Finding work that’s more aligned to your values
“The grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love and something to hope for" - Hector Garcia
I’ve always been interested in the idea of purpose, of having a goal. My Dad used to talk often of finding something to live for, to work towards. Family conversations were centred around achieving goals and doing your best and, as was later coined by Jed in West Wing, swiftly moving on from every success with ‘what’s next?’
So I’ve always had goals, always set resolutions and been working towards something, but as I’ve gotten older I’ve started to realise I haven’t ever really known, or at least been able to articulate what I felt my purpose was. I love to read books on the subject, including books about career paths and playing to your strengths, and I really love to read memoirs of those people who were lucky enough to find and really live their purpose. I’m sure we all know someone who has that confidence that only comes from knowing exactly what you’re doing and why.
I used to think that figuring out what you wanted to do with your life was a one-time task; that once you worked it out, you had a roadmap for the rest of your life and that if you methodically took it one step at a time, what followed would be a gentle climb to success and happiness. I’m sure there are those people who knew what they wanted to do from an early age, or perhaps what was expected of them through a family business or tradition perhaps, but it turns out this is not the case for most of us.
What I’ve found to be closer to the truth is that perhaps our relationship with our purpose through our work is something less like a path to be followed, a steady line on a graph or a clear set of instructions and more like something that adapts to us as we grow. In fact, I can say for definite of my own career journey that on reflection it seems to have evolved with me, in that the various roles I’ve had throughout my career have been fitting to where I have been on my own personal journey. I used to worry that my CV didn’t tell an easy-to-follow story with a gradual increase in responsibility and salary, and then I realised it was in fact the tangents and the time taken to explore other options that were really where I had the most personal growth. It was leaving my well-paid, stable full-time job to go freelance so I could work flexibly and look after my young family, the time I lost all my contract work at the start of the pandemic, then realising, if I hadn’t I’d never have been able to homeschool my children during that time. It’s the opportunities that came in right at the last minute as I was worrying about the bills, and the jobs I’ve taken reluctantly, feeling like a failure when my own businesses haven’t worked out, only to meet some of the most wonderful people and organisations I’ve ever been part of.
But until very recently, if you’d asked me what I thought my purpose was, I’d have sounded very confused. So I’d like to share one of the tools I’ve found to be most helpful in trying to work this out. During those times when I’ve been feeling particularly confused, or lost, or stuck, this is the concept I keep coming back to, that gives me the clarity I’m looking for.
You might find the following free online courses useful:
Using Ikigai to discover the job or career path that’s aligned to your values
Ikigai is a Japanese concept, translating as ‘life and value’, ‘your life purpose’, ‘a sense of purpose or a reason for living’, or my personal favourite, ‘a reason to jump out of bed in a morning.’
First, I’d like to reference a couple of really great places to look if you’d like to learn more about Ikigai, its history and the people who live with it at their core. The first is a book called, ‘Ikigai: The Japanese secret to a long and happy life’ by Hector Garcia and Francesc Miralles.
The second is a series on Netflix called ‘Live to 100: Secrets of the Blue Zones in which Dan Buettner who has written and spoken extensively on this subject travels to five different communities in different parts of the world where people live long and happy lives.
But back to using this concept as a tool for your own work and career, and more specifically, as a way of helping you to identify what your next chapter might look like.
I’m sharing my answers with you here and in the accompanying video, not because I think they’re particularly interesting to anyone else, but because for all the years I’ve been using this method, while I’ve read a lot of great resources on what Ikigai is and how it’s used, I have struggled to find real life examples I could follow and relate to. So, your answers will and should look very different to mine, but hopefully by sharing them it will help you to find your own.
You can start by printing off the template here, or simply drawing four overlapping circles, as a Venn diagram, on a piece of paper.
If you’d prefer to follow along, you can find the video here.
The circles are named as (going anti-clockwise from the top):
What I love
What I’m good at
What I can be paid for
What the world needs
The sections that overlap are labelled (going anti-clockwise from the top):
Passion
Profession
Vocation
Mission
I start by listing what I love:
My family
Writing, playing & listening to country music
Television comedy drama & good films
Living in the countryside
Quiet time
Reading non-fiction
Personal development
Then what I’m good at:
Planning & organising
Writing & editing
Video & graphics
Creative ideas
Then what I can be paid for:
Research
Training workshops
Bid-writing
Evaluation & reports
Then what the world needs:
Peace
Love
Compassion
People who care about what they do and want to make a difference
I then fill in the Passion section by looking for overlap between what I love and what I’m good at:
Personal development
Being self-employed
Sharing ideas
I then fill in the Profession section by looking for overlap between what I’m good at and what I can be paid for:
Professional & organised service
Creative approach to finding solutions
Research, writing & training
I then fill in the Vocation section by looking for overlap between what I can be paid for and what the world needs:
Helping people to make a difference in the world through practical help with research, writing and training
I then fill in the Mission section by looking for overlap between what the world needs and what I love:
To be a conduit for love and peace.
To prioritise my own inner peace and lead by example.
Always be generous and kind.
I also find it helpful at this stage to think of these four sections as follows (you may or may not find this to be true for you, depending on your answers):
Mission describes who I am.
Passion describes what I do.
Vocation describes how I do my work.
Profession describes why people book me/pay me.
Then, I list out on a separate piece of paper, all of the answers from Passion, Profession, Vocation and Mission, and I highlight the words and phrases that really resonate with my desires or values.
Personal development
Being self-employed
Sharing ideas
Professional & organised service
Creative approach to finding solutions
Research, writing & training
Helping people to make a difference in the world
To be a conduit for love and peace.
To prioritise my own inner peace and lead by example.
Always be generous and kind.
Then I take all the words and phrases I’ve highlighted and write them down again.
Personal development
Organised
Writing
Make a difference in the world
Peace
Kind
Gradually I make them into sentences such as:
I dedicate my life to prioritising and sharing my personal development journey.
My purpose revolves around personal development, driven by an organised approach to life.
Through the medium of writing, I aspire to make a meaningful difference in the world, promoting values of peace and kindness. These pillars guide me as I navigate my journey, fostering growth and contributing positively to the world around me.
My final Ikigai statement looks like this:
I help people to make a positive difference in the world through a creative approach and practical help with research, writing and training.
Another way to get from your list of words and phrases to a paragraph is to put them into ChatGPT and ask it to create a statement of your purpose. I quite liked the one it gave me:
My purpose centres on personal growth, blending an organised approach with impactful writing to foster a world of peace and kindness.
What I like about this method is that I usually end up with something that feels less like a goal or ambition and more like a guiding light; something I can read every day to steady myself, keep moving in the right direction and in such a way that feels right to me.
Okay, so now you have a statement or paragraph that sums up what you would like to focus on, what your ideal role might be, or describing a new direction you want to explore. If it closely relates to what you’re currently doing, it’s relatively simple to make some small changes to ensure you stay aligned to what really matters to you. But what do you do if your answer feels a million miles from where you currently are, and something that would require a huge change? In fact, if the exercise has jolted you to a realisation that your current job, career or lifestyle is not in fact aligned to your heartfelt purpose and values, then it can be less than helpful to be reminded of that.
I’ve got another post coming soon where I’ll talk about starting to work or volunteer for causes that matter to you, so look out for that. But for now, here are three writing prompts that may help to find a way forward, whether your feelings towards the outcomes of the exercise have been positive or negative, or somewhere in between.
How closely does this statement align to my current situation? What am I already doing and what am I not currently doing?
Does this statement of purpose feel like something I’d like to do for a job/career/business, or does it feel more like a way of being I’d like to embody or a lifestyle I’d like to have?
How would I feel if this statement were already 100% true?
Please do feel free to share your answers with me, either in the comments below or in the YouTube video comments.
Rachel x
I found this a really interesting and informative approach