Simon Sinek explains how to find your why by calling close friends and asking what specifically they value about you. If multiple friends give similar answers, those responses reveal your underlying why. Your why is a core part of who you are that can't fundamentally change.
There's no such thing as changing your why. Your why is something objective.
It's who you are.
It's who you are at your natural best. You know, we were all fully formed.
When we were young.
We are products of our upbringing and.
We can make tactical changes, but fundamentally.
Who we are is who we are.
And putting your why into words is putting that into words. So once it's written, you can tweak the language for sure and find nuance, but there's no changing it. So if you're changing it every year, probably not your why.
But I can tell you a fun.
Little exercise if you want to learn your why. I call it the friends test. Call a friend who you love, someone who you could call them at 3 o' clock in the morning, or they could call you at 3 o' clock in the morning and you would absolutely take the call. Do not do this with a spouse or a sibling. Those relationships are too close because they.
Know you too well.
Do with a best friend and ask them this simple question, why are we friends? And they're going to look at you like you're crazy because you're asking them to put into words something that exists in the emotional part of their brain, the limbic brain, but that part of the brain doesn't control language, the neocortex. And so they're going to say, I don't know.
Why are you asking me? You say, come on, just humor me. And then, weirdly, you stop asking the question why.
You ask the question what, it elicits better answers. Come on, what specifically is it about.
Me that I know that you would.
Be there for me no matter what.
And they'll start describing you.
I don't know I can trust you.
You're smart, you're funny, and you play devil's advocate. Great, that's a lot of friends. What specifically is it about me? And they're going to go through a few rounds of hemming and hawing and eventually they'll give up, and eventually they'll.
Give up and start describing themselves. And this is what my friend said to me. I don't know, Simon. All I know is I can just sit in a room with you, I don't even have to talk to you, and I feel inspired and I got goosebumps. In fact, I'm getting them right now.
And if you do this with multiple friends, you'll get very similar, if not the exact same answer. Because what they're articulating is your value.
You have in the world, which is your why. So It's a fun way to get at it, if you're interested in it.
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