What is a purpose?
The term “ikigai” has been used in Japanese since the 14th century.
Ikigai is a Japanese concept, meaning a sense of one’s destiny in life. The reason one wakes up in the morning and lives.
Ikigai is a case that crosses four criteria:
What I love
What you love arouses your interest, curiosity, and passion.
What people need
The results of my work are in demand, satisfying the needs of others.
What I can be paid for
People are willing to pay for my work, which pays off for my needs.
Scientists about ikigai:
Every person has an innate need to establish a meaningful life, often referred to as “Purpose in life (PIL)/ikigai,” using the functioning of their prefrontal lobes. Physically, PIL/ikigai psychologically and the prefrontal lobe have common functions such as ambition, regulating emotion, and integrating psychological events. PIL/ikigai contributes to a decrease in anxiety influenced by a need for approval from others and stimulates pleasure and comfort, which may be related to the well-balanced secretion of neurotransmitters such as serotonin, dopamine, and endorphin. Thus, a stutterer feels stress, i.e., anxiety, caused by perceived failure when conversing with others, which may be related to an imbalanced secretion of serotonin and dopamine. Therefore, previous work has suggested that PIL/ikigai may decrease anxiety in stutterers by reducing the symptoms associated with stuttering.
Why do we need to find our purpose?
Isn’t it a purpose of life to enjoy every moment? The more pleasant the moments, the hours, the days, the happier the person becomes.
We spend a third part of our lives at work. When one finds Ikigai, a person starts spending most of his life doing what he/she loves and becomes happier.
Where and how to find the purpose?
Common practices:
(Scroll down to learn
1. Focus on yourself
To find Ikigai, you have to go to the basics, to ask yourself:
Where am I now?
What do I want?
How can I do good with others?
To what I’m saying «Yes,»
To what I’m saying «No»?
2. Turning passion into a business is the right thing to do. But what about when there is no passion? Ask yourself what things are of interest to you.
What is intriguing to me now?
Does nothing come to mind?
Then what brings you joy and satisfaction? Every night, write down the happy moment of your day in your notebook. Revisiting the notes, you’ll see the repetitive actions, the situations, the people.
Alternative. It won’t be pleasant, but it is very effective: describe in detail what you are jealous of in other people.
Then choose from these lists several items for your ikigai and be inspired by them in everyday life.
3. Free yourself from fears
When we set ourselves too high a goal, at the very beginning, we are paralyzed by the fear of failure and risk not achieving anything at all.
It is best to start small, with simple tasks, one by one. Any big goal must be broken down into small, easily achievable goals and act gradually. You won’t notice how something impossible turned to be reality.
4. Take yourself seriously
Before you think about the financial side, determine your talent and what you do lightly and with pleasure.
What qualities are ascribed to you, and what do you know about yourself?
Which of your qualities and skills are you particularly proud of and want to preserve, whatever the cost?
- Chattering
- Scrupulousness
- Confidence
fully accept yourself as a whole person with all your characters.
Fear of judgment prevents us from doing what makes us happy, and we become interchangeable, losing our uniqueness.
5. Ask yourself how you want to make money
There are two ways:
Find a way to monetize your favorite business.
To have a paid job that would be a source of basic or additional income and build a project dear to his heart in parallel.
ask such questions regularly:
What services and to whom can I provide and receive money for them?
What would I be interested in doing, and would there be demand for it?
Write down all the answers in a notebook so that you can go back and analyze them.
6. Surround yourself with good people
Surround yourself with those who support you in your search and help you cope with your difficulties. It may be a relative, a spouse, a friend, a teacher. Network around you will help you to keep you inspired and contribute to your growth.
Ikigai in TryWork programs
At TryWork, our program platforms are built with an Ikigia system for participants to evaluate their traineeship and their different roles throughout the program. These evaluations include questions on whether or not they loved the roles they took on?, were they good at it?, can they be paid it?, what industry would they need it in?, this helps participants to pick and see what best they excel in and this gives a clearer picture to the career coach on how best they could achieve and direct the TryWork trainees resumes, portfolio to highlight their best performance to best navigate the job market.
This evaluation aims to help trainees know where their strengths lie and where they need to improve with ease.
