by Dr. Dave Stefan
On Sunday, January 8th, I will be facilitating an interactive worship service that challenges us to consider our ikigai, a Japanese word that means “reason for being,” and to construct well-being goals for the new year. Leading up to our January 8th service, please take time to complete the following as you reflect on your own sense of well-being. This process is designed to help you find your ikigai, or a part of it, and includes identifying what you love, what you are good at and what some of your well-being needs are. The goal is to then create a 30-day well-being project that will help you start off the new year in a happier and healthier frame of mind.
1. What you love: First, take some time to reflect on what your interests/ passions/ dreams are and jot those ideas down into a Life List of at least 25 items. Then, also, think about those items on the list that are top priorities that you might want to focus on for the next period of your life. Here is one resource to help you think about the various pieces of a Life List:
https://chrisguillebeau.com/how-to-write-a-life-list.
I often do a new Life List every few years after I accomplish most of what is on my list. You can add to your list at any time. For now, this is really just a draft on your way to narrowing down some ideas for a new year’s well-being project. The goal is to have fun dreaming and exploring.
2. What you are good at: Once you have your Life List in hand, complete this VIA Strengths Survey to get an idea of your values and strengths. You will utilize some of your strengths in the completion of your well-being project: https://www.viacharacter.org. When you get the results of this survey, pick one of the top five that you’d like to integrate into your project.
3. After identifying your Life List and completing the VIA inventory, visit the UC Berkeley Greater Good website and explore the Keys to Well-being. Peruse the various keys, and then narrow your focus on one or two that you would like to include in a 30-day well-being project: https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/key.
Then on January 8th, we will revisit some of these results, interact with one another about our ikigais and set our course for the new year. And for those who are interested, we will meet weekly via zoom over a lunch hour to share our progress on the projects and keep one another motivated.
For more information and resources on these various dimensions of ikigai, visit https://www.thecomealivecollaborative.com/resources.
12/23/2022.
