPT of this podcast