Work on Purpose

(Lots of posts today because so much has happened in the last few days.)

Two days ago I attended a Wesleyan event featuring Lara Galinsky, who makes a living helping individuals follow their path to fulfilling work. She has a saying that HEAD + HEART = HUSTLE , where ‘head’ is all the stuff you’ve learned in school and skills you’ve picked up in past jobs; ‘heart’ is what moves you; and ‘hustle’ is like flow, or being in the zone. She believes that when head and heart are aligned, you can achieve hustle. This activates a positive feedback loop where your hard work will make an impact, and that impact will bring you happiness, and that joy will once more inspire you to work hard, and so on and so forth.

The formula is quite close to the one I devised for my Finding Your Calling workshop: GIFT + JOY + PASSION = CALLING, where gift = what you’re good at, joy = what brings you happiness, passion = what moves you. When you manage to find or create work that brings in all three components, you have your calling. Lara’s formula is leaner and more elegant than mine (the alliteration is a particularly nice touch), but for younger people I think it’s good to get them to explore the different aspects of themselves with finer instruments.

Heartily recommend Lara’s book, Work on Purpose. It’s quick, engaging, and very inspirational.