Every single individual is born with the potential to fulfill God’s purpose for their life. These potentials are the things you could do that you haven’t done and the abilities you possess that you haven’t tapped into.
Now, many of us are aware that we possess potential but pointing them out can be difficult sometimes. In this post, I’ll be highlighting the 12 keys to discovering your gifts taught by Dr. Myles Munroe.
Before going to the keys, you must first understand that the discovery of your gifts is something you have to do by yourself. What these questions will do is guide you towards the discovery— they won’t show you your gifts—you will discover them.
What Is A Gift by Dr. Myles Munroe?
According to Dr. Myles Munroe, a gift is an inherent capacity to fulfill a function that meets a need in creation. No one can give it to you; you come with it. It cannot be learned; you came with it.
A gift is not necessarily the loud talents we celebrate like dancing or singing. ANY capacity you possess to satisfy a need people have is your gift. Anything you can give to help people, any solution you can offer to problems, any contribution you can make and service you can offer is your gift. Your gift is the source of your value and it is defined by your purpose.
12 Keys To Discover Your Gifts by Dr. Myles Munroe
1. What Is My Deepest Desire?
Because your whole being— your psychology and biology— is designed by God intentionally for one purpose (His purpose for your life), your deepest desires will be aligned with your potential even if the abilities aren’t glaring yet because they may need to be refined.
Your deepest desires aren’t just things that you fancy or things you feel you can do but things you’re kind of assured you must do.
2. What Am I Truly Passionate About?
These questions are gearing you towards the same abilities so don’t feel unproductive if you’re not finding many answers.
You are passionate about a thing when you spend or can spend so much time on it without getting bored. If you look well enough, you are already engaging in your passions in some form, you just aren’t taking it as something serious.
You feel at home around your passion and doing it comes naturally to you even when other people around you think it’s weird or boring.
Note that passion is in an area of production, not consumption. So you can’t say for instance that your passion is watching Netflix or playing video games. Video games can become a passion when for instance you’re intrigued by the psychology behind them and you dutifully study it. That way you are producing theories or findings as against just enjoying (consuming) the game.
3. What Makes Me Angry?
What gets you upset is another pointer to your gifts. Mostly, when you continually find something upsetting, it’s because you possess the innate ability to make it better. Spotting that it’s not good enough is an ability in itself because many people don’t see anything wrong with it, the same thing that upsets you.
So once you find yourself continually getting upset about anything, take a deeper look to find a solution to that issue and you’ll see things you can do but never know.
4. What Ideas Are Persistent in My Heart and Mind?
Another key to discovering your gifts is paying attention to the ideas that never leave you. Perhaps you have become preoccupied with other things, but this idea always returns to your thoughts. It is a passion that won’t subside, a persistent desire or tug at your heart.
5. What Do I Constantly Imagine Myself Doing?
What do you imagine yourself becoming? What do you really want to do that you may not have told anyone else about? It may be something you think about while you’re at your workplace and wish you could be doing instead of your current job. It may be something you see others doing, and you say to yourself, I’d like to do something like that.
You might just need to give it a try and you’ll discover abilities you never knew you had.
6. What Do I Want to Do for Humanity?
The purpose of your gifts and talents is contribution— contribution to humanity. In what way do you feel you can be a blessing to others? Even if it’s just a faint feeling. What do you see in society that you wish you could help with?
7. What Would Bring Me the Greatest Fulfillment?
Fulfillment is a sense of satisfaction. There are some tasks that you get energized by doing. Not necessarily energy that gets you jumping, but the energy/satisfaction of “doing this was fun regardless of the challenges”.
Fulfillment is closely tied to progress. You are fulfilled because you feel you have made progress and the presence of progress points to an ability that has made the progress happen.
8. What Would I Do for No Money or Other Compensation?
Similar to measuring your fulfillment level from activities, another key to discovering your gifts and talents is identifying something you would do for no paycheck. If money weren’t an issue (let’s say you have $100 billion to yourself) but you must work, what work would you do?
You can as well start moving in that direction now. Many times, it’s not as though we aren’t aware of our potential or gifts, it’s just that we are clouded by the realities of life (bills, reputation, expectations, social pressure, etc) that we choose to ignore or belittle our abilities.
9. What Would I Rather Be Doing?
If you were to choose a better vocation than the one you’re currently doing, what vocation would it be? If you were to contribute towards a cause better than the one you’re currently contributing to, what would it be?
10. What Would I Do If I Knew I Could Not Fail?
Fear can be a powerful inhibitor to thinking clearly, and it may take you a little while to get past any feelings of fear so that you can think and dream without hindrance. If you could do anything in the world and know that it would succeed, what would you do?
First, eliminate superficial answers to this question! Some of those would be winning the lottery, getting back at everyone who has ever insulted you, and so forth.
Instead, this question is designed to help you to eliminate the fear and doubt that can crowd into your mind and block your thoughts when you begin to think about what you would really like to do in life. Forget the fear and doubt and consider nothing to be impossible.
11. What Is the Most Important Thing I Could Do with My Life?
What’s that one thing you’d regret not doing if you looked back at your life while close to death? If you could only leave one legacy on earth, in what area will you want it to be?
12. What Endeavor or Activity Would Best Connect Me to My Creator?
What does God want you to do? Where do you feel His Spirit directing you? One ultimate thought I want to leave with you is that your gifts and talents mustn’t be superpowers right now. For most people, we only come with the raw material which we must refine and work upon.
If you sense God leading you in a direction, it means you possess the potential even if it isn’t fully formed yet.
Because you read this far, I want to give you Lifetime Access to over $1,000 worth of mentorship materials from Dr. Myles Munroe on purpose, leadership, success, wealth, and the Kingdom. Get instant access to all life-changing materials now!
When you have fully answered the above questions, asking God to guide you in them, and you feel that your answers have revealed your personal authority or domain, write a summary statement of what you believe you were put on this earth to do.
Olusegun Iyejare is a career coach and certified counselor. He helps individuals discover and maximize their potential to live satisfying lives regardless of obvious limitations holding them back.
