What is your WHY?

Date: 27 December 2024 time: 920pm, location: BRP 7/3b home, with the Christmas tree lights on and complete silence We went for lunch with a good old friend earlier today. It has become somewhat a custom for us to meet up once, usually at the end of a year to remember the year that has passed and remember the good old days. She is an adventurous soul, she kind of reminds me of me - a more fiesty and upfront version of me. That is Sharmini. She also brings her tarrot or angel cards occaasionally so she would read them for us. We don't take them seriously but it's an interesting information to obtain about ourselves. This time that we met her, we did not tell her anything about the journey we have had, the one we are planning to take on or anything of that sort as we did not want that to influence her reading of our cards. I will not be sharing details of the cards we got but i want to explore another conversation we had that got me thinking. She mentioned about her searching for her "why" based on a podcast by Trevor Noah where he hosted Simon Sinek. Remember at the start of my post i said that she was somewhat like me? Yes we do bump into similar books so there you go. So here is the bigger question i need to answer for myself. What is my WHY or purpose in my work/ life? You see, i started with Simon Sinek book on this question after it was shared during a speech by a friend from toastmasters - Deborah Gordon. She then borrowed the book to me and i held on to it for an entire year- that's right, a whole year of sitting with the book. I started reading it, but stopped as it was too much to take in and it was like I had no brain capacity for it. I paused the reading. And fast forward to 12 months later, I am reminded of the same book again. Coincidence much? So here are some random wild observations that has been floating about for me - what is my true identity? What is my purpose? What is my focus? Why do i do what i do? So with the little time that i have left (until VJ returns home from class and we go for our foot massage), i am going to pen down my entire thought process through a series of questions. Q1. What is the most memorable/ meaningful/ exciting work/ project you have done in your entire life? Whenever I am asked this question, I am often taken back to the time i started my first job. I was tasked with responsibilities. To deliver a training. To coach. To interview. To design training content. Among all of the above, I enjoyed the research that went into any form of subject that resulted in many lead opportunities and angles. This was what the training content was. I did that almost instinctively back then without thinking too much about it. I also enjoyed the conversations I had with clients. Building relationships came very easily to me and i truly enjoyed the connections. I especially enjoyed travelling as part of my work although back then i did it like it was another regular day at work. I also recall my time during consulting years at Mercer where I was able to couple both these skills I was exceptionally good at - building connections and training. Well, I was not "good" at training as I kept with my job scope very tightly so i did not think too much about it back then but I could easily identify gaps in training and I would strive to deliver or design them through the subject matter experts. I loved the freedom i had to do the work on my own and was free to provide any form of solutions I deemed necessary to the client. I started to buckle down under the heat when I was put to be managed by someone I knew was no better than me. I disliked his shallow knowledge yet bullish ways of talking and getting his way around. I suffered from chronic self esteem issues so I could not bring myself to be my true self. I suffered from this condition through almost most of my career. The last of self confidence and self esteem cost me promotions, mobility opportunities and more. I don't think i fully came out of this condition until probably the last 2 years. Since i started introspection reflection. Can you imagine? 20 years of wasted opportunities? Anyway, I digress. I must also mention here why do i think this condition happened to me. You see, growing up, we had a brutal childhood. I watched domestic violence with my own eyes, almost daily for at least 18 years of my life. I assumed that is how women are supposed to be - just be subjected to cruelty. I never learnt to stand up for myself. I never thought there was a different type or even a better life out there. As a result, I shut myself down from the world, not wanting to talk about what I was going through to anyone. Not wanting to be secluded from the society, I did find friends to hang out with but instead of hanging out with those who spoke the same lingo with me, I took to those who spoke different languages than English. So my 2 best friends through high school were chinese girls. 2 of whom are nowhere in my life today. In fact they were never there after we left school. The truth is, i never really connect with them. With anyone for that matter. I made this choice myself so i can escape the realities of having to speak up or speak to someone about whatever turmoil i was facing back home. On the surface I appeared as a regular teenage girl but deep inside I was someone else that no one knew about. My lack of self confidence was also projected through the clothes I wore. I would hide under baggy clothes. No revealing clothes made their way to my wardrobe. Nothing too fleshy etc. I condoned to the orders of the house which was traditionally tamil culture based. So anyways, that is a super short summary of the source of my self-esteem+confidence issues. Q2. What did you enjoy the most about doing it? I enjoyed the satisfaction of seeing a finished / end product. I actually loved the idea of delivering a completed project which resolved client issues. Ultimately I enjoyed the thrill of solving their problem. I could also easily identify their pain points and be able to convince them that what we were offering was going to be the solution. I enjoyed the trust they put in me. Q3. Now, design your ideal day at work using English words: - Freedom - Flexibility - Satisfaction of creating something - Leaving a mark on the world - Being appreciated - Sought after for my expertise - Being famous or known for something - Paid well My BIGGEST discovery for 2024 is this - MY DESTINY BEACONS ME FORWARD.. My destiny is looking for me.. So it is ultimately super duper important that whatever I choose to do moving forward from now onwards is aligned to ME and MY true purpose and not that of my kids/ husband/ mom/ family/ the society. AND the biggest learning or space that has gotten me super engaged, excited and motivated and happy has been in the space of learning. I am super thrilled at the prospect of seeing others obtain knowledge. Watching someone get an Ah-HA moment as a result of what i shared gives me that million dollar feel. And that is what I want to do. And continue doing. I have become really good at behavior analysis. I am also pretty much aligned with basic motivation of people and I am driven by the intention of teaching/ educating others to achieve something beyond themselves. I started tutoring when i was 12 years old. A friend engaged me to teach her younger brother maths. At that age i was already doing 15 year old maths. So i guess I was qualified to teach (or at least that's what I thought). Then I am not sure if that partnership continued but fast forward to 6 years later, i set up my own computer class at a tuition center and taught computers to junior students - for a fee. I was feeling very proud of myself at that time. considering that I was still studying at uni at that time. I purchased the computers on my own and set them up to be used. I did that for about 2 or 3 years at least. I also continued to tutor as and when there was a need for income. So teaching back then was about making money. And I still remember how I would try to make the learning fun for my learners. I did want to become a teacher when I was working at Marcus Evans so i applied to Singapore to teach there but my application was rejected on the grounds of academic results. I think I took that hit quite badly. But I did not for once consider - how about teaching adults in the workplace. Admittedly, my world view back then (although I did travel the world quite a bit back then) was very limited and confined to my deeply rooted systemic beliefs. I wished it was not the case but we shall not dwell in the past and continue with the future. So here I am, fast forward to 31 years after the first time I started teaching, I am considering returning to my calling. My true purpose which is to teach/ educate and be the messenger of all sorts. I think that is the closest I can relate with the destiny I am seeking after or that is seeking for me?