Purpose isn’t a place you arrive; it’s a way you move. Reading about purpose widens the frame; journaling about it turns insight into practice—pen in hand, noticing patterns, testing small steps, living more deliberately.
The four books below are a journey toward discovering one’s purpose: from finding meaning to unleashing possibility.
Grounding in Meaning
Man’s Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl
Frankl’s witness to the camps births logotherapy: we’re oriented by meaning, not comfort or power. He shows how purpose can be chosen—in work, in love, and even in suffering—by the way we respond.
Reframing Success & Commitment
The Second Mountain, David Brooks
From résumé virtues to relational commitments—vocation, family, philosophy/faith, community. It recasts “success” as contribution and belonging, not performance.
Designing & Practicing Purpose
Designing Your Life, Bill Burnett & Dave Evans
Design thinking for a life: the Good Time Journal (track energy), Odyssey Plans (alternate futures), and quick prototypes (conversations, tryouts) that turn “Who am I?” into next steps.
Unlocking Creative Possibility
The Art of Possibility, Rosamund & Benjamin Zander
Twelve practices that shift us from measuring to contributing, inviting others in and playing a bigger game with more grace.
As you read each of these titles, don’t just read them, work with them.
Put together, the journey moves from foundation to reframing to designing to expanding. The goal isn’t to finish the books—it’s to keep revisiting them as you live on purpose, one page and one small action at a time.
Photography by Shawn Chavez
