Lab of The Path to Ikigai
Q. What is the future you want to create?
I got lucky, was curious enough, asked enough good questions, put myself in a milieu that increased the likelihood of good outcomes, all of the above, whatever, to find out in grad school that I could do innovation for a living. I got on my path through a pretty intuitive approach, and yes, luck was a massive part of it.
Luck isn’t a great strategy. I want to help people figure out why they’re here on this planet. I want them to start on this early, and not lose valuable time, as we older folks realize that life is ridiculously short, and you only have 50–60 years to slap the Universe upside the head and nudge it in a better direction.
I love the Japanese concept of Ikigai — four overlapping domains that establish your life’s purpose:
* I love doing it
* I’m good at it
* I can get paid (enough) for it
* The world needs it
The intersection is Ikigai, or your life’s purpose. Our quality of life and value to organizations increase tremendously when we’re on the Path to Ikigai — this is pure win/win.
Too many people buy into the unhealthy story that you can’t do this — that work is for the satisfaction of practical needs, and that the real you is expressed through hobbies, volunteer work, family time, etc. It sounds SO SMART, SO GROWN-UP because risk aversion was Job #1 for our ancestors for millennia, and we’re still wired to succumb to such responsible-adult frabbajabba. It’s as if your enjoying your job means something suspicious is going on.
Whose interests are served by this kind of thinking? A) No one’s. B) Some evil genius or a cabal of such. C) Ray from high school really wants you to believe this, because he still resents how you treated him in Coach Gardner’s American History class.
Enough. Seriously. Life’s too damn short. Sorry, Ray, but no dice, baby. Let’s touch base so I can apologize.
The healthier approach is actually smarter. You’re a better employee, leader, and colleague when you have clarity on your Path to Ikigai. Sure, there is some risk, as this life thing has an abundance of risk. It’s about which risks you’re willing to take on, and the Risks of Omission don’t get talked about nearly enough, yet are ones that appear in an outsized way in the end-of-life research.
The future I want to create is one where 100MM more people have clarity on, and are actually walking on, their Path to Ikigai. Why 100MM? Because it sounds outrageous enough to motivate me, but, in my more-delusional moments, doesn’t seem impossible. Maybe I’ll bump it up at some point.
Q. How do you track progress?
* # of people aware of and understand the concept and its implications/benefits to them beyond a cool-sounding abstraction
* # of people motivated to want to move in the direction of The Path to Ikigai for themselves
* # of people actually walking The Path to Ikigai
* Greater clarity and specificity on the obstacles keeping people from walking the path — the Where and What holding them back. We probably need to start pulling together the Top Ten Obstacles to Walking The Path To Ikigai, and make it tangible.
Q. How are you doing so far?
This is a humble start. I’ve had lots of great conversations — who’s going to disagree with the basic idea? Yet, will enough people take action and start walking the path? Everyone one want to go to Ikigai Heaven; will enough take that first step? And then the 100th? 10,000th?
We’ve identified Gallup’s StrengthFinder/CliftonStrengths as half of the equation — I Love Doing It and I’m Good At It. We need to identify more resources and pull them together into some sort of integral, usable whole (vs. an eclectic mishmash).
Q. What are you NOT doing?
I don’t spend too much time on this, as I’m NOT doing it. I get the point, and will make sure that we don’t lapse into mission creep.
Q. What have you learned so far?
People get this concept and hunger for it. I’ve had a few hundred conversations with friends and strangers about this. Some explanation would help here — when strangers hear that I’m an innovation guy, there are usually a lot of questions, and I’m delighted to answer. Invariably, the conversation gets into Ikigai territory and I ask them what switches them on, and how they could do more of it. It’s very easy to get into the Ikigai conversation — the market for purpose is infinite.
Q. How can you help others? (+ a way to connect directly)
I’d love to have the Ikigai conversation with you and compare notes. How can you and I walk the path with greater conviction and power? Hit me on Twitter at @adhansen and hashtag #ikigai.
Also, where there are similar interests among our various Labs, I’d love to collaborate and see what we can learn from each other. I’d guess that Possibilitarians share interests, insights, and needs that transcend the immediate details of each of our Labs, and creative collaboration could be force multiplier for us.
I’d love to build trust here and bring my experience and skills to your efforts, as you see that I could help.
Q. What help do you need? (+ a way to connect directly)
Great conversations and testing each other’s approach. We’re each finite, so need each other to spot the holes in our game. High-performing organizations/meta-organizations like TSOTP have both high trust and high conflict, but the latter is on the ideas, not interpersonal pettiness and squabbling. A group of switched-on Possibilitarians, each with our own big purpose, has the potential for some amazingly beneficial exponential emergence that we couldn’t expect. The head- and heart-space of this group can create a very powerful context and support for each one of us.
Again, @adhansen on Twitter, or bump into me on The School of the Possible FB community.
Let’s create something good, true, and beautiful here, folks!
