7 Apps for Finding Purpose and Setting Goals

Why is it so? It is quite common that somebody else's goals and aims are imposed on us through Instagram and other social platforms. We should then discover what really matters to us (is it your body? healthy relationship? charity? addressing global problems?) and how we want to live according to these values. When you have defined these values, the next step would be to set monthly goals and daily habits that will bring you closer to fulfilling your purpose.

Although it looks simple on paper, we often don't have the tools to reveal our purposes or to broaden our perspectives to see what's beyond (and maybe find something new out there). There are though a variety of questionnaires, texts, mindfulness practices, and goal-setting techniques that guide you through the process of finding a purpose in life and determining your goals. The apps that we've collected here will help you to do exactly this: to dig deeper and understand yourself better to avoid making resolutions on the first of January and failing to achieve them.

If you haven't yet heard of Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, now is the time! It's one of the most used personality tests that consist of simple questions clarifying your values, life purpose, work ethics, emotional reactions, etc. As a result, you will be assigned to one of the 16 personality types, all packed in abbreviations like ISFP or ENTJ. Without proper explanations, these letters remain completely useless, and here the app comes into play. It helps you to decipher these results and advises on how to proceed and implement them in your life. As an additional fun feature, it shows you an example of famous people who had the same personality type.

You can obviously find this test online but the MB Personality Type app stores your results so that you can quickly check them when facing an important decision, working on your goal setting or sensing the void of purposelessness. Many users are satisfied with the app and this test (4.8 on AppStore), so you should try it too! It is also useful to update your results regularly since our personalities are not something set in stone.

The app though doesn't provide much beyond this point. You need to figure out on your own how to incorporate these results in your daily routines or what to change to harmonize your current activities with your life purpose. However, some of the apps reviewed here can effectively help you with that.

In I Meet Myself, self-discovery is achieved through immersive stories. Sounds intriguing? You do so by associating yourself with the main character, plunged into an original story, who faces various choices and dilemmas. The storyline gives you space to contemplate how would you act under specific circumstances, what are your values and goals, and how are you managing your emotions.

The story is well-thought with multiple scenarios that evolve depending on your choices. The experience can become even more immersive due to the sounds in this app, so get your headset on.

Be aware that going through the story requires some time — save it for a quiet evening or do it in chunks since the story has five chapters and is constantly updated. I Meet Myself is not an app you can use regularly to check in with your goals or employ mindful practices. It is a one-time tool that will help you realize your intrinsic values and goals but won't help you implement them. It might as well be that some of us don't feel so empathic to the character and this type of self-discovery won't work. However, it is still a great experience which is definitely worth trying.

The app is almost entirely based on Dan Millman's book "The Life You Were Born to Live". A very ambitious title, right? According to Millman's system, our life paths are divided into several stages and steps that require additional strength for coping with some aspects and at the same time bringing satisfaction and success in other spheres.

Life Purpose App is though far from being a book turned into an app — it helps you identify your goals and discover new directions your life can take. After completing the initial assessment, you can dive into additional materials and advice. If you're a premium user, you'll get access to the book itself too. All in all, the app is useful to calculate life-cycles and relationship dynamics (especially if you're an admirer of Millan's approach) and, importantly, it reviews your life on a bigger scale. Nonetheless, the system of life-cycles does not have any scientific research and some of us might even seem esoteric.

It is no secret that your daily routines define your days, weeks, and years. If you want to make a change in your life or pursue a goal — you should modify your daily habits and keep up with them, and this app helps you to do it smoothly.

With My Perfect Day, you can create a system of habits that are bringing you closer to your purpose (you can choose either from a ready-made list of habits or create your own). But the app's functionality doesn't stop here: it offers you breathing, journaling, and affirmation practices with which you can discover yourself or conform to your goals. You will regularly get encouraging affirmations that keep you motivated. You can also connect to other people on the same journey to make your experience more social. Users claim My Perfect Day to be an illuminating and helpful experience.

Although this app is tremendously helpful in getting back on track and sticking to what you've chosen, it doesn't cover many other aspects. For example, it doesn't help you discover your purposes or break them into manageable goals that in their turn can become habits.

Working in a big company can make anybody feel drained and exhausted — the state that is often accelerated by not observing one's input. It's indeed hard to find and maintain a sense of purposefulness in our activities when being a part of huge human machinery.

That's why Purposeful was invented: the app aims at combating these feelings of uselessness and helps workers to find their sense of purpose, boost their productivity and increase the general level of satisfaction. It offers users a variety of mindfulness practices and also helps them to find a work-life balance as well as inner satisfaction and driving motives.

There is though one condition — the app is designed exclusively for organizations, such as companies or universities. An individual user can't get access to it unless you have a health plan that includes such an option. So if you think that this app will benefit you and your team, talk to a responsible manager about purchasing this app for the company or inform your health plan provider. Purposeful indeed provides organizations with a tool to enhance the wellbeing and satisfaction of their employees.

Interested in finding out your personality type? Or what kind of relationship you're in? Or what are your undiscovered talents? What would be your perfect career track? This app is full of tests that can help you to assess some spheres of your life or find out something new about yourself.

Moreover, Life Booster brings in a structure to all these self-discoveries — the app creates an improvement plan for three months and helps you to stick to it. During this period, you will continue exploring different aspects of your life: family, work, relationship, health, etc., which to a certain extent reminds us of Gretchen Rubin's The Happiness Project.

It's common knowledge that there are a variety of psychological tests that are used in clinical settings or by HR. However, we don't know if any of these tests included in Life Booster are based on any research and are proven to be relevant, which puzzles me. In any case, it can be fun to play around with this app and think of self-development and your goals in different life aspects, but who knows whether the results can be interpreted in the right way.

You're given you a chance to contemplate questions you don't often face in your daily life: about your values, chances, dreams, and ideals. This app has around one hundred various questions ideal for quiet reflection. Although Questions itself doesn't provide you with a clue on how to track your answers, I believe you can just answer them in your head or use each question as a prompt for journaling. The latter option would be extremely effective since it pushes you to verbalize your thoughts and emotions and to keep a record of them for future references.

You can set a daily reminder to make your practice regular and suitable for you: one can choose the amount and type questions per day. If you don't like the question, you can surely switch to the next one; on the contrary, you can save the question to your favorites, share it with your friends or use it as a screensaver (some of the questions are motivating and thought-provoking).

It's not a scientific program based on psychological theories about personality development etc., so don't expect anything comparable to professional help. It's fun, free and easy to use. Too bad that the app doesn't have a simple note-taking mode in it, which would make journaling much more convenient. In any case, getting away from your daily troubles and thinking of something bigger is always a good idea.

Finding your purpose in life is not a piece of cake, especially when you're feeling lost and overwhelmed, either by the number of options ahead of you or, on the contrary, by the seeming lack of opportunities. These apps can help you to break the ice and maybe point to some spheres of your life you can start working on. Some of the apps will even show you the way of making these changes and sticking to your goals.

The essential starting point is the MB Personality Type test which is proven to be extremely helpful and gives detailed personality description and advice. Questions can become a basis for your effective guided journaling practices that are vital for finding purpose and setting goals in your life. My Perfect Day actually makes you act which is the most important and difficult part of any journey — to make the first step. Since many of these apps are free, try to mix and match and you will find a combination that works the best for you.