There are three questions that have the power to change the way you work, interact with your loved ones, and make use of your time on this planet! With them, you could reconnect to the things that feed your soul to help you work more meaningfully, and create better connections with the people around us. So, what are these three questions? Well, stick around and you’ll find out.
We grow up with funny little passions, don’t we? Collecting beautiful rocks, building forts, doodling, making up songs, learning everything there is to know about ancient Egypt. (Just me?) As we get older, maybe our interests shift to sports, music, or artistic pursuits. We tend to move from playing to focusing in on more “serious” things; the things we believe will make us more productive “real” adults. But are we doing ourselves a disservice?
The musician and songwriter Peter Breinholt has some advice for us on how reconnecting to that sense of joy and play we left behind as kids could help us become more alive and connected adults!
“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”
—Howard Thurman
We’re not to those three life-changing questions yet—I want to prime you with a few others first before we dive into Peter’s marvelous TEDx Talk. Now, think back: When was the last time you did something that you enjoyed so much you lost track of time? What was it? What if you and the people you loved got to experience those moments more often? How would the way you work, relax, and enjoy your time start to change?
Between errands, work, getting our requisite 8 hours of sleep, and family, adding in a hobby feels like the last thing any of us have time for. Yet, taking time to do the things that bring us joy can have a huge impact on the quality of our time at work and with loved ones!
Imagine if you could come to work or sit down to the dinner table feeling a little bit more joyful and a lot less distracted?
Now, we won’t be telling you to go off and quit your job to pursue your passion for birding or eclectic dance. We have to be practical here. But Peter Breinholt will help us better understand how embracing and making time for our hobbies can help us connect to our sense of play, and help us come alive to be more present in our lives.
Here’s Peter from the TEDxBYU stage with his insights on how we can all find the things that make us come alive!
If you want to check out more from TEDx jump over to their YouTube channel. There, you’ll find an endless library of amazing talks about every subject under the sun to get lost in. There’s a lot of insight there to enjoy!
You can learn more about Peter’s work and check out where to catch one of his performances over on his website! You can also keep up with him on Instagram and Facebook, too!
Find what feeds your soul so you can do work in the world that’s meaningful.
So what are your answers to these questions?
- If you had as much money as you ever needed, and you knew that whatever you did with your life it would be impossible for you to fail, what would you do?
- If you could push a button and make the world stop, what would you do with that time? After you got caught up with all of your errands, tidying, and sleep, what would you do with that time?
- What do you think about when you don’t have to think about anything else?
Maybe the answers to these questions come to you quickly! Renee, our amazing outreach coordinator immediately said, “If I had an extra day, I would be playing the hell out of my ukulele!” Perhaps it’s your work that feeds you so deeply,! That was certainly the case for our founder, Dr. Lynda. I had to ponder these questions with a little more depth. But for me, it’s taking long paddling and hiking trips.
Think about how you feel after you spend time with your hobbies, getting lost in the flow of feeling alive. Certainly, I know if I get time to disconnect and take a run, hike, or jump in my canoe, I come back to my work and my relationships with more energy, joy, and zest for life! When you take time to do the things that make you come alive, that joy trickles down into other corners of your life.
It just takes 5 minutes!
So, here’s a fun little challenge for you, something I adopted from the great book, Atomic Habits by James Clear. Make yourself a 5-minute rule. Every day, spend just 5 minutes doing the thing that makes you come alive. You don’t need to do any more than 5 minutes. But, if you find you have time for more, go for it. Maybe you’ll find that you grab your guitar to play for 5 minutes when you would have idly turned on the TV, and your 5 minutes grows into 10 or 20 minutes!
Take a 5-minute walk down the block, doodle for 5 minutes, prepare something in your kitchen that takes 5 minutes but feels “special” (my go-to is avocado toast with the avocado artfully sliced and dusted with fancy salt). You’ll be surprised at how great these five minutes will feel, and how often you’ll have the “treat” of finding you had more time to do the things you love than you thought!
Imagine a world where we celebrate with others the things they love to do!
Imagine how we could get through tough times together, tackle big problems, and make progress if we could take the reserves of positive energy we had from doing what makes us come alive and use it together!
Like these folks, who have found that coming together to fly fish is having more of an impact than just entertainment. In fact, it’s saving lives.
How You Can Use Your Own Hobbies to Positively Impact Others!
What can you do for hours that makes the stress of the world melt away? For Ed Nicholson, the answer was fly fishing, and now his passion is helping veterans combat the effects of PTSD. Check out his story and you might be inspired to help people in your own way!
Read Article Watch Video Listen to PodcastSo, sit down, take a minute to answer those three questions, and let us know what you come up with! Let us know if you start a 5-minute habit by connecting with us on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. I’m challenging myself to do one thing for 5 minutes every day that makes me come alive! Will you join me?
Stay beautiful & keep laughing!
-Liesl
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Notes:
- TEDx Talks. “What Makes You Come Alive? | Peter Breinholt | TEDxBYU.” YouTube, 2020, www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BPTWUpZmVU. Accessed 24 Mar. 2020. ↩