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Many disabled people have issues that do not shorten life expectancy and often live as many years as those without a disability. On the other hand, many, including those of us with mental illness, have shorter life expectancies. If you have a mental illness, especially schizophrenia, lifespan is often shorter. But this is not always so. To live into our seventies, eighties or nineties, something I haven't done yet as I haven't reached sixty, we probably must take extra good care of our bodies and minds to overcome the life-shortening factors of mental illness. We probably also must have a chosen purpose in life.

The role of purpose must not be underestimated as a factor of how long we live. If we have a good reason that we want to be here, it is a motivator toward taking better care of ourselves, it provides hope of a better life, and it gives us more tenacity to hang on. All the aforesaid contribute to lifespan.

Disabled people with meaningful careers often live longer than they otherwise would. People with family ties live longer. People with enjoyment of a volunteer job may live longer. Merely having a reason to get out of bed every morning contributes to lifespan. 

Finding purpose is very individual and very personal. I believe it is up to us to do that, and it is not handed to us from a "higher self," or from any god we choose to believe in. When we process what we want to do, it is a decision, and it is not a "mission." Of course, since this is very personal, I cannot say what works for every reader in finding purpose. To me, finding life purpose for me was not mysticism, it was a decision. 

When we express that we have an ambition, many people will scoff and will find ways to ridicule our efforts. Some might even do things to make it harder for us. I've been told by several mental health professionals that I couldn't succeed as a writer. When one of them said this to me, my reaction was I went home, and I got back on the computer. 

When I was in my twenties, people were impressed at my career in electronic repair. When I became self-employed at that, it impressed psychiatrists. 

I don't do electronics anymore because the level of technology has soared at a speed to which I can't keep pace. If you choose electronics, it can be lucrative and it can get you respect. Yet it will require that you live and breathe electronics--otherwise you'll fall behind. 

I know that when I was young, my life was awful. And this motivates me to live longer and do something to make up for it, and to have something better when I get older. If I lacked any prospects of anything, I could create prospects. 

If you decide it is hopeless, then so goes your destiny. If you live merely for the purpose of enjoying sensations, to me that seems to lack any real purpose. On the other hand, if purpose is strong enough to get us through a rough set of circumstances, it paves the way to a better and longer life. 

A "seer" or at least an insightful person, made a comment on what they saw in me. They used the phrase "what you're trying to do..." The person did not specify what that was. It didn't matter. It got me to think, "What am I trying to do?" From there arose a whole set of thought processes of what I want to accomplish while I'm here. 

You can focus on increasing your lifespan. But do you have a reason that you want to live a long time? If you focus on creating hope for yourself, then it begs the question, hope of what and for what? 

Compliance with treatment for a mentally ill person is comparable to sobriety for an addict. Yet if you do not have a purpose, there isn't as much of a reason to pursue compliance or sobriety. My purpose at this age is to create better living conditions for myself, but it is also to be a happy person. But additionally, I've found it worthwhile to participate in writing. It keeps me going. I'm creating something that might continue to exist a hundred or two hundred years from now. 

Mental illnesses and many other disabilities are overcome not through curing the diseases, but through having something valid to focus on other than being ill. If your life is too focused on the disease, then you've become a professional patient. A lot of exposure to doctors can do this to you. A doctor might have all manner of things they want you to do, and many are very time-consuming. Your existence becomes that of treating an illness. 

If you are disabled and aging there is hope. But it is up to you to create something with it. You can't focus just on being sick; there must be something more. 

Even gaining wealth is a purpose. Anything you choose that appeals to you can be a purpose. For example, politicians have many reasons that they went into politics, perhaps they want to be the most powerful person or maybe they want to reshape the world or save the world. 

Some find purpose in raising their children. A chronically homeless person could have their lifetime purpose be to have and maintain comfortable and safe housing. When it is achieved, it could make sense to shift to something new, even while being glad of a mission accomplished. 

(I'm not speaking right now of the rightness or wrongfulness of anyone's purpose. This essay strictly focuses on finding purpose and how it creates hope.) 

If you want hope in your life, it probably must be for a reason. It doesn't matter so much what the reason is, so long as it makes sense to you.