How To Find And Do Work That You Love (Ikigai)

Tharun Varshanth Krishnamoorthy
4 min readMay 27, 2021

Ikigai is a Japanese concept referring to having a direction or purpose in life, providing a sense of fulfillment and towards which they the person may take actions, giving them satisfaction and a sense of meaning. Psychologists explain why identifying our purpose in life can help us with overall satisfaction. They claim that if we are able to find our ikigai, everything will be easier and more pleasant because we’ll be in sync our capabilities.

There are four questions to find our life path

What is my element? Do you see yourself more as an extrovert or an introvert? Do you find yourself enjoying activities in groups or on your own? Sometimes it’s a mix, but be sure to write down the type of company you enjoy in various situations.

During what activities do I experience flow? When does your time fly? What it something you could spend hours actively doing? This is an activity you will feel fully engaged in and won’t be thinking about anything else while doing.

What do you find easy to do? Is there anything which you personally find easy that others seem to struggle with? Some people find organizing documents in a clear manner easy while others are great at understanding different viewpoints.

What did you like doing when you were a kid? This question helps establish the basis of your ikigai. Are your strengths intrapersonal, interpersonal, logical, physical (kinesthetic), linguistic, or maybe visual (spatial)?

Four components to Achieving Ikigai

Ikigai is the union of four fundamental components of life: passion, vocation, profession, and mission. In other words, where what you love and are good at meets what you can be valued and paid for because it is needed in the world. Ikigai is only complete if the goal implies service to the community. Once you’ve identified these components, the next step is to start following your compass.

Passion

If you have something that you love and are really good at, then you have found your passion. Unfortunately, some people who are pursuing their passion have a sense of satisfaction and happiness. But some of them may feel like what they do is not creating such a huge impact or is not getting them any tangible rewards at all.

Computer Programming is a dream and passion for me. I love to do works using computers. In programming we can consistently create a logic that interacts with the other parts of the computer and other applications can make it happen. All we need to do after we thought it up is actually write it and presto a new thing is created into the world. That really feels like being a wizard. That’s the reason I choose the software engineering degree program to study because it will fulfill my dream.

Mission

If you have something that you love and is also what the world needs, then you are someone with a mission. People with a mission usually become advocates of what they believe in. They may also be a humanitarian who’s trying to change the world by joining volunteer missions or offering pro bono services to those who need it. This can give you a sense of fulfillment, knowing that you are making a difference in the world, but you might not be getting proper compensation for what you are doing.

I have the mission and goals to become a successful professional in my career with a good resource person in the software engineering industry. To achieve my career goals software engineering degree program is the right place for me without a doubt. The software engineering course structure gives me straight-line growth every year to me achieve my goals

Profession

If you are among the many people who have something that they are good at and are getting paid for it, then you have your profession. As a professional, you might be earning lots of money doing something that you have basically mastered doing. People like you are usually considered as experts in your field and this is why you are being paid well.

As a professional, I need to become a successful software engineer. The software engineering degree program is a train’s to me a good professional in the software industry. This industry has a lot of job roles. So when I choose a software engineering degree program I can go with plenty of job roles.

Vocation

We are all familiar with the concepts of “job” and “career,” but “vocation” is a much misunderstood term. Vocation could be work that is outside your wage-earning sphere of activity. For example, a businessperson might have a vocation as a youth sponsor or Sunday school teacher. A teacher might have a vocation as a mentor or worship leader. But vocation may also coincide with career or grow out of a specific career path. The vocation of a doctor or nurse might be “healer.” The vocation of a dietician might be “nourisher.”

In the software industry, there is plenty of vocations available. There is a lot of freelancing opportunities available so we can improve our skills in the working place and also on freelancing sites. we can work on different projects.

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