Margaret Couch: Living with purpose

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For Margaret Couch, the journey began with a simple command: Be still. She wears a silver bangle with the Biblical inscription and refers to it often. As women, she said, that’s probably the hardest thing to do.  Too often, we “should all over ourselves,” she says. “We operate on hyper load and never unwind. We allow ourselves to be pressured into doing things because we haven’t discovered what we are here for.”

But what happens when you put a comma in life?  When you follow Psalms 46:10? Couch found her purpose, and for her it was a spiritual journey with her faith playing a major role. But regardless of one’s spiritual or religious beliefs, she truly believes each woman has a special purpose in this life.

Hers is helping others find theirs. And Couch does so through a retreat called the Soul Purpose Experience, a self-empowering experience in partnership with her horses.

Without ever realizing it, Couch had tied her personal identity to her career, and when that was over, she was having a hard time defining her purpose in life. For 25 years, she had worked in management and personnel consulting, most recently as chief marketing officer and chief integration officer for Alamosa, before the buyout by Sprint.

So when she left her office for the last time on Feb. 7, 2007, she really had no idea what she would do next.

“I was so propped up my job, my title and my career that I dreaded social encounters because I had no comeback to the question, ‘So what do you do?’ "

So Couch joined boards and associations hoping to fill the void. And while she enjoyed the work, she believed there was something more. A background in psychology, education, and human development led Couch to revisit her childhood. “I was looking for what it was that inspired me and encouraged me. Where was my passion?”

Couch realized that what she loved most was solving problems by looking for out-of-the-box, unconventional solutions. And, of course, her horses.

She and her husband, Bill, then began to transform a cotton field in South Lubbock County into a ranch complete with their home, barns and a bunkhouse. And of course, horses -- including the ranch’s namesake Trinity, an abused equine that Couch rescued and nursed back to health.

That’s the idea of the Soul Purpose retreats. Couch leads small groups of women at a  “spa for the soul,” as she calls it, providing them the opportunity to pause and discover God’s purpose them and learn strategies to incorporate that purpose into all areas of life.