Everyone in the world wants to be happy. With a happy life, one's life will be more meaningful and easier to be grateful and enthusiastic in everyday life. It is undeniable, too, that while undergoing routines every day, humans will feel bored. This feeling of saturation will later make someone reluctant or lazy to go through the day until they are not productive. Well, for those of you who often experience this, you need to know the concept of ikigai with the explanation below.
Meaning of Ikigai
Ikigai is a traditional Japanese ideology associated with a person's life expectancy. Ikigai itself comes from the word "iki" which means "life" and "gai" which means a value. Taken together, ikigai is a way of finding the meaning of life or the value of happiness. Ikigai itself is better known as the concept of things that make a person happy.
Ikigai Concept
The concept of ikigai consists of 4 essential elements which include likes/passions, professions/things mastered, missions/what is needed around, and what you are paid for. For more, see the detailed information below.
1. Likes or What is Most Liked
One of the elements of happiness that you need to know is what makes you happy while doing these activities. If you are happy and like the work or activity, you will be motivated to work hard every day, from waking up until the activity is complete.
2. What Are You Good At
The next thing you need to explore is what advantages you have in yourself. To create happiness, you can also take advantage of the advantages yourself which will affect the welfare of yourself and others. By mastering or being an expert in a certain field, you can be more meaningful than doing things you love but don't master.
3. What You Get Paid For
The third element of the ikigai concept is “what you get paid for”. The application of the concept of ikigai is how one understands what one's superiority can produce. On the other hand, if the advantages you have do not produce results, then you will try to be more productive and useful for the environment and the world to achieve that goal.
4. What the World Needs
The last one is “what the world needs”. When you know what the world needs, then you will focus and put more effort into preparing yourself and providing something that many people want or need. That way, you can realize what a lot of people need.
To make it easier to understand, here is an example of the concept of ikigai. A person with the initials A has a hobby in the world of photography. Because of his interests and hobbies, A always tries to deepen his knowledge and techniques in photography to master and have good photography skills. After mastering it. Finally, A began to use his skills to earn money while making things useful for himself and others. After earning enough, A began to realize that from these advantages there were several other things that the surrounding wanted, for example, a photography teacher so that there were many other great photographers in the area. In order to fulfill the desires of the world or around, then A tries to prepare himself to be useful to many people.
Benefits of Applying Ikigai
Some scientists reveal that the concept of ikigai has benefits in the form of a long life. This research was conducted in the small town of Kyotango and the participants were the elderly. The elderly had higher levels of DHEA (a steroid hormone produced by the adrenal glands or known as longevity glands) than in other cities in Japan.
After being traced, it turns out that the elderly often do hobbies that they really like such as dancing, painting, fishing, sports, and so on that keep them productive even in old age. Studies show that social activities and hobbies can also reduce the risk of dementia and Alzheimer's disease.
How to Get Happiness with Ikigai
1. Be Thankful
Being grateful for every favor and blessing were given by God can be one way to be happy. If you continue to complain and are not grateful for the blessings you have, you will tend to be angry, annoyed, and depressed because you can't achieve the desired goals. On the other hand, by being grateful, you will appreciate yourself more, receive God's gifts and be more motivated to do better things.
2. Looking for a Job According to Your Talent & Passion
The next is to find a job according to your talents and interests. By looking for jobs that match your talents and interests, you will be happier and able to achieve goals or pay according to your abilities.
3. Believing Obstacles Are Natural
Achieving happiness definitely requires a process that is not short. It takes the support of determination and motivation to achieve it. Not to mention, in each process, you will meet obstacles or challenges. At that time, the challenge must be lived until the happy goal is achieved.
4. Don't Overthink
The last thing is not to overthink a lot. For example, you have interests and talents in a field. However, you doubt that it can produce and can bring in enough money. So, the thing to do is don't hesitate and try to get started first. If you feel that you have done it and there are too many complicated things and there is no happiness in it at all, you can try to live or hone your skills in other fields. Try to be based on interest so that everything you do feels fun.
That's information about ikigai or the concept of happiness that comes from Japanese ideology that can be applied in everyday life or in business. A happy life does not always have to be related to material things, happiness can be in the form of physical or spiritual. May be useful! Get more lifestyle information at the following link.