Connecting your Purpose to your flow

We need to be able to do these things on the right side with our eyes closed, all these things that come back together. And we're here about purpose. So thinking about, like, where you fit in, what do you do and how do you want to pursue this adventure, this life? The next WX mission is to accelerate growth, foster clarity, help you connect to your greater purpose through intentional design. Right? All the things we train and all the things we talk about are all intentional builders. You know, like clarity, goals, action, planning, practice, like integrating, learning about clarity inside your design team and how you can help them understand what's, what you're building with design clarity, understand that design energy is this incredible way of learning all the disciplines that you work with in product and design and engineering and learning about how you can all integrate cohesively, work better together, right? Design energy. And then like thinking about the productivity of the team and how you can be more productive as a professional and as a designer and thinking about how you optimize like design, design productivity, right? It's like accelerating. And then we talked about design impact last week and you know, how you measure success, how you benchmark, how you continuously learn design and life awareness, like all these things bubbling up, right? It's like 16 years of experience and knowledge just jam packed into this framework. But now we're here purpose. And really the purpose is like, we need to be able to do these things on the right side with our eyes closed. We need to know like, oh, we're starting a new project. These are the 10 things that we need to do. Like, we need to be able to understand, we need to clarity. We need to be able to break things down, you know, like there's just going to be so many opportunities for you when you unlock this deeper level awareness, you know, so you can build, build remote teams so you can optimize like just any challenge that comes to you and you can break it down and think about how you can approach it because you map it out. And then after you map it out, you can, okay, start examining it, start benchmarking it and then you can start recommending opportunities for the team or new problems to solve. You know, all these things that come back together and right, we're here about purpose. So thinking about like where you fit in, what do you do and how do you want to pursue this adventure, this life? So to do right, we need to know that purpose is fueled by intention. So with intention comes a greater sense of purpose. Without intention, I mean, it's possible that you can end up just like you know, flailing your arms and not really knowing why you're doing what you're doing. You know, you come into work, do you know exactly what you're doing? You come into your life, you walk in the door to see your family, do you know what you're doing? Do you know how you're going to show up in those moments? Right. That's why we also do the homework in week one of clarity. When you're learning about your purpose, your kryptonite, your priorities, how you want to show up and interact with other people, how you identify, like, are you consistent? Are you passionate? Like how do you identify as a creator? And then it's like, what does success look like for you? Right? So just these six questions is it's like a big giant wind up, you know, in baseball, you're winding up getting ready to throw. It's like knowing all those things allows you to show up with purpose. And then you can also have the intention alongside of it. So big, big, big things, you know, in these five words. And then we have. Well, intention is manifested from consistent reflection. So I'm having purpose. I need more intentional with the things that I do. So how can I do that? Well, I can have consistent practices of reflection and journaling so that I can quickly course correct and recalibrate because I feel a little off this week or I feel like, oh wow, my team's feeling a little distant from me, what are things that I can do to help bring them back in or what can I do to talk to them about it? Or you know, when you start to reflect, it's not about like over analyzing, it's not about over, you know, thinking just, you know, negative thoughts or anything. It's about building in consistent practices to reflect. And I gotta say, like a week right before COVID hit when I decided that I wanted to pursue like leaving Facebook, starting a new company, and it was like, is it the right time? Should I like keep like doing this or should I just jump in and go? And it was really like when I decided to get a high performance coach and I started going through and just like, you know, being able to bounce things up here, I'm like, want to start this company, I want to build a high performance platform. And then all these other things happened in Stars aligned because I was reflecting, because I was journaling, because I was talking it out. It unlocked other opportunities for me to even reach out to, you know, my, my CEO, who's my CEO now, and be able to realize that there was an opportunity There. And you know what? Like, he could have not responded. It could have went a lot of different ways. But the key was I was reflecting and I was journaling and I was doing the practice work. And it unlocked an opportunity that I just didn't think that. I mean, I dreamed about it and I wanted to do it and I wanted to pursue it, but it made it more real the more that I reflected on and the more I journaled about it. So the intention can be manifested from doing these things. So then it's like it increases the intentionality. And increased intentionality helps you drive more focus and purpose to what you do. So here we go, let's keep this going. So connecting to your purpose, like frequently connecting to that purpose statement and what you got going on, it helps you acknowledge, like, why you do what you do. So why do I want to do this? Oh, it's like back to my family is my purpose. I want to have a healthy, happy and exciting life that's important to me. So if that's important to me, I'm going to take stock and invest in that. And the same thing goes, if I want to have a world class product and a world class team, well, what does that look like? And what kind of intentionality can I bring into that moment? Well, I want my team to feel confident and courageous when they have a new idea. I want them to be organized and intentional with how they propose new ideas to the product teams. Or I want my product teams to really understand that we're moving a pile of opportunities and energy every single day. Like, how can we do it in a really positive and fun way? So there's like all these things that we can do and all these things that we can do to connect to this purpose. So this kind of intention just helps you kind of just recalibrate and keeps you focused on, you know, why you do what you do. And consistently doing that frequently is just kind of like a power up and it's a habit. The more you can do it, the more intentionality you can bring and then the more purpose you can have again, it's really helpful. And it's just how I like to show up. So you can think about how you, like show up, right? Go back to Clarity week. You go back into how you identify and what success looks like and how your interactions and you can really clarify that with just throwing up, like three words. Like, what are my three words for each of those categories? And then you can break down those three words and like, give it a little bit more meaning. Why do I want to be consistent? I want to be consistent because what I've learned in my career is being consistent leads to success. Having consistent rituals like consistent updates, consistent output, consistent communication, consistent collaboration, consistent fun, consistent energy. Those things have served me over my career. So I'm going to keep doing them because they bring me success. So I want to keep at it. So another way to look at this is if you develop the routines to connect to the purpose and create intentional actions each step of the way, then it's basically you're showing up, you're diving into the systems that you have already created. So the routines that you have every single day, you have routines, you have things that you're doing. You showed up today to watch this live event, this session. You had a whole day of meetings that you had before you came here, before that you might have had lunch, you had breakfast. You maybe worked out, you maybe went for a walk. You had a transition moment. Like, what routines did you have coming into this? And think about, were they connected to, you know, your highest self, your purpose? Were you showing up the best that you could in those moments? And if not, then think about, like, well, what are the intentional actions that you could take for next time when you show up tomorrow for, like, a workout or for a meeting or for a presentation? How could you show up and set yourself up for success for those things? And, you know, and that's kind of like the intentionality that we can bring to elevate and make these experiences better for people and for yourself, too. So you have better outcomes. You can have better moments with your friends, your family, your loved ones. It's all encompassing. So to do that again, we talked about these six things. I brought them up a couple times. Purpose, Kryptonite, Priorities. Identify interactions, success. These are kind of like these routines or even themes that you can have when you feel like you're a little off. You're not really following your, like, your vibe. You can go back to these and be like, how am I doing on this? What's most important to me right now? My priorities. What's most important? List them out. What thoughts and feelings and habits are standing in my way right now? That's my kryptonite. Well, I'm staying up too late. Or, you know, when somebody gives me feedback, I kind of react a little, like a little aggressive, like a little defensive. That's my kryptonite. Maybe that's what it is. And when you have those moments, that's an opportunity for you to have a little Course correction so you can recalibrate and think about, okay, next time somebody gives me feedback, I'm gonna take a deep breath, I'm gonna, you know, acknowledge, thank them for giving me that feedback. I'm acknowledge it. All right, great. Then I'm gonna try to understand it and get clarity around it. And I'm gonna look at that feedback as a gift, as an opportunity, as it is something that I can play with, something I can get better at. You know, it's like just that little self talk and a little bit of conversation that you can have with yourself. Kind of change the whole course correction of how you experience life. And you know, there's obviously like, there's noise and problems and challenges and things where you can't always do that. But just having that little emotional awareness to know that you. We are just emotional beings. We are creators, we are makers. Like, it's not always going to be perfect, but if you can have like sound intentions, positive intentions, positive intent, you can really have fun with this and you can really take it to a whole nother level in your life and have fun with it. So going through these things, the second thing, right, these passion, project, career and personal goals. Right now I'm really focused on passion and project goals right now. My career and personal goals were really heavy probably in the first quarter, quarter of the year when I was coming out and like right now we're traveling stuff. So I'm really focused on passion and project goals, my career. I love what I'm doing. I'm not like trying to like transition into a new career. I'm like, I love what I'm doing with Next Level UX and with Growth Day and with my passion projects of like building and training and like, you know, building this like metaverse for Next level ux. Like, I love that I would do that without anybody paying me. Like, I want to invest in it because I believe in it. So it's like I don't need right now to focus on career or personal goals because I've already created the rituals and the routines and the habits right now for my physical being, like how physically fit I want to be. I don't want to be a bodybuilder, but I want to stay physically fit where I can have sustained energy throughout an entire day. From like the moment I wake up, 5am, which I love, waking up early. I love, like, I love waking up in the middle of night. 5am is not in the middle of night, but it has that feeling I love like the sun coming up I love seeing that. I love hearing the birds and doing that. That's something I love. So I make sure I get to experience that. And then, you know, from like 5 to 9 in the morning, it's all passion, it's all like play, it's all helping people, it's supporting. And then when I turn it on at 9 to however I work for, and I usually am off at 5, like I'm time to get to family and I take breaks throughout the day. But my personal is also kind of dialed in with rituals and routines. So by creating those ritual routines in Q1, like really dialing them in for the year, I could put more focus on these other things and it's just completely fine to do that. But I know, okay, when I need to go back to a personal goal or something I need to do, I can do that. And it's totally fine. I do have personal goals too, but they're kind of personal, so I'm just going to keep them personal. And then for this last thing. So, yeah, you're going to have all these clarity and goals and things, but right, we got to have a plan. And you know, it's funny thing that, you know, you're always hearing in the personal development space like, oh, I want to create this new habit, how to create this new plan. And we're building like habit technology inside of growth day. But the thing is like in the essence of it, it's not going to happen unless you have a plan to do it. If you're just like, remember everything that you need to do to be able to tackle clarity and goals and you don't have a plan or you don't have a plan for your project work. What you're doing. If you're expecting a project manager to tell you what you need to be doing, you're not creating a plan for your next like 90 days, for your next 60 days, your next 30 days, you're missing a lot of opportunity. Like if you put those things in and you know what you need to accomplish the work that your team wants you to do, you could probably do it in 1/4 of the time if you really planned it out and then you have time for all these other fun things that, that you want to create. If you're learning new projects, learning new skills, if you're learning new things, it can take a little bit longer. But that's why you need a plan so you can integrate all that training and all that practice and all the things that you want to get better at into it. Here I have an example for you. And I know that one of the individuals on this call right now is building design systems. So if you know that you have to build a design system and you're carving out a piece of it around, you know, typography around layout, around, like, other elements, you know that the end goal in like maybe 90 days is to have like a finished artifact that's in storybook. You have it documented, engineers could use it. You have design tokens. Design tokens are a way to use variables. Variables are like labels inside of the code. So, you know, as a designer, oh, it's blue 20 or it's, it's grayscale 30. And you have different labels that you define with your team based on your system that you can communicate to build consistency. You can learn those things over that 90 days and still deliver what you were asked to deliver because you had a plan, you know what the outcome is. And you can work backwards, mix in like weekly training, mix in things like this, and it just makes it way more possible for you to have a lot better outcomes and learn along the way. So always want to mix in those learnings. And this practice, that's why practice was the fourth thing, because we've got to learn to do this, like, practice, practice, practice, practice. It's never going to end. And if you stop practicing, maybe you're in. You're not driven in the right purpose space. You're, you know, if you're not driven to keep learning in something, maybe you need to shift into a different industry that you fired up about and that you're just like, I like reading about this, so this is maybe what I should be in. If you don't like reading or you don't like doing the things in the industry that you're in, you're probably in the wrong industry. Just say, but you get the idea. All right, so we talked about, like, you know, the core foundations, right? Because we're talking about purpose today. Now what we need to think about, it's still a part of how you integrate purpose into your day. I show this because this is more about, like, how you can accelerate and find little better rhythms in your days and better rhythms with your teams. But if you can think about your morning, mid and evening, your days and think about the purpose, add a layer of purpose to this. Okay, what am I having fun moments? When am I having joyful moments? When am I excited in this session? Okay, Wednesdays is workshop days, Thursdays is, you know, design talk stays and things that I'm Finishing Fridays I eat usually like to record. You can start planning out your days and figure out, like, what is a purposeful week for me. What does it look like? Design it, architect it, redesign it, reflect on it, journal about it. What works, what doesn't work. Mondays you have this meeting that wipes you out every single week. On a Monday. That might not be a meeting that you want to have on a Monday, because Mondays set the tone for the whole week. So either you might want to shift the time of that meeting, or you might want to come on a whole other level of preparedness so that you can have the best meeting for the worst meeting that you have every single week, but you can change it and you can get it going in a different way so that you can really just set yourself up for success every single week. And you can finish the week strong by maybe implementing, like, a Friday. Finishers where you have. This is stuff we do at Growth Day, where we have, like, these are four or five things that we're gonna finish on Friday. We're gonna feel really great after we finish those things. And it could be one thing that you need to finish. But the idea for this is to really find your flow and be reflective of it and really mindful and, like, really think through what does it feel like.