That star in the center is what the Japanese call one's "ikigai," your life's true purpose.
The origin of the word ikigai goes back to the Heian period (794 to 1185). “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.”
The “Ikigai Venn Diagram” was born when entrepreneur Marc Winn thought it would be a good idea to merge the Purpose Venn diagram with Ikigai and share it in a blog post.
Ikigai is your unique distillate of strengths and passions filtered through what the world is willing to pay you, which simultaneously benefit the world.
When you discover these things and choose only the very best and the highest to occupy that center space, it is a moment of clarity, poignancy, humility, and excitement.
You know what you must do. Then, you need to go do it.
Whether that is to create something of your own from scratch, which was my choice, or to join others in an existing project, business, cause, movement; that is up to you.
The beauty is that such clarity gives courage, and the good it will offer attracts others to you.
There is a process and a price to find this, however. It is work. To discover your Ikigai, you must first find what you're most passionate about. Then, you find the medium through which you can express that passion.
An inward journey is required, and most people will never do that work. Perhaps it is fear, or lack of faith in self or the process, but I have offered to guide hundreds in this and only a few dozen have accepted, and of those only a handful have completed the work.
For those who have, they found meaning and direction and power as previously divergent forces in their lives now aligned.
It is powerful.
About the Author
Larry LaMotte is not the guy who knew what he wanted to be since age 7. No, he is trained as an Architect with the heart of an entrepreneur. He built his own home. He has worked since age 8: paper routes, farm work, bike taxi, singing telegrams, bouncer, waiter, carpenter, designer, consultant, mentor, facilities manager, career counselor, business owner, with a couple of self-reinventions. He plans to live to 120. ReCapturit® is the current culmination of his work.
