During Lockdown, the YouTube Gods (aka the algorithm) led me to a TEDTalk on How To Ikigai.
Ikigai is a Japanese philosophy that roughly translates to your ‘reason for being’ or your purpose in life.
It’s the thing that gets you out of bed in the morning; that gives your life meaning.
Ikigai comes from the island of Okinawa.
Fun fact: the people of Okinawa have one of the longest life expectancies on Earth, with residents often living to 100. Many chalk this up to Okinawans living their ikigai.
I’d encourage you to read up about ikigai, but the takeaway for now is that people that live their ikigai are fundamentally aligned with the work they do; with the work the world needs them to do.1
In other words, they know the answer to the ‘why’ of their lives and the benefits show.
They literally live longer.
That got me thinking, how do you find your ikigai – your purpose in life?
Finding purpose
Around the same time that I learned about ikigai, I was starting my podcast. I wanted to understand how successful individuals who had shunned ‘safe’ traditional career paths like law, finance and medicine to turn their passions and interests into rewarding but unconventional careers like building a startup, or becoming a comedian or a TV costume designer.2
My hypothesis was that by speaking to people who had done this, I would be able to uncover something in their journeys that would help me find my ikigai.
Podcasting seemed like an interesting vehicle for this.
I spoke to many guests over a number of months on the show and a common theme that emerged was purpose – all of my guests were absolutely certain that they were doing what they were meant to.
Just how did they find their purpose? The answer was surprisingly simple.
Curiosity.
By being curious and digging deeper into the things that interested them, with time each person was able to create a career that they really loved and brought them fulfilment.
In some cases, it was by going deep on subjects they found interesting and becoming an expert at it.
In others, it was by making small, incremental time and resource investments in their interests – for example, starting small with a side hustle that eventually turns into a full-blown business.
It took a while to wrap my head around this, but I uncovered 2 valuable insights.
Finding purpose is a process
In every case, my guests made mistakes or had to re-trace their footsteps at various points in their journey, but over time they were able to get closer to finding their purpose through patience and determination.
That’s a pretty comforting thought – it’s totally okay to not have all the answers immediately but you have to keep trying.
That said, you can drive yourself mad by trying to find your purpose in your own head. You’ll waste a ton of emotional energy by navel-gazing about this and it’ll cause more anxiety than it’s worth.
There’s a far more effective way to find your purpose.
Curiosity is an action
Curiosity is the act of asking questions over and over again until you’re finally satisfied with the answer you arrive at.
As kids, we’re so good at doing this but seem to lose this ability when we grow up.
By putting curiosity into action, you’re going through the iterative process of learning and discovering about the world around you, about yourself and the things that bring you to life, or about people who inspire you.
By acting on curiosity, you create the surface area to uncover opportunities, generate energy and find inspiration.
Do it often enough and you will create enough serendipity to eventually find your purpose.
Why having purpose matters
Reflecting on my life over the last few years, I’ve spent a lot of time agonizing over whether a career practising law was for me (after having already invested the last 12 years of my life into it…).
I even had a fair amount of discomfort at holding any sort of job title that had the word ‘legal’ in it.
That wasn’t because there’s anything wrong with being a lawyer (there isn’t). It just didn’t feel like it told the full story of who I am.
It felt limiting. Restrictive.
I’ve since discovered that the practice of law was what I did, but it wasn’t my why (Simon Sinek explains this distinction quite well.)
Curiosity in action – about a year ago, I took up a role in operations at a tech startup with the aim of figuring out what my ‘why’ is, if it wasn’t law. I was still (and will always be) a lawyer and doing legal work, but just without the title.
It’s a funny thing, the impact that job titles have on our self-image.
When I really drilled down into it, the parts I enjoyed about practising law all involved creativity, problem-solving, building.
After my pivot into operations, the same held true. Looking at some of my non-work interests (music & songwriting, art, DIY), I could see a theme emerge.
My ikigai is to build. To create.
Just by understanding that, I was able to re-frame my view of my professional career.
I came to the liberating realisation that what I do matters less. As long as I am building or creating, I’ll feel fulfilled. Whether it be law, operations or something else, this is far less material as long as it aligns with my purpose.
Having purpose is important because it gives direction. It gives us focus.
Like a compass at sea, it allows you to navigate uncertainty and change while staying true to the course, but without being limited to a rigid, linear path.
By knowing your purpose, you’re able to be flexible. Learning and un-learning becomes a normal part of life because what you do is no longer as relevant to who you are as why you’re doing it.
With a little curiosity, you might just find your purpose.
1This seems to be changing recently, with many attributing the downturn in life expectancy to young people turning away from the old ways of life on the island.
2To be clear – that’s not to say that careers in law, finance and medicine are not rewarding nor achievements worth celebrating. Just that they’re very conventional career paths by comparison.
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