Ikigai & Kaizen: The Japanese Strategy to Achieve Personal Happiness and Professional Success (How to set goals, stop procrastinating, be more productive, build good habits, focus, & thrive)

by Anthony Raymond

It is your job to keep your hands on the wheel. To ensure that your ship remains on an even keel, despite the winds of change that streak across its bow.

Ikigai is a Japanese life strategy that emphasizes the importance of finding your “true calling.”

The pursuit of one’s Ikigai is an important journey of self-discovery. If you can correctly identify the vocation that you are best suited for, then the spark of intrinsic motivation will illuminate within you—igniting the passions that power your pursuits, prompting you to accomplish momentous feats.

“Lingchi,” is a Chinese term that is commonly translated in the West as “death by a thousand cuts.”

The third concept is called “Hansei” (honest self-reflection). Hansei is a Japanese method for understanding “what went wrong.” It’s about seeking clarity of thought through careful consideration of past mistakes.

“Kaizen,” — often translated as “continuous improvement.” With Kaizen, we understand that the answers to life’s biggest quandaries do not come in the form of a magic pill. Instead, our most momentous accomplishments are typically the result of years of concentrated effort and dedication.

You might try gauging the degree to which you have already found your own Ikigai by considering the following question: “When you wake each morning, how do you feel about the workday that awaits you?”

Do you rise from bed with gusto—eager to take on new projects and meet new challenges?

In the Okinawan language there is not even a word for retirement.

sometimes, an Ikigai chooses you.

This is why you must remain vigilant in your pursuit of your Ikigai—relentlessly scanning the horizon, ever-ready to sample new curiosities, new hobbies, and new career prospects as they avail themselves to you.

In completing the preceding Ikigai discovery exercise, it’s pivotal that you try to be as honest with yourself as possible. If you’re unable to conduct an objective evaluation of your own skillset, then you may end up with a misaligned Ikigai.

Purpose describes our desire to engage in activities that are beneficial or meaningful to ourselves, our family, or our community.

Passion has little to do with euphoria and everything to do with patience. It is not about feeling good. It is about endurance. Like patience, passion comes from the same Latin root: “pati.” It does not mean “to flow with exuberance.” It means “to suffer.”

This is why you must seek out and devote yourself to a meaningful cause. This is why you must sail with purpose. This is why you must choose an Ikigai that is true and righteous.

said the way to be a better comic was to create better jokes. And the way to create better jokes was to write every day. He told me to get a big wall calendar that has [an entire] year on one page… The next step was to get a big red magic marker. [Then] for each day that I do my task of writing, I get to put a big red X over that day. After a few days, you’ll have a chain. Just keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day. You’ll like seeing that chain, especially when you get a few weeks under your belt. Your only job is to not break the chain. “Don’t break the chain!”

James Clear, author of the New York Times best-selling book Atomic Habits, described the Seinfeld method this way: Don’t break the chain on your workouts and you’ll find that you get fit rather quickly. Don’t break the chain in your business and you’ll find that results come much faster. Don’t break the chain in your artistic pursuits and you’ll find that you will produce creative work on a regular basis. So often, we assume that excellence requires a monumental effort and that our lofty goals demand incredible doses of willpower and motivation. But really, all we need is dedication to small, manageable tasks.

Everyone has overcome a challenge of some size. Everyone has faced a scuffle in which they came out on top. Maintaining a log of such triumphs can be invaluable on the days when the spirits of intrinsic motivation are not so easily conjured, or when the impediments before you appear insurmountable. It’s easy to stand awestruck at the difficult trial that lies before you. But it’s even easier to forget the many defeated obstacles that lie toppled behind you—silently laid out atop the ground that you have already won.

What small step could I take today which may (in the long run) improve the process or product?

The ritual of asking the same question at the start of each workday helps the employee to focus his mind on the ultimate goal—the continuous improvement of the product or the means by which the company builds the product. Of course, nobody expects each worker to arrive at a new epiphany every 24 hours. Instead, Deming’s goal was merely to establish a proper frame of mind for the workforce. Asking employees to remain vigilant in their pursuit of productivity helps to deter complacency and readies the mind to spot a potentially big idea when one eventually surfaces.

Ensure that your leaders are approachable… Break down barriers between [departments]. People [working in] research and design...must learn about the problems encountered…[by the people working in] production and assembly. Your team will understand that there isn’t enough time in the day to implement every new proposal. But it should be made clear to them that there is no harm in making a suggestion.

Your team will understand that there isn’t enough time in the day to implement every new proposal. But it should be made clear to them that there is no harm in making a suggestion.

Warren Buffett once said: The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say “no” to almost everything.

Some situations cannot be improved upon. Some relationships cannot be salvaged. Instead, the correct course of action may be to let sleeping dogs lie. Acceptance is often the only gift we can give those who are estranged. Forgiveness may be all we can provide for those who have wronged us—even if they don’t deserve it. This offering need not be wholly altruistic; its utility may be twofold. As Johnathan Lockwood Huie wrote: Forgive others, not because they deserve forgiveness, but because you deserve peace.

As the English novelist Paula Hawkins wrote: The holes in your life are permanent. You have to grow around them, like tree roots around concrete; you mould yourself through the gaps.

This is the essence of Kaizen. We do not gauge the value of our lives based on the number of peaks we have won, but on the number of days we have climbed. We pledge that, regardless of the quagmire that we find ourselves in today, we will try to make tomorrow incrementally better.

Wabi-sabi teaches us to coexist with imperfection and appreciate the beauty of transience. This way of thinking frequently finds expression in Asian art and culture. A Japanese rock garden (or “Zen Garden”) features a deliberate interplay between order and randomness. The gravel is tended with great care, raked into intricate patterns that defy the forces of entropy. And yet, large stones jet out from the genteel landscape, seemingly at random. Their antagonistic presence juxtaposes the meticulous symmetries of the garden, creating a dynamic representation of man’s quest to create order amidst the backdrop of chaos.

Lingchi can teach us to recognize the pernicious effects of each tiny life transgression. But without Hansei, we might not know the best way to interpret this information, nor how to devise a plan to improve our situation. Hansei enables us to look back and thoroughly evaluate our personal shortcomings. But without Kaizen and without our Ikigai, we might have trouble determining how to make our future journey more profitable and spiritually fulfilling. Ikigai will teach us to find our true calling. But without the guidance of Kaizen, we may falter in our commitments and fail to execute the many steps that are required to become a master of our craft. Kaizen will turn us into more efficient and productive workers. But if we have a misaligned Ikigai (i.e., if we hate our meaningless job), then we’re just another wage slave — pushing papers across a desk instead of gifting the planet with our true talents.