Living a purposeful life is on the mind of most of us. Let us ask ourselves this question. How could I gain more clarity on my life purpose? When you live a purposeful life, you wake up every day excited to serve the world. On my personal quest to identify my IKIGAI, I came across this book – IKIGAI, The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life, written by Hector Garcia and Francesc Miralles.
IKIGAI, is the point of intersection of passion, profession, mission and vocation.
1. What you love doing defines your “Passion” and “Mission”.
2. What the world needs based on that you define your “Mission” you can work for and your “Vocation”.
3. What you are good at, makes you understand your “Passion” and be in the right “Profession”
4. What you can be paid for helps you choose your Profession and Vocation.
Alongside the above model of IKIGAI, the book describes an important phenomenon called “Flow” in achieving your IKIGAI. It is easy to imagine a picture in your mind of a flowing river, which is serene and calm. When human beings apply the concept of flow in their life, life moves smoothly. Enter the flow state and ask yourself relevant questions – what is my life mission, what is my passion, what problem of the world I can solve and what matters the most to me. This process can unfold avenues for you which will lead you to identify your IKIGAI.
One of the techniques to identify flow is finding what activities you do during the day in your life which lets you enter the state of flow.
Let us go through these 5 ways through which we can enter “Flow”
- Focus on a Single Task
When we multitask, we increase the time duration for completing all the activities we are doing. Hence, focusing on a single task at a time increases our productivity. Also, when we multitask, our brain switches between different patterns and slow down the processing. Hence, best use of our brain ability is giving attention to one task at one time.
2. Find a Distraction Free Environment and Time
We all aspire to achieve phenomenal results in our work. It is important to identify the right place for doing our work – designated place in home or office. This helps us have all our resources at one place and maximize our efficiency. Also, we all are aware that the productivity at the morning hours is maximum as we have less distractions that time. Identify the time and place for yourself which helps you enter the Flow state.
3. Take up a Challenging Task
Our brains get activated at a quick speed when we take up a challenging task. This help us stay motivated towards solving the problem. Also, it helps us in tapping on our potentials and achieve the optimal result.
4. Understanding the why and how of what we are doing
When we do any work by knowing why we are doing it, we get more clarity towards its end result. This way we can choose to do really important tasks and ignore unimportant tasks. Also, knowing how to do the work gives us the ability to perform it in least amount of time.
5. Break the big task into small pieces
When a big task is divided into small size tasks, it becomes easier to do it. Also, we can apply Pomodoro Technique (work for 25 minutes and take 5 minutes break or work for 50 minutes and take 10 minutes break). This technique helps us to monitor our performance and also feel accomplished when we have completed every small task.
Let us use this wonderful concept of IKIGAI and live a purposeful, happy and long life.
