Some common and good advice: Get clear on your “why.”
But rarely do people tell us how to find out what our “why” is. It usually doesn’t come as part of the advice.
Still, there’s a powerful way to pin down your why, and it involves outsourcing all your questions to your best friends. Your “why” comes down to a very basic line of thinking:
What are you working toward, and how come you are working toward it?
Maybe you’re working toward making a living as a musician, or perhaps an author. Or maybe there’s a certain role in a certain company that you’ve dreamed about.
How come you want those things?
Author and speaker Simon Sinek recommended finding a close friend and asking them a simple question: Why are we friends?
Odds are, your friend will look at you strangely, and perhaps not want to answer because they feel it is awkward or unorthodox.
Sinek then advises to make the question concrete in such a way that it elicits an answer: What is it about me that allows me to know you’d be there for me no matter what?
Eventually, if you keep pushing for descriptions, they will stop describing you, and begin to describe themselves, Sinek explains. That’s when your ears should perk up.
They will articulate the value you bring to their life, which will convey the impact that you carry with you as an individual.
Perhaps they tell you that, when they sit down with you in a room, they feel so sure of themselves and comfortable around you that they don’t feel the need to justify their actions, or explain themselves to you, because they know you are honest and supporting.
Or maybe they’ll explain that just by being in the same room as you, they feel inspired to do great work or create something new.
Sinek recommends taking these two questions to multiple close friends, and listening to what they all say. That combination of things they describe about themselves (which, really, are descriptions of you) are where you can source your “why” from.
“Your ‘why’ is what you give to the world, and amongst your closest and best friends, it is the space you fill in their lives,” Sinek said.
He continues to describe that your “why” is an essential part of your being, even if you do not recognize it, and even if you are enduring difficult times.
“A ‘why’ is a sum total of who you are…it is the fundamental core of what inspires you, it is the spark that drives you…a ‘why’ does not change, if anything crisis reveals it to us, but it does not change it.”
Getting clarity on this can narrow your focus and streamline your work, as well as your purpose for getting out of bed in the morning. Answering these questions, even vaguely, can bring you a greater sense of meaning.
The work, too, can become more enjoyable if you can clarify why you’re doing it. It also opens the door for you to be more of yourself — more of the person you already are — once you hear from others who they know you to be.
Ultimately, it allows you to be a better version of you — which really means a better person for those around you. The impact of your “why,” really, is so you can deliver more of your light to the world around you.
Motivational speaker and author, Zig Ziglar, put it another way: “You will get all you want in life, if you help other people get what they want.”
I dig deeper into these topics in my weekly newsletter. Join 1,800+ weekly readers and subscribe free here.
I used these ideas to write a bestselling book in a year while working full-time as a journalist. Learn more on Amazon.
Photo by Brett Sayles on Pexels.com
Very well said 🙂