How do you measure the size of a life?

A letter to the part of me chasing bigness.

If you’ve followed me for some time, you know I write a lot about parts work.

Because I’m trained in Internal Family Systems, I pay attention to what parts of me are loudest and, sometimes, enter into a mental dialogue with those parts. Earlier this year, I confronted the part of me who wants to live larger.

She sounds like this:

Stop playing small. You’re so much better than the best you’re giving right now. Push yourself. A big life is out there for you.

What is big, I wondered. Is bigger better?

How does one measure the size of a life?

Discovering Dharma

Since exploring this part, much has changed. I left my salaried job to pursue brand strategy work independently. I abandoned my post as Chief of Staff at a creative agency where I did big important things every day.

Is this the opposite of what that part of me wanted? Did my life become smaller?

As an ode to my former role, I’ll use an agency fave here: let’s circle back on this. :)

Years ago, when I started exploring a simultaneous career path in personal transformation space (hypnotherapy, IFS, breathwork, coaching), I couldn’t help but think the brand process could be fruitful for individuals. Not just entrepreneurs, but any individual.

In pursuit of creating such an offering, I started studying dharma.

Dharma is a Sanskrit word that loosely translates to one’s sacred calling. I have become obsessed with dharma—unearthing it, naming it and pursuing it with wild abandon.

I joined an inspiring group called Dharma Artist Collective (DAC) where I was turned onto a game-changing book, The Great Work of Your Life.

Author Stephen Cope outlines a guide to living one’s dharma. He presents it through the lens of the ancient Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad Gita, but also through the lives of famous dharma artists (a term coined by DAC founder Erick Godsey)—among them Jane Goodall, Susan B. Anthony, Walt Whitman and Henry David Thoreau.

Herein lie the breadcrumbs drastically shifting my desire to chase a big life…

Thoreau’s Little Life at Walden Pond

Thoreau’s most famous book, Walden, is a reflection on simple living in natural surroundings. The book is based on his experiences during two years, two months and two days living in a cabin near Walden Pond in Massachusetts.

What most don’t realize is that, prior to this simple living experiment, Thoreau tried to build a big career by conventional means, attempting to break into the literary scene of New York. And failed.

“Throughout his entire year in New York, Thoreau never managed to publish more than one slim book review, in spite of his powerful determination to be published with the big boys.”

It wasn’t until Thoreau went home and made his life smaller that he was able to tap the tree of his genius.

Here, he produced complete drafts of full books and essays in a given week, many which have become global best-sellers and required reading in American grade schools.

What can we make of this?

A Life of Impact

I hear the word “impact” a lot amongst younger generations. My own brand positioning when I went independent was written for “impact-driven entrepreneurs.” What I meant by this was: people who are looking to leave a large mark on this world. People who sought bigness.

Those were the people I wanted to be in a room with because that is what I aimed to be.

When I inquired with this bigness-seeking part of me, I found my aim was rooted in conditioning about what it means to live a good life. One that I could be proud of.

My subconscious believed I had to be lauded on a mass scale to be proud. Perhaps in part because my dad was a VP at a Fortune 500. Those are big shoes. But I also think it’s a product of the times.

In the digital media age—a time when fame is one viral video away, we are conditioned to believe notoriety and volume (likes, reviews, audience size) are quantifiers for a fulfilled life. That a good life is one that has enduringly moved the most people.

Now studying Thoreau and other great dharma artists, I’m not so sure about that.

Trading Bigness for Fullness

The dharma artists in this book have named their gifts—that which is most alive within them—and pursued them to their fullest ability.

If this is the closest thing we have to a prescription for fulfillment, then chasing a big life could be the very thing that keeps us from living a full life.

How many people lose their authentic essence because they’re chasing a life of grandiosity? How many forsake their dharma for a shot at fame or status?

Well, a lot. Number one in Bronnie Ware’s Top Five Regrets of the Dying:

“I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself. Not the life others expected of me.”

On the other hand, how many people are pouring themselves into their vocation, having deep impact on a one-on-one level and feeling totally fulfilled? I imagine a lot. But we don’t often hear those stories. They’re not sexy.

When I think of a full life, I imagine a vessel—something that holds and encompasses the full spectrum of our experiences.

Perhaps we ought to be more concerned with filling our vessel with steady dharma work, making it grow from the inside instead of stretching it to the max in anticipation of bigness and finding that life largely empty.

As Cope posits, perhaps our mission is to find the labor that feeds us—that fills us up—and do it without any regard to the fruit.

Take a detour into the leading voices of our time on creativity (Liz Gilbert, Rick Rubin, Stephen Pressfield) and you’ll find they most certainly agree.

“You can measure your worth by your dedication to your path, not by your successes or failures.” — Elizabeth Gilbert, Big Magic

Think of the Small as Large

Thoreau’s grand impact wasn’t really seen until after his death. He had notoriety, but not near the volume of impact that we know today. In its first year as a published work, Walden sold a mere 300 copies.

Still, many would say he was self-actualized in this period of great dharma art. While his pursuits in New York were aimed at growing his vessel, the real fulfillment occurred with solitude, a small cabin and just enough of a stretch:

In New York, Thoreau was reaching too high. He had an idea of greatness. But it became a rigidly held concept that disconnected him from his true greatness, which was both smaller and larger than he thought. At Walden, however, Thoreau was right sized. At Walden he undertook just a small experiment. He was comfortable enough, yes. But he was just a little uncomfortable, too. There was a stretch. And right in that balance, Thoreau found the correct size for his life. And his dharma exploded with energy.

Think of the small as large.

— Stephen Cope, The Great Work of Your Life

Have I made my life smaller?

In a way, yes. I’m not working with multi-million dollar developers and organizations these days. I’ve found myself working with more individuals. Bad ass dharma artists. Doctors, healers, coaches and the like.

In another way, it has become larger. Leaving the safety of salary was a stretch. It’s required me to fully commit to taking the driver’s seat of my life.

In the stretch, writing brand positioning and identity for entrepreneurs has inspired me to pursue my long-held notion that this brand process could be transformational for all individuals.

Work feels more like a prayer these days. It’s not always easy but it always feeds me. As does sitting here writing this essay.

The word enthusiasm comes from the Greek Entheos—meaning God within.

There is nothing to gain in these words but the full expression of my enthusiasm to help you find your own.

Pay attention to what lights you up, my friend. It’s illuminating your dharma. Find the work that feeds you. Create just enough stretch. In that space, do your small part. Every single day.

Nothing is bigger than this.