1 To my Parents: Thank you for taking the time to create me. To my Wife: Thank you for giving me the time to create myself. Ikigai 2.0 Version 1.2 (Dec 27, 2020) © 2020 Sloww | Awaken the Art of Living Kyle Kowalski kyle@sloww.co sloww.co 2 Praise for Ikigai 2.0 “Thank you so much for this amazing insight ... Ikigai and your explanation of it, changed the way I think about life.” — Carla J. “I’m so thankful for this ... I feel the need to correct the popular, westernized, Ikigai Venn diagram every time I see it. Thank you for taking the time to clear things up!” — Risa T. “I really like Ikigai 2.0. It simplifies it with checks and balances. It’s easier to focus on what truly matters.” — Angela N. “This is great stuff ... Everything you suggest here resonates with me, and I especially love your point of emphasizing a weighting / prioritization system.” — Marc F. “This is beautiful, and talking about your own experience is awesome. I have this printed out and made tons and tons of notes. I am going to reflect on it deeply.” — Nilesh M. “Ultimately, it's unlike anything I've read before. There’s a novelty to the synthesis style of writing ... bite-size pieces of content held together by common themes. Very interesting rhythm that’s good for stopping, thinking, and starting up again.” — Jason C. 3 Contents Introduction .................................................................................................................. 5 Chapter 1: The Origin of Ikigai 1.0 ................................................................................ 6 Chapter 2: The Truth about Ikigai .............................................................................. 10 Chapter 3: The Evolution to Ikigai 1.5 ......................................................................... 16 Chapter 4: Introducing Ikigai 2.0 ................................................................................ 19 Chapter 5: My Ikigai 2.0 .............................................................................................. 31 Chapter 6: Money as a Byproduct (Ikigai 2.0+) ......................................................... 47 Chapter 7: My Ikigai 2.0+ ........................................................................................... 62 Conclusion ................................................................................................................... 66 Workbook: Your Ikigai 2.0 & Ikigai 2.0+ ................................................................... 67 About the Author & Sloww ..................................................................................... 88 Sources ......................................................................................................................... 90 4 Introduction At the end of 2015, I was in the midst of a full-blown existential crisis. I believe my crisis was the culmination of working insane hours while feeling a complete lack of purpose in what I was doing. On paper, I had made it. I was getting paid six figures as the Marketing Director of a global apparel brand. But, I’ve learned the hard way that money without meaning will leave you empty. My crisis led to questioning everything about life. The more I questioned, the more I searched for answers. And, the more I searched, the more I learned. My crisis lasted roughly six weeks, but little did I know it was the seed that would change the course of my life. Throughout 2016, I continued to question, search, and learn. At some point in my journey, I came across the concept of ikigai . You’ve probably seen the word. Maybe you’ve seen the four-circle diagram. Needless to say, it’s a hot topic today. But, what is ikigai really ? Like most things, there’s a lot of misinformation floating around on the internet. Over the last five years, I’ve given myself a self-directed education in life purpose. I’ve read five books about ikigai and conducted countless hours of online research. What I noticed is that every author and source of information takes a different angle on the complex concept. Over time, I believe I’ve been able to put many of the puzzle pieces together and redesign the visual ikigai diagram to better reflect the truth. What you’re reading right now exists because it’s what I would have wanted to read when I was first beginning my search. My goal is to make it the only ikigai guide you will ever need. “If you find a book you really want to read but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.” — Toni Morrison, Nobel and Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist This guidebook is presented in a synthesis style of writing to give you the highest insight-to-word ratio. All fluff has been stripped out to give you only what is most essential to help you find purpose in your life. Each chapter builds upon the prior one, but take your time. It's designed in a way that allows you to pause frequently and reflect on your own life. There’s also a bonus workbook at the end for your own ikigai. It turns out that I’m not alone in the existential crisis I experienced in 2015. The last few years have culminated into what some are calling a “meaning crisis” or “meta crisis.” If you’re in the midst of your own crisis or simply exploring your life purpose, then you’ve picked up the right guidebook. Welcome to Ikigai 2.0 5 Chapter 1 The Origin of Ikigai 1.0 Odds are you’ve seen this four-circle diagram. This big question is: how did it become widely recognized as ikigai? In 2014, the four-circle ikigai diagram—what I’ll refer to as Ikigai 1.0 throughout this book—was released into the digital world by Marc Winn on his blog The View Inside Me 7 Ikigai 1.0 went viral. It's been viewed by tens of millions of people. But, there's more to the story. Here’s what happened. In 2017, Winn published a follow-up blog post: “I merged two concepts to create something new ... The sum total of my effort was that I changed one word on a diagram and shared a ‘new’ meme with the world.” 8 6 Marc Winn was inspired by two things. First, he had just watched a TED Talk by Dan Buettner about the Blue Zones—the places on Earth where humans live the longest lives —which mentions ikigai. In another part of his life, Marc had seen a Venn diagram on how to find purpose. In the spirit of combinatorial creativity, he merged them together by changing the word in the middle of the diagram from “purpose” to “ikigai.” “I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be a good idea to join these two concepts together which is this Venn diagram on how you find purpose and this old Japanese concept of a good life and a reason of being?’” — Marc Winn Dan Buettner’s TED Talk is from 2009 and has been viewed over five million times. But, what about the original purpose Venn diagram? Winn sourced it from Andrés Zuzunaga, who originally created the graphic in Spanish. “I can confirm that over the years the crowd has indicated that this is indeed the original source of the Venn diagram on purpose. My role was merely to merge the concept of Ikigai with this already defined concept of purpose.” — Marc Winn Here’s Andrés Zuzunaga’s original Venn diagram: 9 7 It was created by Zuzunaga in 2011 and published in 2012 in Borja Vilaseca’s book Qué Harías Si No Tuvieras Miedo ( What Would You Do If You Weren't Afraid? ). So, is Zuzunaga the original? Well, that’s tricky too. He says: “It came to me, it didn’t come from me.” 10 We’re all the outputs of all the inputs in our lives. As writer Kirby Ferguson says: “Everything we make is a remix of existing creations, our lives and the lives of others.” While Marc Winn’s remix was conscious, is it possible Zuzunaga’s diagram was an unconscious remix of something else? All of this is eerily similar to the “Hedgehog Concept" created by Jim Collins in his 2001 book Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t: 8 Jim Collins estimates that only 3-5 percent of everyone on Earth has figured out their Hedgehog. Could you imagine a world where 20 percent find it? What about 50 percent? “If you could drive toward the intersection of these three circles and translate that intersection into a simple, crystalline concept that guides your life choices, then you’ve got a Hedgehog Concept for yourself.” The magic is living in the middle of the Hedgehog Concept. What is it like living within the alignment of all three circles? Collins says: “When all the pieces come together, not only does your work move toward greatness, but so does your life. For, in the end, it is impossible to have a great life unless it is a meaningful life. And it is very difficult to have a meaningful life without meaningful work. Perhaps, then, you might gain that rare tranquility that comes from knowing that you’ve had a hand in creating something of intrinsic excellence that makes a contribution. Indeed, you might even gain that deepest of all satisfactions: knowing that your short time here on this earth has been well spent, and that it mattered.” Given the amount of research Jim Collins puts into his work, I wouldn’t be surprised if his diagram is the most “original” of all. At the same time, his work is the result of his own insight gathering and synthesizing—all of which have influenced his Hedgehog Concept. Either way, it will play an important role when we construct Ikigai 2.0. Before we get there, let’s cover a quick history lesson to better understand how these diagrams compare to the truth about ikigai. 9 Chapter 2 The Truth about Ikigai This chapter outlines a short history lesson about ikigai, along with ten myths and ten perspectives. The most important elements of ikigai are synthesized here to give you a base knowledge as a foundation before we build the Ikigai 2.0 model. What’s the origin of ikigai? Akihiro Hasegawa, a professor and ikigai researcher, believes the origin of the word may date back to the Heian period (794 to 1185). 1 Gordon Mathews, an author and professor, dates the term to the fourteenth century. Either way, there’s modern-day confusion about ikigai despite its long history: “The contemporary Japanese works on ikigai that I’ve studied say little about the history of the term or about ikigai as conceived in the past.” — Gordon Mathews, author of What Makes Life Worth Living? 2 Yukari Mitsuhashi, author of the book Ikigai: Giving Every Day Meaning and Joy , may be able to explain Mathews’ observation: “The reason the topic of ikigai is a difficult one to tackle – even for someone who is Japanese – is because, although it is a common concept in Japan, it is not something you learn from a textbook. Growing up and living in Japan for most of my life, I don’t recall ever being taught about ikigai in a classroom. Japanese children learn more than 1,000 kanji in elementary (primary) school alone, but ikigai is not one of them.” Part of the confusion is likely due to the fact that ikigai only exists in the Japanese language. When you attempt to dissect the word itself, you end up with: • iki = “life” • ikiru = “to live” • kai / gai = “value” or “worth” That last part of the word is especially interesting: “Gai comes from the word kai (‘shell’ in Japanese) which were deemed highly valuable, and from there ikigai derived as a word that means value in living.” — Akihiro Hasegawa 1 10 Regarding kai : “kai is a suffix meaning roughly ‘the realization of what one expects and hopes for.’” — Gordon Mathews 2 When translated today, you see a variety of ikigai definitions including: • “life’s worth,” “worth living” • “the value of living,” “the value of life,” “value or meaning to live” • “reason for being,” “reason for living,” “the reason for which you wake up in the morning” • “the happiness in life,” “the happiness and benefit of being alive,” “the happiness of being busy” • “something to live for,” “the joy and goal of living” Many people still refer to the book Ikigai-ni-tsuite (translated as About Ikigai or On the Meaning of Life ), written by psychiatrist Mieko Kamiya and published in 1966. “Mieko Kamiya, explains that as a word, ikigai is similar to ‘happiness’ but has a subtle difference in its nuance. Ikigai is what allows you to look forward to the future even if you’re miserable right now.” — Yukari Mitsuhashi 1 “Kamiya stated that those who have firm Ikigai would be those who realize their own mission, or purpose in life, and who are deliberately progressing toward their goals.” — Wikipedia 3 Mieko Kamiya also mentions that ikigai has two parts to it: 2 • ikigai taish ō = the object that makes one’s life seem worth living • ikigai kan = the feeling that life is worth living What do these two parts actually look like in the real world? “The word ‘ikigai’ is usually used to indicate the source of value in one’s life or the things that make one’s life worthwhile (for example, one might say: ‘This child is my ikigai’). Secondly, the word is used to refer to mental and spiritual circumstances under which individuals feel that their lives are valuable.” — Noriyuki Nakanishi 4 11 This dual distinction is important to understand. Gordon Mathews expands by making a critical point: while ikigai is personal to yourself, there is no self without the context of others. “Self-realization may seem to imply self as opposed to others; but whether one lives for one’s family or one’s art, one’s company or one’s dream, one still is projected into a world beyond the self.” 13 “All ikigai may be seen as both individual and social. Whatever one lives for (be it company, children, spouse, lover, art, God, liquor, or the dream of self-fulfillment) is social, projecting self into a world of others, whether real or imagined. At the same time, what one lives for is individual, in that it cannot be decided for one by others but only by oneself.” 14 “Ikigai, as one’s deepest sense of social commitment, is what gives one a sense of linkage through what one most deeply loves to one’s social world.” 14 By now, the history and truth of ikigai may be raising some questions for you when you compare it to the four-circle diagram. The next logical things to tackle are the many myths about ikigai. Below are ten myths with support from ikigai experts. These are important to keep in mind as we move forward. Myth #1: Ikigai is about money “Your true Ikigai is something that you would do for free if you were given the chance. When it comes to Ikigai, think of the rewards you’ll get, instead of the money. Rewards are still valuable. They fill your emotional bank account.” — Tim Tamashiro, author of How to Ikigai: Lessons for Finding Happiness and Living Your Life’s Purpose Myth #2: Ikigai is about work “In Japan, ikigai is a slower process and often has nothing to do with work.” — Laura Oliver 5 Myth #3: Ikigai is about retirement “Many Japanese people never really retire—they keep doing what they love for as long as their health allows.” — Héctor García and Francesc Miralles, authors of Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life 12 Myth #4: Ikigai is a single thing. “Ikigai does not come from a single value system ... It comes from the rich resonance of a spectrum of small things, none of which serves a grandiose purpose in life by itself.” — Ken Mogi, author of Awakening Your Ikigai: How the Japanese Wake Up to Joy and Purpose Every Day Myth #5: Ikigai is a grand thing. “Ikigai is not something grand or extraordinary. It’s something pretty matter-of- fact.” — Gordon Mathews 5 Myth #6: Ikigai is about lifetime “Hasegawa points out that in English, the word life means both lifetime and everyday life. So, ikigai translated as life’s purpose sounds very grand. ‘But in Japan we have jinsei, which means lifetime and seikatsu, which means everyday life,’ he says. The concept of ikigai aligns more to seikatsu and, through his research, Hasegawa discovered that Japanese people believe that the sum of small joys in everyday life results in more fulfilling life as a whole.” — Yukari Mitsuhashi 1 Myth #7: Ikigai is assigned by others “Behaviours which make one feel ikigai are not actions which individuals are forced to take, but they are spontaneous activities which people undertake willingly.” — Noriyuki Nakanishi 4 Myth #8: Ikigai is only about goals “I have learned in my own research with older Japanese, what makes ikigai effective is its inextricable link to a sense of mastery – the idea known as ‘chanto suru’ that things should be done properly. As such, ikigai emphasises process and immersion rather than a final aim.” — Iza Kaved ž ija 6 Myth #9: Ikigai isn’t about the future “Ikigai is more concerned with the future: for example, even when one feels that one’s present life is dark, possessing a desire or goal for the future allows one to feel ikigai.” — Noriyuki Nakanishi 4 13 Myth #10: Ikigai never changes “It is also something that comes and goes and changes for each individual over the course of their lifetime.” — Nicholas Kemp & Kaoru Hayashi, authors of Ikigai Demystified: Ikigai is Not a Venn Diagram As you can see, ikigai is complex. But, it’s complexity is part of its beauty: “The complexity of ikigai actually reflects the complexity of life itself. So, in order to be a master of ikigai, you really need to appreciate how complex and rich life actually is.” — Ken Mogi To help us better appreciate the rich diversity of life, we’ll balance the ten myths with ten perspectives from ikigai experts. Again, these will be important to consider as we build Ikigai 2.0 and you find your own ikigai. Perspective #1: Ikigai is universal “Ikigai is a universal commodity, to be handed out to everyone with an eye for it.” — Ken Mogi Perspective #2: Ikigai is about human flourishing “Ikigai is more in line with the characteristics of eudaimonia, the condition of human flourishing or of living well.” — Nicholas Kemp & Kaoru Hayashi Perspective #3: Ikigai is about your true nature “According to (Mieko) Kamiya, when a person discovers a new theme for their existence, this theme should be in line with their true nature.” — Wikipedia 3 Perspective #4: Ikigai is about your inner potential “Ikigai, which is the highest level of desire, may be considered to be essentially the processes of cultivating one’s inner potential or that which makes one’s life significant.” — Noriyuki Nakanishi 4 14 Perspective #5: Ikigai is about knowing yourself “Ultimately, knowing your ikigai is about knowing yourself, which takes time and effort. It’s worth investing this time and effort, though, because once you understand your ikigai you can find ways to pursue it, and you may find that many seemingly unrelated areas of your life end up contributing to it in one way or another.” — Yukari Mitsuhashi Perspective #6: Ikigai is personal “Ikigai is personal; it reflects the inner self of an individual and expresses that faithfully. It establishes a unique mental world in which the individual can feel at ease.” — Noriyuki Nakanishi 4 Perspective #7: Ikigai is what you most essentially live for “Ikigai is what, day after day and year after year, each of us most essentially lives for.” — Gordon Mathews 2 Perspective #8: Ikigai is living every day to your fullest “I think having ikigai ensures that I will never be bored until the day I die. Maybe that’s happiness. You keep chasing your ikigai and one day you just die. You live every day to your fullest, going to bed exhausted at the end of the day, falling asleep and then waking to another new day.” — Dai Tamesue Perspective #9: Ikigai is about self-acceptance “The greatest secret of ikigai, ultimately, has to be the acceptance of oneself, no matter what kind of unique features one might happen to be born with. There is no single optimum way to find ikigai. Each one of us has to seek our own, in the forest of our unique individualities.” — Ken Mogi Perspective #10: Ikigai is like a treasure map “This word (ikigai) is really like a treasure map. And, this treasure map can help you find your way to finding wonderful things about yourself that you can share with the world, and the world will say ‘thank you’ for it.” — Tim Tamashiro Let’s dive deeper into that treasure map. 15 Chapter 3 The Evolution to Ikigai 1.5 In the years since Marc Winn released Ikigai 1.0 in 2014, there have been many attempts at evolving the diagram. I consider these Ikigai 1.5 models—we’ll quickly cover three examples. The first Ikigai 1.5 model comes from the Toronto Star. In 2016, it looks like they filled in some additional spaces of the diagram using an ikigai image from the stock image site Dreamstime: 11 16 The second Ikigai 1.5 model comes from David McCandless, founder of Information is Beautiful , who adjusted the orientation of the original diagram to attempt to get all four circles to intersect. Here’s David’s rationale: 12 “Sadly, pedantically, the four-way Venn in the diagram is broken, from a technical POV. If you look closely, two sectors – love & paid for, good at & world needs – don’t intersect uniquely.” “So I fixed that and theorised what those missing sectors might contain, while making a few other tweaks.” 17 As the third and final Ikigai 1.5 example, here’s one from Amanda Kudo, author of the book My Little Ikigai Journal Amanda changes some definitions of the circles: • “What you can be paid for” changed to “Where I can make a difference” • “What the world needs” changed to “How I see the world” These two circle changes also require changes to the overlapping areas: • “Profession” changed to “Gifts” • “Mission” changed to “Values” • “Vocation” changed to “Possibilities” 18 Chapter 4 Introducing Ikigai 2.0 Now we know the truth about ikigai, the origin of the four-circle diagram (Ikigai 1.0), and some attempts at evolving the model (Ikigai 1.5). While the evolutions propose some interesting ideas, they do not incorporate the true meaning of ikigai. This brought me to a crossroads. Since the viral diagram has little to do with the truth about ikigai, do I: 1. Create a brand new diagram from scratch and hope it catches on (possibly calling it something else other than “ikigai”)? 2. Attempt to redesign the viral diagram to better match the truth? Since the world is already familiar with the four-circle diagram, I decided it made more sense to go with #2. My hope is that Ikigai 2.0 can be a way forward: “I’m waiting for somebody who wants to develop it fully. But, not only in a materialistic way—in a profound way.” — Andrés Zuzunaga, creator of the original Spanish purpose diagram 10 Based on the truth about ikigai, the 2.0 model must consider the following: • Ikigai is personal and universal—involving the self (intrinsic feelings) and other (extrinsic sources). • Ikigai comes from your true nature, knowing yourself, and self-acceptance— which allow you to cultivate your inner potential. • Ikigai isn’t necessarily about money or work—or even retirement. • Ikigai is what you most essentially live for every day—with an eye toward the future. • Ikigai may be one thing or many, big or small—and may change over time. Let’s walk through these and build the Ikigai 2.0 model along the way. We’ll start with the four-circle diagram as a base template and morph it as we go along. 19 Ikigai is personal and universal—involving the self (intrinsic feelings) and other (extrinsic sources). First, let’s begin with the intrinsic feeling that life is worth living. There’s nothing that’s required for you to do here. Instead, it’s all about being . It’s about who you are at your essence. Spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle refers to this as your primary, inner purpose that’s shared with all humanity. “The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple. And yet, everybody rushes around in a great panic as if it were necessary to achieve something beyond themselves.” — Alan Watts We’ll represent this essence with an orange circle in the very heart of the diagram: Next, we have the extrinsic source(s) of value in one’s life that is/are worth living for. This is concerned with doing —what you do in the world and/or who you do it for. Tolle refers to it as your secondary, outer purpose that’s unique to you and can change throughout your lifetime. In the book Man’s Search for Meaning , Viktor Frankl outlines three different ways we can discover meaning in life: "By creating a work or doing a deed, by experiencing something or encountering someone, and by the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering." 20