What Do You Want to BE?
Uncovering your Ikigai
Audio narration by David Marlow
What Do You Want to be When You Grow Up?
It's a question we were all asked as kids.
I love this illustration from Eduardo Salles because it was true for me as it was for many of us growing up during the space program's heyday and going to the Moon.
If we all were what we wanted to be when we were children,
the moon would be full of unemployed people.
Eduardo Salles
It is important to remember those dreams you had as a kid because they will tell you a lot about what you want 'to be' today.
For me being an astronaut meant making a difference, solving problems, exploring/inventing new things, and making the world a better place.
Those are things I'm still passionate about today and are part of my Ikigai.
I'm not going to be an astronaut; my gifts and dreams are being expressed in other ways, which is okay.
How about you? What did you want to be?
There are better questions to ask kids. As adults, however, it allows us to recall those sparks of interest from our childhood.
What is it about those things that appealed to you? Are there elements of that in what you do today? Could you add more of those things to what you do today?
Here are some bonus questions to ask kids (or yourself)...
🌱 What problems do you want to solve?
🌱 Who are the people you admire, and why?
🌱 What kind of person do you want to be when you grow up?*
🌱 Adult version-What kind of person do you want to be now as a grown-up?
🌀Some of you will find interesting answers to these questions.
Remember, every day is a fresh start.
Lets make thing a little bit better.
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Love this post and the questions that follow.
As a child, for some reason, I wanted to become a psychologist. It felt important to me to be able to connect to people, get them to share and help them through their thoughts and issues. I could not get there.
But somehow my journey through the years of being in the HR field have led me to being a coach today - and in many ways, this helps me achieve what I wanted to when I was younger, although I am certainly not a psychologist..
I like the question of what type of person do you strive daily to be? To add at the end of day> how did your development today somehow embrace interacting and helping others? Did you greet with a smile the person that provides the coffee to you in the morning? Did you allow someone to go first at an intersection while driving? Did you encourage a colleague that may be having some challenges? Did you say I love you to your spouse, family member, friend or simply acknowledging another human being with respect that all deserve! Agape Love is the Universal language or expression of interacting with others with purpose and charity...a great building has a firm foundation...build that foundation with love and assume positive intent. May not work all the time with results we are expecting, but can certainly be a joyful framework to go to the moon and back while still being gainfully employed and happy!