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WAYWARD PURPOSE — START HERE
Faith. Direction. Discipline
Transforming Moral Injury Into Moral Leadership;
So Suicide Is Never A Option
A Note Before You Begin
Content Warning: This page discusses suicide, trauma, and moral injury. If you or someone you know is in crisis, especially an active-duty service member or veteran, dial 988, then press 1, or contact your local emergency line. Tell someone what you’re carrying. Silence is the most dangerous companion to pain.
Disclaimer: Everything here reflects the views of Wayward Purpose, not the U.S. Government or the Armed Forces.
Note: We are not clinical social workers, counselors, therapists, psychologists, or licensed medical professionals.
Transparency: This Substack uses affiliate links to help fund our mission.
What This Space Is — and Isn’t
Wayward Purpose exists for the people carrying more than they admit:
Veterans and service members
Purpose-driven leaders
Gifted and neurodivergent minds
The spiritually exhausted
The ones who feel lost but keep leading anyway
If you’ve felt misaligned, burned out, faith-wounded, morally injured, or simply tired of being strong, this space is for you.
We are not therapists, clinicians, or medical professionals.
We don’t diagnose or treat.
We coach, guide, and walk with you as you rebuild your inner world — so your structure becomes stronger than your spiral.
Our founder is an ICF ACC coach with nearly twenty years of military service, leadership, and human performance experience. He’s led teams, written policy, built culture, and coached hundreds. He’s studied moral injury, loosely coupled communication environments, and the human toll of service. And like many of you, he’s lived through darkness and worked his way back through faith, discipline, community, and the slow rebuilding of inner order.
We’re not here to fix you.
We’re here to give language to the weight you carry, structure to hold you steady, and a path to reclaim purpose — without hype, without shortcuts.
What We Mean by Moral Injury
Moral injury isn’t weakness.
It’s the consequence of conscience.
It’s the wound that forms when:
you violate your own moral code
you witness something that fractures your worldview
you’re asked to carry more than anyone should
you lose faith in yourself, others, or God
your inner compass and outer world collide
It shows up as exhaustion, shame, numbness, anger, isolation, or the quiet belief:
“My life doesn’t matter anymore.”
We’ve built Wayward Purpose to interrupt that belief — and rebuild what it breaks.
Why Coaching Matters Here
Coaching is not therapy, mentorship, consulting, or advice-giving.
It’s a structured, disciplined process that helps you:
see your patterns clearly
build self-awareness without shame
realign with what matters
reclaim faith and direction
move from pain to purpose
Therapy heals wounds.
Consulting fixes systems.
Mentorship shares experience.
Coaching helps you rebuild the inner structure needed to lead your life again.
When deeper wounds surface, we guide you toward therapy.
When you’re ready to rise again, we help you return.
Our Mission
We exist to make suicide never an option.
Not metaphorically.
Not aspirationally.
Practically.
We do this by helping people:
Confront moral injury honestly
Steady their mind and nervous system
Rebuild discipline and direction
Reconnect with faith and identity
Form community where silence is broken and stories matter
Suicide grows in isolation, misalignment, and unprocessed moral wounds.
Moral leadership grows in clarity, structure, and connection.
We’re here to help you choose life — and choose it with purpose.
The Way Back Requires a New Kind of Care
Traditional approaches help — but they often miss the spiritual, ethical, and existential dimension of the wound.
Wayward Purpose stands in that gap.
We don’t offer
hype,
quick fixes
or motivational noise.
We offer →
Clarity
Structure
Faith
Direction
Community
The ingredients needed to become whole again.
Purpose isn’t found.
It’s reclaimed.
And it starts with naming what hurts.
What We’re Building
Wayward Purpose is a living movement built around reflection, research, and renewal.
Here’s where our work shows up:
🪶 Way-Ward Essays
Raw, honest, cinematic reflections that give language to experiences people carry in silence.
💭 Way-Ward Reflections
Short, punchy insights connecting moral injury, faith, service, and the gifted mind.
🎙️ Way-Ward Podcast (Coming Soon)
Conversations on pain, identity, meaning, and leadership — stripped of jargon, full of humanity.
🫱 The Guidon Circle (Coming Soon)
Our fellowship of service and story.
A place for honest voices, shared witness, and communal resilience.
✍️ Poetry + Creative Work
Because sometimes emotion needs a different language.
Every piece of writing, coaching session, conversation, and product is built to move one mission forward:
Make suicide never the option.
What Makes Wayward Purpose Different
Most platforms focus on surviving.
We focus on leading — from the inside out.
Most content tries to inspire.
We aim to steady.
Most programs try to motivate.
We help you build structure when motivation dies.
Most voices online tell you to “be stronger.”
We help you be clearer, so strength returns naturally.
And while others give answers, we create space for story — because storytelling heals, and connection saves lives.
If You’re New, Start Here
Read the latest Wayward Essay
Let it meet you where you are.Subscribe (free or paid)
Every subscription supports someone who needs this work.Share your story when you’re ready
Vulnerability here is not weakness — it’s witness.Join The Guidon Circle when it opens
Our fellowship of service, story, and healing leadership.
Why Subscribe Now
You’ll get:
Essays that feel like someone naming what you’ve been afraid to say
Tools to rebuild clarity, discipline, and direction
A community that speaks your language
Early access to The Guidon Circle
Faith-rooted, anti-hype content for gifted, exhausted minds
A place where your story will never be minimized or dismissed
You’re not just reading a newsletter.
You’re joining a movement that refuses to let silent suffering take another life.
A Final Word From Will
This mission is deeply personal.
I didn’t set out to become an entrepreneur.
I set out to stay alive — and help others do the same.
Coming up on twenty years in uniform, I saw what happens to good people when moral injury goes unnamed. I lived it. I watched others carry it until they broke.
What saved me weren’t slogans or programs.
It was people — faith, community, and the slow rebuilding of discipline and direction.
Wayward Purpose was built to give that same lifeline to anyone quietly drowning in their own life.
I don’t have all the answers.
But I know the weight you’re carrying.
And I know there’s a way through it.
If you’re here, you belong.
Start with the latest essay.
Then add your voice to ours.
Together, we make despair temporary — and purpose lasting.
Subscribe and join the movement.
Faith. Discipline. Direction.