What makes you thrive?

When I was in college and trying to figure out what do with my life, an advisor gave me the following “assignment”—make a list of all of the things you’ve done in your life that you loved doing, the experiences that have been meaningful and given you a sense of satisfaction. Then make a list of all of things that have sucked the life out of you, experiences that have left you depleted and wanting. Look at the lists and see if you can spot any themes. What kinds of things light you up and what kinds of things burn you out?

This was revolutionary to me, at the ripe old age of 19. Of course I was aware of how I enjoyed some activities more than others. But I was well steeped in the notion that my preferences didn’t matter. I knew the expectation was that I should be more than capable at all of the things (a straight A report card was always the goal in my family), and that my interest in “soft-subjects" like the arts, lay somewhere between “not a good way to make a living” and “akin to a cream puff—all fluff and no good stuff” (oddly, this is a phrase I learned from my high school voice teacher when she described the quality of singing without breath support, but I'm appropriating it here because it makes me smile). When I was in grade school, I remember adults asking us kids what our favorite school subject was. My honest answer was “reading and language skills”, but all the cool kids* said “recess” and got a good laugh and a knowing look, so I parroted them, even though I hated recess because it meant I had to try and interact with my peers, and I would have rather used that time to daydream and make-believe and act out the TV commercials I wrote to promote the contents of my lunchbox. But the socializing was clear and consistent—to the question of “what do you love to do?” there are right answers (which earn you praise and admiration) and there are wrong answers (which earn you ridicule or admonishment). No wonder I had no idea who I was; I couldn’t even admit to myself, let alone proudly claim, the activities that gave me joy and contentment.

My work as a life and leadership coach is a re-education, an effort to teach myself and others the thing I wish I had been taught as a child and teenager and young adult—fulfillment has everything to do with discovering what you love, and then doing it as often as you can. Fulfillment is not the result of earning straight A’s, or being good at the “right” or “marketable” things, or letting the value of profit eclipse the value of purpose.

My virtual course “Wandering and Wayfinding”, is deep dive into this exploration, adapted from a year of my life in which I went searching for purpose and direction. The next cohort starts March 3 and sign ups start February 8.  But if you want to wade around in the water a bit before taking the dive, try out this exercise, adapted from the one my college advisor gave me:

Think of four times in your life when you felt like you were thriving. You might have a couple of experiences come to mind immediately—write them down without over-thinking it. If you are having a hard time coming up with examples, don’t panic, this does not mean you have never thrived, or that there is something wrong with you or the way you’ve been living your life. Try to relax and let your mind wander.

If you are really struggling to come up with examples of your own thriving, see if this prompt works better for you:

If I gave you a whole month to do whatever made you feel alive--no strings attached, no judgement, no tethers to reality--how would you fill your time? Now think about times when you have been doing those things (or things similar to those things) and see if you can identify the roots of your thriving. 

A couple of things to keep in mind:

• First, just because something was challenging doesn’t mean it can’t be on the thrive list. In fact, for me, challenge is a key ingredient in my thriving. If I’m feeling bored, stuck in a rut, uncreative and unenergized, I will actually look for a new challenge, a situation where I feel out of my league, or where I really have no idea where to begin, in order to jumpstart my thriving.
• Second, don’t spend too much time evaluating whether something should or shouldn’t be on either list. If it floated up into your consciousness as a response to the prompt, trust your gut and just put it on the list; you can change your mind later, if needed. 

Once you have your lists, look for themes:

What kinds of environments, interactions, and topics do you seem to be drawn to? What kinds of tasks, structures, and spaces seem to naturally result in a state of flow? What surrounded you, and what were you contributing? And, on the flip side, what was it that made all those life sucking experiences so unbearable? What was the context and nuance of those activities?

(A tiny warning: it is likely that people with whom you have had interpersonal conflicts will come up here as “reasons” those experiences were so awful. Try not to let this become a blame game. Try to zoom out a bit and see why that interpersonal conflict was so toxic, without villain-izing the other person or yourself).

Here are some of the things that made 19-year old me thrive:

• collaborative, creative activity
• rehearsal, much more than the performance
• being put in charge of things
• recognition for my accomplishments

And here's what sucked the life out of me at 19:

• conflict, of any kind
• environments with stiff rules and behavioral norms
• anonymity (being a little fish in a big pond)

Fast forward a couple decades; here are the keys to my thriving currently:

• I need a lot of alone time and one-on-one time with people who want to have meaningful conversations
• I crave authenticity and can spot a bad performance a mile a way
• I need to feel like I am learning and growing, and I love challenging work because it catalyzes growth
• I get really overwhelmed by dysfunctional systems
• I hate small talk and being interrupted…these things leave me exhausted
• I need easy access to some kind of creative or generative activity 

The evolution is kind of fascinating, right? (I especially love the noticing that conflict is no longer a drain on my thriving; it took time and effort, but being able to stay present and grounded amidst conflict is one of my proudest accomplishments.) 

More importantly, charting the journey and having an up-to-date short list of things that contribute to my thriving helps me unpack and understand the ups-and-downs of my life, the intense emotions that can come up in a day, or the slow onset of frustration, boredom, or anxiety. I can always pause and look for evidence of something that I know burns me out, and look for opportunities to implement activities that I know make me thrive.

Give it a try. Let me know what you find out. I love learning about what makes people thrive. 

*In my world, the "cool kids" were the boys with hair gel that made their flattop haircuts extra spikey, and the girls who dotted the I’s in their names with little hearts. My name didn’t have any I’s. It had two O’s, right next to each other. I could turn them into eyeballs and draw a little smile beneath them. But this was not the same thing as dotting an I with a little heart. I wished I was named Jennifer, or Christina, or Nicole. But even if I had been, it still would not have solved the problem that I didn’t like recess and the dark secret I was trying to keep hidden—that unstructured interaction with my peers made me anxious and all I really wanted to do was read stories and then act them out (and maybe also gather up some neighborhood kids that were younger than me and give them some roles and some overly specific instructions for how to play them).