May 26, 2024 • 13 mins
The true concept of Ikigai is not the venn diagram that so many of us know. In this week's Mojo Monday, Carly talks about what Ikigai really is and how each one of us can tap into it everyday to really feel that life is worth living.
Recommended books/courses:
Ikigai-Kan by Nicholas Kemp
The Little Book of Ikigai by Ken Mogi
Courses - Ikigaitribe.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Hi everybody. It's Carli here for this week's Mojo Monday.
So I'm going to start with a question and feel
free to press poruts if you want to spend a
bit more time thinking about an answer, because it's not
one of those questions you can just kind of rattle
off the answer. It needs a bit of thinking process.
So here it is. This is a question what makes
(00:29):
your life worth living? So this is a question that
can help you find your ikey guy, which is a
topic I'll be talking about today. And I did question
whether I would do a Mojo Monday or iggy Guy,
as I wasn't sure ten minutes or would really do
it justice. So this is really a taste of what
egy guy is and how you can tap into it.
(00:52):
And then at the end, I'll give you some recommended
books and even maybe a course that you can look
into if you're interested to find out more. So when
I mentioned the word ike guy, you may have had
an image in your mind that comes up with a
ven diagram. And if you google ikey guy, or go
on LinkedIn or any of those socials, this ven diagram
(01:15):
comes up. And if that's the case, one I'm about
to tell you may surprise you because the true, authentic
Japanese concept of ikey guy is actually not that then diagram.
It's not a single life's purpose that we have to
seek out, and it doesn't solely come from okin Nawa
(01:35):
in Japan. The ven diagram is actually a Western interpretation
of ikey guy. And if you haven't seen the ven diagram,
the areas on it that they say make up ikey
guy to do something you love, do something you're good at,
do something that the world needs, and do something that
you can get paid for. And I was pleasantly surprised
(01:58):
to find out that this is not the Japanese concept
of ikey guy, because I always felt that meeting every
aspect of this then diagram, especially the part about getting paid,
was something that was kind of just a bit out
of reach. So how did this Van diagram come to
represent ikey Guy. Well, in twenty fourteen, an Englishman named
(02:20):
Mark Winn and I think he was like an entrepreneur
and a blogger, and he was watching Dan Brutner's Ted
talk on the Blue zones. So if you haven't heard
of Dan Brutner, he has done a lot of studies
on the areas which they call the blue zones where
people live the longest. And what Dan Brutner talked about
(02:40):
was these concepts of Ikey Guy in Okinawa and Mark
was fascinated by it, and he took another van diagram
which was created by Andreas Zununaga gosh I hope I
pronounced that right, z U z u Naga. And what
he did was he replaced the original word which was
in the middle of the venn diagram, which was purpose
(03:03):
with ikey Guy. And the blog post went viral and
this ven diagram, which has been the subject of many
books and used by business coaches and entrepreneurs, has become
this it's a misconception in the West that this is
what Ikey Guy is. And while the ven diagram has
been incredibly helpful for many people, especially in business, it's
(03:27):
actually it's important to know that it isn't Ikey Guy. Now.
Nicholas Kemp, who Paul had on the podcast probably about
a year ago, has been working hard to get the
true Ikey Guy message out to the West. He's got
a coaching course and courses that he does called Ikey
(03:49):
Guy Tribe, and which I did one of them over Lockdown,
which is where I discovered the true meaning and Vicky
Guy and ikey Guy's now a huge part of my
daily life and I wanted to share this with you
so perhaps you can start feeling ikey guy in your
daily life. So what is the true authentic ikey guy. Well,
(04:11):
ike guy is a feeling that you get. So Iki
means living and guy means value of or worth, so
it translates to a life worth living. And to my surprise,
it's actually not a special word in Japan. It's very
much used in general conversation to describe how someone is feeling.
(04:32):
And ikey guy is an approach to life that gives
your life meaning and it can be a number of things.
It can be small joys that you can experience every day.
And I'll give you an example from my own daily
life to kind of illustrate what that means. So I
love ceramics, particularly those ceramic pieces that are not perfect.
(04:54):
They have that real kind of organic and earthy quality.
And I've collected handmade boads, the small coffee mugs that
I've bought from local markets when I travel, and most
of them are without handles and shaped to almost mold
in my hand as I'm drinking. And every morning I
(05:15):
choose a cup and I make myself a cup of
coffee and I enjoy it while everyone else is still
in bed, and I really savor the moment, and I
don't do anything else but sip my coffee. So no texting,
no checking socials. All the news is just me, my coffee,
the dogs, and the morning bird song. And this little
(05:38):
ritual is my ikey guy and it brings me this
feeling of calmness, It brings me joy, a feeling of
presence and gratitude. This is what we call my ikey guy. Kh't.
So ikey guy is your source of iky guy, and
then ikey guy can't is the feeling that you get
from your ikey guy. And you notice in this example
(06:02):
that I've given you that in order to feel ikey Guy,
I have to be fully present, So if you're distracted,
you won't tap into ikey guy. So you really need
to have the intention to enjoy the moment of whatever
your source of iky guy is. And this could be
anything that you feel has meaning and value to you,
(06:23):
so like a hobby, having a meaningful conversation with a friend,
surfing nature, going for a run, whatever it is. Immersing
yourself in it, even for a few seconds, and you
will start to feel ikey Guy. And I'm actually finding
the older I get, the more I tap into my
(06:44):
Ikey Guy Khn't, which is that feeling is through nature.
I really love being in nature. I feel present, I
feel calm, and I would say that nature is one
of my sources of Ikey Guy. So ike Guy can
also be It can be a number of things. It
can be an object that has meaning to you. For example,
(07:06):
I have a chair that my late mother used to
sit in, and each time I now sit in that chair,
I remember her and it gives me a moment of joy,
and it's almost like I can feel her presence sort
of through the chair. There's been a fair amount of
research behind ikey Guy, and Nicholas camp has taken a
deep dive of this in his book Ikey Guy Khn't,
(07:29):
which I highly recommend if you are interested in Ikey Guy.
He talks ostensibly about mire Co Cama, who he refers
to as the mother of Ikey Guy, and she was
one of the first researchers to study ikey Guy and
included an aspect of one of the things that it
was included in her research was ikey guy being looking
(07:52):
forward to a bright future. And so this is something
that when we look forward to, So it could be
a holiday, you know, a birth day gathering, or some
sort of celebration or event that holds meaning for you.
So when you think about what's to come and that
gives you that sense of sort of joy or that
anticipation of joy, you can tap into that ekey guy.
(08:14):
And I love this as I actually think it ties
in really nicely with what Paul and I talked about
a couple of weeks ago, which is looking to your
future self in a positive light. So if you visualize
yourself living a good life, it can bring a feeling
of joy to the presence and motivate you to make
decisions now that will benefit your future self. And just
(08:36):
like all feelings, ikey Guy comes and goes. And when
things are challenging, it's easy to focus on those challenges
and those difficulties that you're going through, but you can
find ikey guy and moments of joy even during hard times,
and this can really help us get through the tough times.
And mere Co camea found that discovering meaning and value
(09:00):
in the challenges that we face in a way is
a way to experience Siki Guy, and I can really
relate to this. So some of you may know that
my son was diagnosed with a very rare disease about
eighteen months ago and it was probably the most challenging
time of my life. But there was also meaning and
value in that experience. So Oscar, my son and I
(09:23):
shared a deep bond that I don't think I would
have experienced if he hadn't been sick. I also tapped
into this relentless determination to do everything that I could
to get through it. And this aligns with another aspect
that came have found, which is you can find ikey
(09:44):
guy in growth and sense of purpose. So you can
see there's many aspects of ikey Guy, and the main
message here is that ikey Guy is not one thing
that you have to seek out, and it's certainly not
something that you need to get paid for. You can
find meaning in all areas of your life. You just
need to take the time to connect on a deeper
(10:05):
level with the things that you value, the things that
are important to you. So you could start with your family,
so especially if everyone is so busy that all your
conversations revolve around logistics, like you know who needs to
go where and whether something needs to be washed, or
I mean, that's my family. But take a moment to
(10:26):
pause and put intentionally put the logistics aside and spend
some quality time with the loved one and have a
meaningful conversation, or go outside and look up. I do
this a lot. I soak in the sounds and the
sights and the aromas, and feel the air on my
skin and connect with the fact that you're alive in
(10:50):
this amazing world. And that can bring you a source
of Vicky Guy. And the more you find sources of
Viky Guy, the more Iky Guy becomes a daily approaching
your life. So as we wrap up today's episode, I
just want to leave you with a few thoughts. So
Ikey Guy is about finding joy and purpose in everyday
(11:10):
moments of our lives. And it's certainly not a destination.
It's not a goal. It's more part of our life's journey.
It's about recognizing and appreciating the small things that bring
us happiness and fulfillment, whether it's a meaningful conversation with
a loved one or the simple pleasures of your morning
coffee or finding peace in nature. So Ikey Guy can
(11:34):
be found all around us. So take a moment each
day to reflect on what brings you joy and purpose,
pay attention to those moments and really embrace them. And remember,
Ikey Guy is not about meeting every criteria in a
then diagram. It's about living a life that feels worthwhile
(11:55):
to you in whatever form that takes. So I'm going
to recommend some resources for you to find out more
about the true authentic Ikey Guy. So a couple of books,
The Little Book of Ikey Guy which is by Ken
Mogi which is m o g. I and Paul had
him on the podcast a couple of years ago as well.
(12:17):
Nicholas camp As, I said, wrote a fantastic book called
Iggy Guy Khan and go to Ikey Guytribe dot com
because he has he has some courses that you can
do as well, and he's also got a podcast called
Ikey Guy Tribe, so have a look at those. So
thank you so much for joining me. I hope you've
(12:39):
found some inspiration to seek out and savor the moments
that make your life worth living, and wishing you a
week full of moments of iggy guy, have a great
week and see you next Monday.
Hi everybody. It's Carli here for this week's Mojo Monday.
So I'm going to start with a question and feel
free to press poruts if you want to spend a
bit more time thinking about an answer, because it's not
one of those questions you can just kind of rattle
off the answer. It needs a bit of thinking process.
So here it is. This is a question what makes
(00:29):
your life worth living? So this is a question that
can help you find your ikey guy, which is a
topic I'll be talking about today. And I did question
whether I would do a Mojo Monday or iggy Guy,
as I wasn't sure ten minutes or would really do
it justice. So this is really a taste of what
egy guy is and how you can tap into it.
(00:52):
And then at the end, I'll give you some recommended
books and even maybe a course that you can look
into if you're interested to find out more. So when
I mentioned the word ike guy, you may have had
an image in your mind that comes up with a
ven diagram. And if you google ikey guy, or go
on LinkedIn or any of those socials, this ven diagram
(01:15):
comes up. And if that's the case, one I'm about
to tell you may surprise you because the true, authentic
Japanese concept of ikey guy is actually not that then diagram.
It's not a single life's purpose that we have to
seek out, and it doesn't solely come from okin Nawa
(01:35):
in Japan. The ven diagram is actually a Western interpretation
of ikey guy. And if you haven't seen the ven diagram,
the areas on it that they say make up ikey
guy to do something you love, do something you're good at,
do something that the world needs, and do something that
you can get paid for. And I was pleasantly surprised
(01:58):
to find out that this is not the Japanese concept
of ikey guy, because I always felt that meeting every
aspect of this then diagram, especially the part about getting paid,
was something that was kind of just a bit out
of reach. So how did this Van diagram come to
represent ikey Guy. Well, in twenty fourteen, an Englishman named
(02:20):
Mark Winn and I think he was like an entrepreneur
and a blogger, and he was watching Dan Brutner's Ted
talk on the Blue zones. So if you haven't heard
of Dan Brutner, he has done a lot of studies
on the areas which they call the blue zones where
people live the longest. And what Dan Brutner talked about
(02:40):
was these concepts of Ikey Guy in Okinawa and Mark
was fascinated by it, and he took another van diagram
which was created by Andreas Zununaga gosh I hope I
pronounced that right, z U z u Naga. And what
he did was he replaced the original word which was
in the middle of the venn diagram, which was purpose
(03:03):
with ikey Guy. And the blog post went viral and
this ven diagram, which has been the subject of many
books and used by business coaches and entrepreneurs, has become
this it's a misconception in the West that this is
what Ikey Guy is. And while the ven diagram has
been incredibly helpful for many people, especially in business, it's
(03:27):
actually it's important to know that it isn't Ikey Guy. Now.
Nicholas Kemp, who Paul had on the podcast probably about
a year ago, has been working hard to get the
true Ikey Guy message out to the West. He's got
a coaching course and courses that he does called Ikey
(03:49):
Guy Tribe, and which I did one of them over Lockdown,
which is where I discovered the true meaning and Vicky
Guy and ikey Guy's now a huge part of my
daily life and I wanted to share this with you
so perhaps you can start feeling ikey guy in your
daily life. So what is the true authentic ikey guy. Well,
(04:11):
ike guy is a feeling that you get. So Iki
means living and guy means value of or worth, so
it translates to a life worth living. And to my surprise,
it's actually not a special word in Japan. It's very
much used in general conversation to describe how someone is feeling.
(04:32):
And ikey guy is an approach to life that gives
your life meaning and it can be a number of things.
It can be small joys that you can experience every day.
And I'll give you an example from my own daily
life to kind of illustrate what that means. So I
love ceramics, particularly those ceramic pieces that are not perfect.
(04:54):
They have that real kind of organic and earthy quality.
And I've collected handmade boads, the small coffee mugs that
I've bought from local markets when I travel, and most
of them are without handles and shaped to almost mold
in my hand as I'm drinking. And every morning I
(05:15):
choose a cup and I make myself a cup of
coffee and I enjoy it while everyone else is still
in bed, and I really savor the moment, and I
don't do anything else but sip my coffee. So no texting,
no checking socials. All the news is just me, my coffee,
the dogs, and the morning bird song. And this little
(05:38):
ritual is my ikey guy and it brings me this
feeling of calmness, It brings me joy, a feeling of
presence and gratitude. This is what we call my ikey guy. Kh't.
So ikey guy is your source of iky guy, and
then ikey guy can't is the feeling that you get
from your ikey guy. And you notice in this example
(06:02):
that I've given you that in order to feel ikey Guy,
I have to be fully present, So if you're distracted,
you won't tap into ikey guy. So you really need
to have the intention to enjoy the moment of whatever
your source of iky guy is. And this could be
anything that you feel has meaning and value to you,
(06:23):
so like a hobby, having a meaningful conversation with a friend,
surfing nature, going for a run, whatever it is. Immersing
yourself in it, even for a few seconds, and you
will start to feel ikey Guy. And I'm actually finding
the older I get, the more I tap into my
(06:44):
Ikey Guy Khn't, which is that feeling is through nature.
I really love being in nature. I feel present, I
feel calm, and I would say that nature is one
of my sources of Ikey Guy. So ike Guy can
also be It can be a number of things. It
can be an object that has meaning to you. For example,
(07:06):
I have a chair that my late mother used to
sit in, and each time I now sit in that chair,
I remember her and it gives me a moment of joy,
and it's almost like I can feel her presence sort
of through the chair. There's been a fair amount of
research behind ikey Guy, and Nicholas camp has taken a
deep dive of this in his book Ikey Guy Khn't,
(07:29):
which I highly recommend if you are interested in Ikey Guy.
He talks ostensibly about mire Co Cama, who he refers
to as the mother of Ikey Guy, and she was
one of the first researchers to study ikey Guy and
included an aspect of one of the things that it
was included in her research was ikey guy being looking
(07:52):
forward to a bright future. And so this is something
that when we look forward to, So it could be
a holiday, you know, a birth day gathering, or some
sort of celebration or event that holds meaning for you.
So when you think about what's to come and that
gives you that sense of sort of joy or that
anticipation of joy, you can tap into that ekey guy.
(08:14):
And I love this as I actually think it ties
in really nicely with what Paul and I talked about
a couple of weeks ago, which is looking to your
future self in a positive light. So if you visualize
yourself living a good life, it can bring a feeling
of joy to the presence and motivate you to make
decisions now that will benefit your future self. And just
(08:36):
like all feelings, ikey Guy comes and goes. And when
things are challenging, it's easy to focus on those challenges
and those difficulties that you're going through, but you can
find ikey guy and moments of joy even during hard times,
and this can really help us get through the tough times.
And mere Co camea found that discovering meaning and value
(09:00):
in the challenges that we face in a way is
a way to experience Siki Guy, and I can really
relate to this. So some of you may know that
my son was diagnosed with a very rare disease about
eighteen months ago and it was probably the most challenging
time of my life. But there was also meaning and
value in that experience. So Oscar, my son and I
(09:23):
shared a deep bond that I don't think I would
have experienced if he hadn't been sick. I also tapped
into this relentless determination to do everything that I could
to get through it. And this aligns with another aspect
that came have found, which is you can find ikey
(09:44):
guy in growth and sense of purpose. So you can
see there's many aspects of ikey Guy, and the main
message here is that ikey Guy is not one thing
that you have to seek out, and it's certainly not
something that you need to get paid for. You can
find meaning in all areas of your life. You just
need to take the time to connect on a deeper
(10:05):
level with the things that you value, the things that
are important to you. So you could start with your family,
so especially if everyone is so busy that all your
conversations revolve around logistics, like you know who needs to
go where and whether something needs to be washed, or
I mean, that's my family. But take a moment to
(10:26):
pause and put intentionally put the logistics aside and spend
some quality time with the loved one and have a
meaningful conversation, or go outside and look up. I do
this a lot. I soak in the sounds and the
sights and the aromas, and feel the air on my
skin and connect with the fact that you're alive in
(10:50):
this amazing world. And that can bring you a source
of Vicky Guy. And the more you find sources of
Viky Guy, the more Iky Guy becomes a daily approaching
your life. So as we wrap up today's episode, I
just want to leave you with a few thoughts. So
Ikey Guy is about finding joy and purpose in everyday
(11:10):
moments of our lives. And it's certainly not a destination.
It's not a goal. It's more part of our life's journey.
It's about recognizing and appreciating the small things that bring
us happiness and fulfillment, whether it's a meaningful conversation with
a loved one or the simple pleasures of your morning
coffee or finding peace in nature. So Ikey Guy can
(11:34):
be found all around us. So take a moment each
day to reflect on what brings you joy and purpose,
pay attention to those moments and really embrace them. And remember,
Ikey Guy is not about meeting every criteria in a
then diagram. It's about living a life that feels worthwhile
(11:55):
to you in whatever form that takes. So I'm going
to recommend some resources for you to find out more
about the true authentic Ikey Guy. So a couple of books,
The Little Book of Ikey Guy which is by Ken
Mogi which is m o g. I and Paul had
him on the podcast a couple of years ago as well.
(12:17):
Nicholas camp As, I said, wrote a fantastic book called
Iggy Guy Khan and go to Ikey Guytribe dot com
because he has he has some courses that you can
do as well, and he's also got a podcast called
Ikey Guy Tribe, so have a look at those. So
thank you so much for joining me. I hope you've
(12:39):
found some inspiration to seek out and savor the moments
that make your life worth living, and wishing you a
week full of moments of iggy guy, have a great
week and see you next Monday.
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