Unlocking Ultimate Fulfillment: Why Following Your Bliss Matters More Than Ever

Follow your bliss even if only as a hobby to greatly enhance the quality of your life.

"Follow your bliss."?( Joseph Campbell ) is one of my favorite quotes of all time.?Simon Sinek made his entire career by rebranding this "curated" wisdom as "Find your why."?He added some over simplified pseudoscientific neurology to make it appear as both scientific and up to date, but I prefer the original.???

Unfortunately,?most people, including myself have been pushed, by well meaning forces, usually people, to do what's "sensible".?After a mere two to three decades my family has given up trying to change my mind to settle for the "safe" well trodden path.?The most likely people to discourage such striving will be your family, and significant others first and society second.?Fortunately,?the latter is FINALLY admitting that the traditional go to school, get a job & have a successful life is deeply flawed & outdated.?Even Elon Musk has said, " College is for having fun & proving you can do your chores,?not education." ( paraphrased )

What's sensible is usually backward looking and therefore especially vulnerable to change and failure.?Baby Boomers and their parents were probably correct in saying get a good education and a good job to live a successful life.?Unfortunately, that's NOT the reality of today.??

Playing it safe guarantees nothing as my lifetime of employment has repeatedly shown.?I've "had a good job" multiple times the results were:

The WHOLE plant was closed when Russia collapsed.?Our plant was making and sending 50 gate valves a day to Russia for their oil and gas industry.?I worked at an industrial machine shop that manufactured wellhead products.?Up until the day the entire plant closed,?I was the person who painted the valves before they went to the shipping department for export.?Our plant was setting all time income records for that facility.?One day, out of the blue, we were all called to the lunch room.?We are told the whole plant would be closing since the collapse of the U.S.S.R. ended the one contract that was keeping the plant open and profitable.?So much for a "safe" job.

Years later between 1999 - 2004, I worked at a massive print factory.?We printed the Safeway flyers for all of North America in our Calgary plant.?It was a "great job" with high wages,?full benefits, medical,?a matching RRSP program, the works.?I worked on the presses stacking flyers onto pallets.?After about six months I was promoted to pre-press where the printing plates for the presses were made.?I became a "plate-maker".?About four years later it was announced that half of our department would be laid off and replaced by an automatic plate loader.?I was one of four to get laid off.

Following your bliss guarantees nothing either,?and you might fail to turn it into your vocation.?But better to fail striving to succeed at something you truly love to do than doing the same for something you don't care about.?I have to admit,?I took no pride in printing junk mail despite the great pay and benefits.?In truth,?I was happy to leave the job regretting only the loss of income and benefits.

Job security was once true for a short period in modern human history for the baby boomers and perhaps their parents, but not since then and perhaps never again.?The modern reality is having a good job guarantees NOTHING.

I've been striving for decades to turn my bliss into my career, and I'm still not there.?I've been doing so for my entire adult life,?regardless of whether I had a "good job" or not.?Through all the good and bad economic times, nothing has kept me going, hopeful and inspired like striving to turn my bliss into my vocation.

I'm listening to a book right now about what it takes to achieve "mastery".?Robert Greene, the author defines "vocation" by the classical definition.?"Life's,?work,?motivation or purpose."?But I like the Japanese ( Okinawan ) word that describes the nuance of one's bliss better than any English I know.?生きがい ( ikigai ) translates as reason to live, one's life motivation or reason for which one wakes up in the morning.?That's how I feel about inventing.?"I will climb this mountain ( of becoming a professional inventor ) or die upon it." But I will never give up because it is my bliss.??

While I think you should strive to make your bliss your vocation,?at the very least pursue it in your off time because following it has far reaching cognitive, happiness & health implications regardless of whether you ever do it professionally.

Following your bliss gives you the three elements that Daniel Pink identified as the best way to motivate people in their careers in his book Drive.?They are:

1) Autonomy - The freedom to approach and carry out your work in whatever way you see fit, that matches your strengths and motivation to achieve the best outcome.

2) Mastery - The freedom and ability to grow,?improve and progress toward mastery in your work.

3) Purpose ( which I prefer to call Meaning ) - Something about your work that extends beyond the paycheck to become something that holds a deeper and larger purpose, meaning or impact to society at large.

In short, following your bliss guarantees nothing with respect to job security, just as getting a good job doesn't.?But unlike a good job you don't care about,?your bliss has Mastery, Autonomy and Meaning built into it.?Those give you motivation and drive beyond anything any job without it could.??

My own example is ongoing,?I love what I do 80+ hours a week WITHOUT pay ( yet ) while doing a meaningless job on the side to survive.?I've been doing it for over 14 years.?It hasn't been easy, it hasn't provided income, but it continues to bring me bliss.

Update - A single Zoom meeting I had today ( April 28, 2021 ) may be the tipping point which finally turns my ikigai into my vocation:-)?It still just a possibility but I would have quit a decade or more ago were it not my bliss which has given me the drive and perseverance it often takes to be successful.

tim #bgreen

P.S. 七転び八起き ( Fall down 7 times, stand up 8. ) - Japanese Proverb