Leading a Fulfilling Life | Simon Sinek

so yeah i mean let's reinforce that point because i think it's an important one that fulfillment is a right and not a privilege and when we go out with our friends for dinner when we used to be able to do that um uh you know you sit around and somebody says i love my job and everybody goes oh my god you're so lucky like they won something that statement should be the norm not the exception we should all get to go to dinner and say i love my job and it's the one person who says i don't that's that that we can that we can intervene um so yeah i believe it is a right and um we have a responsibility ourselves to to find a a place where we want to work with the people that we would work with rather than just taking the biggest salary um that we have a responsibility to take care of the people around us and we have a responsibility to speak up and ask our our leaders to work with us and create a place where people want to come to work where we where there's a safe space for us to take care of each other and feel taken care of so there's mutual responsibility all around um so when you say you know how do we do it well it's it requires constant work it's like how do you stay healthy well i can give you a whole list of things you have to do you have to eat right you have to nurse your personal relationships you have to get enough sleep you have to exercise you have to meditate you have to be mindful you know there's a lot there's like 30 things and you can't do all those things well all the time it's a striving um and uh and when one's doing well sometimes one one thing falls off it's a striving and it's the same the the pursuit of fulfillment is a striving you know i i think it's you know this is why i make the distinction between fulfillment and happiness you know to seek happiness is a lot easier because happiness is fleeting you know you you you get a new job you're happy you get a raise you're happy you win a new piece of business you're happy you're given a gift you're happy you know somebody says something nice to you you're happy and that feeling goes away nobody nobody walks around with a sense of happiness for a job they got four years ago it's gone where fulfillment is different fulfillment you can feel fulfilled by your work even if you're not enjoying it today you can feel fulfilled by your work even if you're having a bad a bad day you know or or one of your colleagues is grumpy you can still be fulfilled by the work it's more it's more uh it's it's more infinite it's more constant and so um whereas happiness is you know the things that lead up to it sounds more like an event fulfillment is a striving it's a lifestyle and you do all these things like having adjust calls like building trusting teams and working to be the leader you wish you had in other words you see your life as a life of service to those around you whether you're in a company whether you're an employee whether you're a leader or if you're just a parent that you see your life in service you know to your spouse uh your partner or your and your kids and indeed your community what makes a community highly functional is that we view uh that every single person within that community sees their responsibility to serve the community rather than standing around demanding the community does something for them you know it's a chicken and egg question you know um you can pursue these things and you can trust your gut um without ever learning it you know people who trust their guts we all kind of know we just don't have the words for it um and understanding your why gives you words uh understanding your why makes it a lot easier um i have a little metaphor called the celery test that really captures it nicely so we're constantly seeking advice on whatever it is how to build a better family be it a better parent you know build a better business serve our community better whatever it is we're constantly seeking advice and we read books and we read articles and we ask friends and we talk about it and you know and so the question is which advice do you follow it's it's hard and so i the analogy is it's like you go for dinner at somebody's at somebody's house and it's a you know dinner party or something and everybody's got some advice about what you should do uh if you want to build a great community you need to you need to use m ms we used m ms and we had it worked great for us you want to build a great community somebody else says rice milk especially in these difficult times you have to use rice milk kit kats somebody else says we use kitkats and it's been amazing and somebody else says no celery celery is the thing you have to use and so you go to the supermarket and the question is which products do you buy right you don't know and so you may buy them all so it takes time and it takes money to to go through the supermarket and buy all those products and the promise the problem is is you may or may not get value out of some of those those things you don't really know and when you're standing in in the line with all of these products in your shopping basket nobody can see what you believe because you bought everything if you know your why right let's say but let's say your why is to always be healthy and only do things that protect the health of your body you get all the same advice from all the same wonderful people that all have wonderful case studies and the question is which advice do you follow which products do you buy it's super easy we don't have to talk about it everybody listening instantly knows you only buy rice milk and celery obviously you spend less time at the supermarket you spend spend less money at the supermarket you're guaranteed to get value from those products and when you're standing in line with only celery and only rice milk in your basket everyone can see what you believe somebody can come up to you and say hey i can see that you believe in being healthy so do i congratulations you just attracted a new member of the community somebody who who will be um who fits the value set and as you can see you can make gut decisions about what feels right and what doesn't feel right but by by by putting it into terms when you know your why not only do you have better clarity more confidence when you make your decision but you also have the opportunity to scale it a lot easier because by telling everybody what you believe now they can go shopping for you and you don't even have to be there

Channel: Simon Sinek

Views: 23,455

Rating: 4.9738808 out of 5

Keywords: simon sinek, start with why, inspiration, motivation, leadership, career, inspire

Id: rtXJGnrNd8w

Length: 6min 26sec (386 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 21 2021