Meaning Making Is a Skill!

Meaning making is a skill and it's a vital skill that we all need as a leader, as someone in a family, as someone in an organization. Because meaning making is what helps keep us motivated, helps keep us inspired. It keeps us, you know, from giving up when things get hard. So welcome to the Meaningful Revolution podcast where we talk about people's passions and hope to inspire you to your own. We also answer the question, what if you could just add 1% more meaning to your life every day for the next year? So join us on this meaningful Revolution. I'm your host, Shawn Butner, certified high performance coach. And we have a really great episode for you today. So let's get into it. Hey, welcome to or welcome back to the Meaningful Revolution Again, I am your host, Sean Butner, and we ask the question, you know, what would happen for you if you added 1% more meaning to your day each day for the next year? And we love to share ideas that inspire you and answer that question. So real quick, where have we been so far in season two, right? It's this idea of how do we feel inspired and meaningful and what gets in the way, right? And we know that we create meaning in our lives through doing things that make us feel alive, right? So playing music, dancing, working on the meaningful jobs, the meaningful work that, that meaningful missions and purposes that get out and help improve people's lives and service to other things generally is one area where humans find meaning. They find meaning through connections and relationships. We talked about five different ways to build stronger relationships in an earlier episode. Go check it out. And we create meaning through doing meaningful things, right? So we do things that feel alive, but the actual, you know, work that helps us feel connected to something bigger is super important. So what prevents people from feeling those things, feeling the meaning in their lives, and feeling inspired to do action? Well, it's not enough ambition, right? Especially in the context of the last three years people have been holding back. We've talked about the great resignation, we've talked about how that that's really impacted a lot of people from the pandemic to inflation to on and on and on, also shows up in a new concept I just recently read and I'll probably talk about in my blog a little bit later on. People that are quiet quitting, which is, you know, they're not going to do anything more than the actual minimum for their job for a bunch of different reasons. I have a bunch of ideas and perspective as a coach, as someone that's worked in a really high functioning environment, and one that's been a little bit more of a bloated typical corporation. I'll share about that in that blog. But we need to fuel the ambition for us to grow, for us to want to provide more for our families, to want to provide more impact in our communities. And it's such an important thing that if you've been holding back because of all the things out there in the world or saying like, ah, it'll be better tomorrow, I'll get started. You know, it's that lack of ambition or it's the environment itself, right? Related to both the great resignation and, and quiet quitting. It's, you know, maybe the environment's toxic and so you're holding back because you don't want to get your headband off. If you speak up, maybe the environment isn't helping support you financially. So why would you work double for not enough compensation? Or why would you continue to do a job where everyone's berating you? I'll all that kind of stuff. But shaping our environment is important. Having agency in shaping our environment is really important to feel like we're inspired and making meaning in our lives. And today we're going to talk about how another thing that holds people back and feeling like they are doing meaningful things in their lives for their organizations and communities and that's feeling capable, right? When we feel confident and capable, we feel motivated, inspired to act. We feel like the actions that we do matter, that I can, you know, start and finish a project and see it impact the organization or increase sales in my business or impact how people live. You know, there's a tangible way that, that your actions result in ripples out in the world. And when we feel uncertain or not capable, that's when we feel stuck in our job. We feel stuck in a relationship. We feel that maybe don't have enough energy. I'm a little exhausted. So tomorrow I'll get started. Tomorrow I'll ask for that raise. Tomorrow I, I'll talk to the kids about helping out around the house more and so on and so on and so on. So here's a big idea to really focus on. Don't let the promise of tomorrow rob you of the opportunity today, right? Every day we have a chance to show up. Every day we have a chance to learn, to grow, to advance. And if you've been holding back, maybe you needed to hear that if you are going full cylinder crushing it for cheering you on. So, you know, there's a bunch of both types of folks that are here on the Meaningful Revolution podcast and I just want to acknowledge that wherever you are, I'm cheering you on, but we can work on this skill that is called meaning. So, and here's the really great news, folks. You know, capability is just skill development, right? Or developing skills is a skill itself. So if you're willing to get into action, to start the next job, to start the next journey, to start the next relationship or the next phase of your life, sometimes if. If you want to get started on that, you just need to think about what skills you need to learn that can inspire you to act and help you connect to your why while you're in motion. So in this context of, you know, really focusing on creating a little bit more meaning each day, you know, dedicating time to learn a new skill is a great way to go about it. And I have five different areas where people generally pull skills from or abilities or capabilities that can really help them advance their lives. So the first big bucket of skills that people really need to hone, especially if you're feeling stuck, like I mentioned before, are people skills, right? So do you have the skills to understand and relate to people, to get support from other people, to lead more effectively, to publicly speak, you know, to understand group dynamics? So this is like, you know, do you understand psychology? Do you understand sociology? Do you understand organizations and how they work? Do you understand sales? Like these types of things? And they're important for finding meaning because so many times we need other people to support us, you know, we need other people to listen to, encouraged, to cheer us on, to mentor us, to coach us, you know, and. And essentially, like, people skills is a. A conversation around influence. Like, can you get people to buy into your ideas? And, you know, if you are focused on, you know, getting more people to vote, you're focused on poverty, you're focused on big societal things. Like, it all comes down to the skill of getting people to say, yes, I need to. This is a problem. Yes, I can help. I could. I believe I can change this. I can help. And then, you know, the. The influence and persuasion of getting people to act, right? And not in that, like, creepy way that sometimes people think influence, but, you know, it's definitely something, you know, influencing. Co. Influencing is a skill that everyone should have. So as you're listening to this, maybe if there's one, two or three different skills that maybe you could focus on in the next year or next year, not next three months, here's a little, little bit long. But like, you know, what kind of skills do you think you would need in the people skills category, right? What are you working on to develop in order to help advance your career, to help you advance your missions and purposes in life? And I think that can be the spark that gets you into action. Okay. Second thing that really helps people develop skills to find meaning in their lives is hobbies, right? You know, things that you do just for fun. And that could be, you know, music, poems, dancing, gardening. Again, there's so many different things, you know, working on cars, building solar panels, whatever, working on computers. Like the list goes on and on and on. But like things that you're just naturally interested in, sometimes by adding a little bit more learning or a little bit more activity in those each day can help get you feeling more connected to your life, feeling like there's a little bit more purpose and why you do what you do. And it's such an important thing for feeling meaning more in your life. You know, personally, like, music is something that I really love to write and play and perform, even it's just for myself and, or my wife, you know, but it is something that can, you know, help you feel more resilient, something that can help you really feel the day a bit more and more able to handle what life throws at you. The third type of skills, you know, are just the professional knowledge skills and abilities that go with your profession. So maybe it's a new programming language, maybe it's a new field of medicine if you're a doctor, you know, maybe it's a new way to do business if you're a business owner or marketer or, you know, so there's things that are going to be specific to your profession that can really help you advance and feel like, you know, that it's one thing to learn something just to learn something like in a hobby, but it's another thing that help when you learn like a professional skill that really is going to help you be more effective, right? And I think if you have this growth mindset about your career, having that constant contact with the cutting edge, the best, best practices, the best operating procedures can really help you feel like you're progressing in your career. So it's a lot something to really think about. So what's something in your career that you need a little bit more knowledge on or some skills or abilities around or capabilities around, you know, that can really, really help you. Fourth thing to think about skill wise, that can really help you feel more purposeful and connected are wellness skills. Right? So how are you learning to take care of your body a bit more through diet and Exercise or your mind more through meditation or, you know, eye breaks during the day if you stare at the computer all the time like I do, or what are things that you're doing to keep your spirit healthy. And again, this like spirit skills of connecting to something greater, connecting to your why is kind of what we've been talking about with finding more meaning through skills, right? And of course then there's like, I'm going to call this category specific skills to create and feel meaning in your life, right? And that's your daily gratitude. Like we talked about with Mike Seeley last season, we talked about big picture thinking, right? And being able to connect yourself to the grand design, right? So if you are someone that works at a pizza parlor and someone asks you what you do, you could say, oh, I just throw tomato sauce on bread and bake it all day with cheese. Or you'd be like, I feed families in my community. And the difference between both, you know, same job, two different outlooks could mean all the difference to how you feel about your job. So, you know, that's the kind of the big picture thinking that we're talking about here. Also skills like benefit extension, like I have a three mile run I gotta do. If I do it for myself, I might crap out after a half mile because I'm out of shape. But if I'm like, I'm doing it to get into the best health of my life, so I'm around for my family for the next 50 years, you might approach that activity a bit different and you're extending the benefit not to just yourself, but to the people in your family or, you know, I feel like leadership is a skill that also helps provide meaning. Because when you're able to understand and have relationships with people and guide them towards a greater cause, a greater purpose, it's really hard to not feel like you're connected to, you know, something bigger, back to that spirit, back to advancing a big goal or a big mission in your life. You know, when you're able to effectively lead with people that believe in the cots, you know, so I think that's really super important. So these are kind of just some ideas for you. So what came up for you as we're talking about it? Are you going to need to work on your, your public speaking? Are you going to need to work on how to communicate in order to lead better? You know, how are you developing the skills and people skills, hobbies, professionally or wellness to help you with your meaningful skills or capabilities? Right. I think that those are some really big questions that can help you advance in your life. So with that said, guys, just remember again, don't be waiting to say, oh, I'm going to work on, you know, figuring out the skill, the skills that I need tomorrow. I'm going to work on, you know, some leadership skills next week. Like what can you do today? What can you get in the game doing to get some momentum to connect again to the big why on what we're doing, on trying to feel a little bit more meaning in our day every day for the next year. So with that said, guys, I hope you enjoyed this episode. Please share this episode with three people if you think that they would like it would help us out here at the Meaningful Revolution. As always, go to Apple Podcasts and subscribe and leave a comment. Let us know what you're thinking. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. We're gonna be doing another episode kind of like this, then a wrap up episode just to preview the next two episodes. And then we're gonna go into season three of the Meaningful Revolution where we're going to get back to more interviews. Got some fantastic people lined up to to share with you in those. I'm really excited about it. So that's that, guys. Go out there, live with a little bit more meaning in your life and we'll talk to you in the next episode. Thank you for listening to the Meaningful Revolution podcast. I hope you enjoyed this episode and if you could please share this episode with three people that you think might enjoy it and like and subscrib. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts. Leave a comment Please rate us because that helps us get the word out. So until next time, listen to the next episode right after this. I know you'll love it and we'll see you then. Take care of.