Our guest is our very own Rebecca Tapp - Future Crunch's director! She's also the host of the Decoding Purpose podcast, and in this webinar she helps us explore an overused word - purpose. We hear it everywhere, but it means different things to different people. BC (Before Corona), purpose was considered to be the North Star. The brightest light in the sky, a beacon guiding us to the future. But what happens when that future has been turned upside down? When the sky is all of a sudden covered by clouds? According to Rebecca, we need to stop, and instead of thinking about purpose as something we steer towards in the future, use it as an anchor in the present.
Gus
Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Episode Four. My name's Gus, if you haven't joined us before, this is Future Brunch. Today's episode is going to be a really, really good one because we are being joined by someone who is very near and very dear to us.
Tane, good morning.
Tane
Good morning. How is everyone? I'm seeing people from Colorado from the Appalachians to Invercargill, which is the Southern tip of New Zealand. Literally, we're not only from top to the bottom of the globe, but also on almost opposite sides so that's really cool. Thanks everyone for joining us.
Gus
In today's session, we're going to be trying to unpack this word, purpose. To do that, we are thrilled to welcome someone that we've known for six years now and someone who we've done a lot of work with over the years. She is both a good friend and a great business colleague. We'd like to welcome in Rebecca Tapp, who is a Future Crunch director, and also the host of the Decoding Purpose podcast. Good morning Becs.
Rebecca
Good morning. How are you?
Gus:
Great. What about you here?
Rebecca:
I'm so excited to be here and I can't wait to dive in to purpose with you guys.
Gus:
Fantastic. If we do have some audio issues, we will try to sort it out as we go through. I think we've managed to sort most of the audio. If anyone is picking up any technical difficulties, just announce it in the chapter which is on this side of the screen and Tane will see if he can try and fix it. Okay. Let's get into it. Becks, we usually open with this question; what is something or what is the thing that has surprised you most about the last few months since the crisis hit? what has been the thing that has been most surprising to you?
Rebecca:
Yeah. Look, I thought about that question having watched the last few future private sessions, and I guess for me, it was the personal experience I had of COVID-19 in that as you guys know, I'm somebody who thrives on being busy, thrives on the big picture, seeing the future and that's something that really gives me momentum and it gives me energy in terms of how I show up as a professional. When COVID-19 hit, I felt like if there was an elastic band between the present moment and the future, which I was so busy building, it was like a big purse is this just came down and cut that elastic bands in half, literally throwing me on my backside.
Rebecca:
I think there was probably three weeks there where I was like, I had no energy, I just couldn't find the normal momentum, the normal sense of ambition that I normally have had, had really just dried up. I felt a little whiplash for a while, but the beautiful thing about that, and this is probably the best thing that I got from that experience was what I actually learnt and what really surprised me the most is that maybe decoding purpose isn't about purpose at all, as in purpose being something that exists in the future, maybe it's about being purposeful, maybe it's about how we show up in the moment.
Rebecca:
That really took me off on a little bit of a tangent again about, well, what is purpose? As you guys know, I've literally spent the last two or three years or longer really decoding purpose because I had personally found, as had a lot of the corporate organizations I have worked with over the years, that purpose is kind of this big lofty concept, and we throw it around and we talk about the purpose of economy and purpose driven business that actually, when it comes to the crux of the matter nobody really knows what it is.
Rebecca:
That was when I went on this mission to decode purpose. Within the context of COVID-19, when I had that experience prior to COVID, I'd thought purpose was something that existed in the future. It was our North star so therefore it was our guiding light and something that we were moving towards and that in itself was what created the energy and emotion that we experienced as being purpose. COVID-19 came and threw that idea out the window for me, because all of a sudden I'm like, "Oh, where's my North star gone? It's been ripped out of the sky." But what happened for me is in that moment, there was a shift where I was like, hang on a minute. This North star is something that exists within me and that is the intuitive part of purpose. It's that inner compass, it's that part of us, that instinctual part of us that knows what the next right step is to use Julie Masters language.
Rebecca:
It's the part of us that is courageous enough to pioneer and to have that inner guidance that just knows where to go. That's something that I have really seen come into play with COVID-19 because all of a sudden people have realized that, maybe not consciously, but realized that North star is within us and in doing so have in on the back background of the crisis, ask themselves three questions. Those questions are, well, I can't do anything else right now, I'm in the political straight jacket, as you would frame it, Gus whereby my livelihood is being threatened, my life has been threatened in the context of a health crisis then there's also the aspect of what happens if we hold our freedom. For anyone wanting to read that article, please jump onto the Future Crunch website.
Rebecca:
But if you put that into context as individuals, we're standing in the middle of that, and that feels incredibly helpless, and all we can do in that moment is go well, I can either be a victim and crawl up in a little ball in the corner and do nothing or I can do the opposite of helplessness, which is, well, how can I help, how can I heal, and how can I build hope at this moment in time? Anybody who I believe is navigating this period of time with the level of certainty, has stepped into that level of service that's why we're doing these Future Crunch webinars. It's why I have a COVID-19 segment on my podcast, it's why we are celebrating professionals who are in service whether that be the nurses are the grocery workers, et cetera, et cetera.
Gus:
Okay. There's a bunch in there to unpack. Wanted to maybe backtrack a little bit before we start unpacking this word purpose. Tane we've spoken about this word purpose quite a lot over the last few years and not always in a positive way, right?
Tane:
Yeah. Purpose always seems like a word that's thrown around. It's like sustainability. It's like, let's all be sustainable. Well, what does that mean? Does that mean not using plastic straws? Does that mean taking out your recycling diligently, make sure you've got a compost heap? It's one of those terms that it's very hard to give direction. One of the coolest things about talking with you Becks is that you define that purpose you draw purpose out within people so they can use it to drive what they do, not only in their personal lives, but within the organizations businesses and to make a difference so, yeah.
Gus:
Becks, I want to ask you a question. As Tane has said over here, purpose just gets thrown around. I mean, if you go to any corporate website or you speak to anyone and they all have a purpose, or they say, "We have to have a really great culture and organization because our organization has a defined purpose." Isn't it just a word that's nice to have? Basically, isn't it just a marketing gimmick?
Rebecca:
Yeah. I think there are definitely a few myths about how the word purpose is used and also a few myths around what is called the purpose economy. Now, I'm sure you guys would have heard that term thrown around over the last five or 10 years. In essence, the idea of the purpose economy is a good one so don't get me wrong, I think it's amazing that we're encouraging businesses to give back and to be concerned about the greater good. That's a really awesome thing.
Rebecca:
For those of you who may not have heard of what the purpose economy is, the purpose economy is this idea that there has been a convergence of trends come together at this particular point in time. Those trends include, for example, the millennial values the millennials who are the biggest generation to exist are coming through the workplace and that are commanding that they want to work for purpose driven organizations.
Rebecca:
Then there's also trends around digitalization and the attention economy and this idea that if we are a purpose, purpose driven business, that we are able to cut through with a narrative that is about the greater good. Then there are also other trends within that around trust and this idea that we distrust business a lot more than we do in the past, I think over the last three years, trust in leaders and businesses dropped something like 13%, don't quote me on that.
Rebecca:
There are these trends that are converging that from a marketing perspective, pull together a narrative that it's good to be doing good in business. That's great, that's a really great theme but the problem with that is that purpose is so much bigger than that. Firstly, purpose isn't just for the privileged. If we look at that idea, let's talk about that; You need to be a profitable business to have a purpose at that pool in the first place. It's one thing [inaudible 00:13:41] to say, "Hey, I'm going to go out and we're going to collaborate with regards to collecting ocean plastics to make shoes." That's awesome, but you already need to have a profitable model in order to do that.
Rebecca:
If you look at the idea of conscious consumerism you need to have money to be able to consume in an ethical way because it actually costs more. This is not just for the privileged and it's not just for businesses that are doing well. Purpose is fundamentally for everyone. I just want to loop this talk into to your article, Gus with regards to the projection of the economy. The idea of the purpose economy then built upon this idea that if you create purpose in business, that's going to lead to profit and growth.
Rebecca:
Now, that misses the whole point because the point of purpose should actually be about building sustainability. That should be the focus. The focus should be looking at how we collectively thrive, and that model sits more within a circular economy or some of the ideas that we presented example from Kate Raworth or Mariana Mazzucato, if I've pronounced that correctly, I don't know if I did. That's your area, Gus, but I think there is some definitely interesting themes there about really what purpose is about.
Gus:
Okay. I mean, I understand, so what we're talking about here is we're trying to redefine purpose to become something that's bigger than just a marketing term or even something that is something that just businesses do purpose is something that is for everyone. Given what this incredible shock to the system that we've all had, I think a lot of us are feeling a bit out at sea so is there a way that people can redefine their own personal purpose? Is there sort of a series of steps they can take or any tips or hints that you have for people to try uncover, I suppose, a new sense of purpose given everything that's happening?
Rebecca:
Yeah, absolutely. I talk about purpose as being a lot like DNA. Again, this is Tane's area, we're going to dive into some basic genetics here. But if you think this idea of discovering our purpose, I think the first thing to consider is that purpose is unique code, just like our DNA is a unique code. I also believe that purpose, like DNA, is something that we inherit. If you think about that, we inherit our DNA, we inherit our natural talents. It's influenced by culture, belief systems and values that we also inherit so it's similar to DNA in that sense.
Rebecca:
But DNA is also something that exists beyond us so lack of purpose [inaudible 00:16:32] a legacy so when we have a child, we pass on our DNA. But think about this idea of purpose, we can build a business and then leave that business, we leave a legacy, we can work in a role and then leave that role but we have still left behind our purpose in that we have built something and created something. DNA are quite similar and purpose are quite similar in that sense.
Rebecca:
Finally, I think the other interesting thing to consider is DNA is something that evolves as a result of the environment. Well, so is our purpose. That is why I spoke before about how my understanding of purpose and my own purpose has evolved in the context of COVID-19. That's an example where our connection to meaning and purpose is something that shifts and evolves like in the same way epigenetics affect our actual DNA.
Rebecca:
Now, I want to set that up just to give you context, to go into the activation of purpose or the uncovering of purpose to use the language that we use to promote this webinar, I believe that the discovery of purpose happens in two steps. We have the uncovering of purpose, then we the discovery phase. With the uncovering of purpose, I want to, I guess, give you a little bit of a metaphor. If you can visualize for a moment, you've taken yourself out into uncharted land and you're standing there in the middle of the desert, and it's an archeological dig. You're like, okay, well, I've got to look to my past to be able to uncover three things that are really going to determine what my purpose is.
Rebecca:
Now, these three things are referred to as being the purpose Trinity. They are three Ts hence the Trinity, which include talents. Think about this, we've just spoken about the DNA example, what do we inherit? What are our natural talents? Now, to give you an example, a Mozart, as an example, could play the piano by the age of four. By five, Mozart was composing music and unbelievably, his sister was also an incredible musician.
Rebecca:
There is something about that, where he has literally inherited that talent, but you can use it for more basic examples of that. Gus, I don't think you're tall enough to be a basketball player. It's just not in genes. That's the other thing about purpose? Like your genes, it doesn't lie. If you don't have a talent, you just don't have a talent. But if you do, it's something that is easy for you, it's something that has flow, it's something that makes you feel joyful.
Rebecca:
Now, the second one to consider here is time. Now, I don't know if anyone out there has read Malcolm Gladwell's book, Outliers, that he talks specifically about the 10,000 hours it takes to master something. Think back, if you look back to the past, where have you put your focus? Where have you chopped wood? Where have you applied discipline? Where have you put in the hours and done the work? Where have you showed up time and time again? That is where you would have achieved some level of mastery to become the person that you are today. From there we have talent, we have time.
Rebecca:
Then the final one is trials. Where have you experienced key trials in your life? What has challenged you? Where have you experienced pain or suffering or anger or grieve? Literally, what has broken your heart wide open? I think really, this is significant the trial part. Even if you haven't had a trial, you might have held somebody else's hand who has had a trial, but at some point, those experiences are what really enabled that inner transformation.
Rebecca:
In opening up that heart, we open ourselves up to empathy and this is a key in the activation of purpose because from here, what happens is we almost, through that empathy, walk up onto a bridge where we stood in this bridge and we've got these three gifts; we've got the gift of our talent, the gift of where we've spent our time and then we've got the gift of the trials that we have endured, the transformations that we've had over the course of our lifetime. As we stand on this bridge and we open to empathy, it's from here we look to the future. Now, the interesting thing about this is right now, we're on this bridge, but we're standing in fog. We can't actually see that future, we can't see that North star, and this is where the DNA of purpose model comes in.
Rebecca:
I spoke before about DNA as a symbol of purpose and now I want to talk about it as an acronym. To break that down for you, the DNA-
Gus:
Give us two seconds here. Before we dive into the acronyms, I just want to hold off. I want to just give us a breather, because we're going to then dive into the DNA. Give us a second. I just want to sort of unpack a few things; Tane, Do you have any questions at this point? I just wanted to give us a little pause we're going to get into the DNA.
Tane:
I just love the idea of purpose being an inner compass. It's sort of your guiding light, it's a lens through which you look at the world and make decisions. I think that fundamentally, that is the blueprint of what we're trying to get down to. As a DNA geneticists, as a scientist like that, your DNA sort of defines everything else that comes from the atomic level up. If your purpose is strong and solid and you really have the right belief, the right purpose, then that's incredibly powerful because everything grows exponentially from that point.
Tane:
I think of it as a compass, the guiding light or the base; the bottom of the pyramid upon which everything else is built. That's what I'm really getting strongly from this. Before we go into the Trinity and the DNA, yeah, just that solid base is what really guides me and you really helped me realize that actually.
Gus:
A couple of people want to ask Becks any questions, please just at the bottom of the screen over here, there's a question over there and I think we might also see if we can try create a bit of a poll. Becks I'm wondering about two or three minutes, I wonder if it's possible do you think that this is a quick exercise that we could do at home for people who are on this call, maybe ask everyone to just maybe sort of put down or get a piece of paper and maybe see if they can write down a few things around what purpose could be or how they could [crosstalk 00:23:46]?
Rebecca:
I mean, basically what I would advise is get your piece of paper and actually just put a line straight through the middle of page. On one side we have [inaudible 00:23:56] purpose. What we have there is literally talent, time, trials. Jot down those three titles and just give yourself some time to journal and let it flow and just write some words down and get yourself thinking about it. What I want to say with this work is that it's also deeply unconscious.
Rebecca:
Literally, we used the word uncovering but allow it to surface, but you might find... I mean, I spoke to you guys before I have a meditation that goes with the uncovering of purpose, which I will record later and maybe I shoot across that we can maybe share with everyone to download. But it is a deeply unconscious process so just allow it to surface, you don't have to have all the answers in this session today. The intention of this key is to get you to start peeling the layers of the onion hence why my whole process is about decoding purpose because I think people make a mistake to think there is one very clear definitive answer
Rebecca:
Where decoding purpose is decoding you, it's decoding your mission in life, it's your reason for being. That's not something that needs to come to you at the end of this webinar. It's a process, it's a way of being, and again to paraphrase something I kicked off with, it's not about purpose it's about purposefulness. How do we be purposeful?
Gus:
Okay. All right. What we're going to do is we're going to take a three minute break here and we're going to invite people at home, wherever you are tuning in at home or wherever your location is. Maybe just take a pause, take a deep breath or two or three, get out a piece of paper or you could possibly even use your phone, whatever writing implement you have to hand and maybe just jot down some ideas around these three things; talents, time and trials. You can see them in the chat box over there and in about two or three minutes, we're just going to give everyone a bit of time to do that and then we'll come back in and we'll unmute everybody.
Tane:
I'm going to do it and I hope I get gold stars because I know there's a right answer. Tell me, I got a right answer, men.
Gus:
We're going to give everyone 30 more seconds to do that and then we're going to get back up and Carol asking Becks some questions. All right might want to start wrapping that up. If I had a little bell, I would use it, but unfortunately clearly that spiritual or awake so no bells to get us out of that one. Tane how many gold stars did you end?
Tane:
Probably zero because there are no right answers to this, I really wish there were. Get us into the first question Becks, and then maybe I'll tell you what my response was, and you can digest it from there. How about that?
Rebecca:
Guide you into a question with regards to [inaudible 00:30:35].
Tane:
The purpose Trinity I mean with talents.
Gus:
Hold up two secs, we'll get there. What I also want to ask is just if you want to ask any questions to Becks at the bottom over here and vote them up please feel free to go check it out. There's one question that I like over here that might feed a little bit Becks maybe into this next stage. You've talked to us about uncovering purpose in this [inaudible 00:31:05]. You said that there were two stages.
Rebecca:
Yes, correct.
Gus:
There's someone at the bottom over here who's asked a great question which said that does purpose evolve? I mean, DNA evolves so does your own personal purpose evolve?
Rebecca:
As in today.
Gus:
I hope you answer that?
Rebecca:
Well, my answer to that is that I believe that purpose is like our DNA in that we're born without DNA. That part doesn't change so there is an element of purpose that is the anchor and that is unchanging just in the same way that there is parts of DNA that never changed like your eye color is not going to change, your hair color is not going to change. There are certain parts of that code that provide a framework. That said like epigenetics, things will happen in the world that will change how we express that purpose.
Rebecca:
For example, you guys are speakers, I'm a speaker as well. Our former mechanism of purpose was to go out to big events and talk on stages. Now, we can't do that anymore. We can't use that mechanism because the world has changed so we literally have had to evolve how we show up for our purpose. In the case of Future Crunch, our purpose has always been intelligent optimism and sharing intelligent optimism but our mechanism for purpose is now via this webinar because we can't stand on a stage and do a keynote. Does that answer the question? What I would say is that our purpose is unchanging our mechanisms for purpose are in evolution.
Gus:
Okay. Yeah. That's great. Tane, you were going to talk about the Trinity, the first ones. Sorry to have cut you off earlier over there.
Tane:
No, that's right. There's just some audio issues, unfortunately. But yeah, I really do like why you talk about the DNA of purpose it's really epigenetics. It's about turning things on or off. DNA is pretty stock standard. It's like the narrative and the story we tell ourselves. But you can take certain chapters given certain environmental factors, certain times in life and really rest your laurels on those and get inspiration from them. Just like your favorite poems the one from Robert Frost, I took the road less traveled but doesn't always fit for every situation so drawing on different parts of purpose is really important. That's what epigenetics is.
Tane:
A caterpillar has the same DNA as a butterfly. It's the environmental factors that turn it into a butterfly and I think that's what's so important; you really need to have a strong, I guess, a pool of purpose and draw on what you can given a certain circumstance. That's what this new pandemic has taught me. It's like, I can't draw from all pools, all little worlds within my tool belt. Now, I'm restricted to certain ones therefore it's really important to get the things right. Purpose is more important than ever now. Yeah.
Rebecca:
Absolutely. I love the idea of the caterpillar becoming the butterfly, because I've spoken today about the North star being something that exists within us but that doesn't mean that it's not also the North star in that we can still have a vision for the future, we can still have the butterfly, but all we can focus on in this present moment is the DNA, which is the becoming.
Tane:
I understand that, yeah.
Rebecca:
That is where the purpose exists within us, our DNA exists within us and it's what we do today that creates tomorrow. But that doesn't mean there's not that vision, that butterfly, that future that we're also working towards.
Gus:
That leads me to this next question, Becks and once I've asked you this, I'd actually like to get into some of the stuff that people are asking down at the bottom over here. Let's say you've uncovered your purpose, you've done your time, you've done your talents, you've done your trials. You've got a bit of an idea here, what your DNA or purpose is, how do you actually then go out and do this? I mean, is it just something that sits there as a vision statement on your wall or how do you embed this into your everyday life and everything that you do? What's the next step, I guess? What are some practical steps that people can take right now to actually start embedding purpose into what they do?
Rebecca:
Definitely, definitely. Well, as I said before, when we look at the first phase, the uncovering phase, that's looking to the past. What we want to focus on in taking action is firstly, the present moment and the creation of the future. How do we do that? Now, I've come up with an acronym called the DNA of purpose. The DNA of purpose is broken down into three key areas, which is firstly, the decision. I have never met somebody who is fully embodying purpose who didn't make the decision to do so.
Rebecca:
But it's bigger than that. If we look at the idea of the decision, we are standing on a bridge to the future right now where we can't see the future, everything is incredibly uncertain. It's also the decision to courageously choose a future that we desire. We can either choose to be a leader in our lives or we can choose to follow. We can talk to this point from the point of view of the individual, of the people who were tuning into this webinar because they're wanting to understand personal purpose, or we can talk about this from an economic point of view at this point in time. Are we going to have the courage to choose again? What is our decision?
Rebecca:
From there the second part of the DNA model is the narrative. Future Crunch we're all about the narrative because we fundamentally understand the power of storytelling. But I want to really break this down because I think this part really explains the reason why people get a little bit lost in the wonky side of purpose and just roll it around without actually understanding what it really is. I broke up the narrative into three key areas. Now, firstly, we have the marketing why. Now, this is the bright glossy why like the Future Crunch, we're starting a movement of intelligent optimism. We are, but that also sounds really fantastic in our, in our marketing material or for me, I amplify voices changing the world. I do also marketing collateral.
Gus:
Yeah. It's sort of, you throw up in your mouth a little bit with that stuff, isn't it? It just sounds it's too lofty, it's too much.
Rebecca:
Exactly. Let's get real about it. Now, to lean in a little bit to Kayla's message. Firstly, you have the marketing why, then you have the courageous why. Now, this is the why of the pioneer of the entrepreneur of the innovator. They're the people who believe that they can write a new story and do, and then they become it. They are the courageous pioneers and the courageous why is the person who was driven by the revolution who was driven by the change and that's what motivates them; that is their why.
Rebecca:
Then underneath all of that, and this is one that I think has really been the catalyst for me to dive into the world of purpose and that is understanding the vulnerable why. Now, the vulnerable why is a deeply personal story because it is the story you tell yourself about why you show up every day about why you do the work. Now, for me, this really came from a space in my early 20s of going through quite a difficult time with mental health. At that period of my life, I had to go, well, you know what? I've got a lot of emotional work to do here, and in my case that involved a lot of counseling and a lot of the real work, the deep work. When you've got that road ahead of you, you've got to make a decision to show up and why are you going to do the work.
Rebecca:
In that moment for me, it was about choosing life, it was about going, "You know what? I've got one or two decisions here. Again, I can pull up in the corner and be a victim or I can show up every day and even if I can articulate my reason for being here, I can show up knowing that there is a reason why I am here and that makes my life worth it today." That's why I get up and do the work today. That is a deeply honorable why. That's like getting to the grit of, why am I here? Why am I bothering with any of this? They're the three stories; you've got, yes, your marketing why but then you've got your courageous why and you've vulnerable why. Until we start talking about the full spectrum of why we do what we do, we're always going to feel like purpose is a lofty concept because we're not being honest about what it really is and what really drives us.
Gus:
What's the A?
Rebecca:
The A is an alignment to purpose. I've spoken a lot about this already today and it's the internal North star, it is the intuitive pole. But I want to break this up for you because I want to lean back into science a little bit since we're using the DNA model. Now, when we look at narrative, say we talk about the marketing why, it's a cognitive story, it's a thought, it's in our brain, we can write it down. But purpose is something that actually speaks to us at a visceral level. There is an idea that's thrown around a little bit called heart intelligence and I think it's a really great way to catch up the energy of purpose.
Rebecca:
Now, we all know when we are on purpose, we feel a sense of being alive. We will feel a sense of joy, the shoulders will go back, we will expand. It's almost that sense of soaring or flying when we feel like we are on purpose. The flip side of that is not being on purpose where we literally the shoulders are hunched, we literally feel a heaviness, we feel depressed. We see this in people around us. You know who is on purpose in your world and you know the people who were miserable and disconnected.
Rebecca:
Now, this is an energetic response. This is heart intelligence. Our heart is going to fundamentally tell us whether we are on purpose or not. And it's not going to think it, it's something that we know inside of us. Likewise, we also have that gut intuition. I mean, it's been spoken about for centuries you know, female intuition or gut instinct. These ideas have been thrown around but think about the last time you couldn't natively make a decision. Fundamentally, you would have made that decision based on your gut. There's even been studies with regards to the Vegas nerve which is the nerve connecting the gut and the brain and it's why we experience butterflies in our stomach. As an example, when we're nervous about something our guts and our brains are intrinsically linked.
Rebecca:
Fundamentally, in alignment to purpose is also about listening to that gut instinct; is this right? Is this wrong? Do I turn left? Do I turn right? It's an embodied feeling and that is an alignment to purpose.
Gus:
Okay, thank you. Okay, that's perfect.
Rebecca:
Yeah, the word integrity comes to mind when I think about alignment.
Gus:
That's perfect. It's also quite nice this lovely image, which by the way is from an artist called Reuben Wu and I'll stick it up now actually so people want to look it up. He's got some really wonderful stuff on that. But that really makes me think about that alignment. I love the analogy of the gut and the brain. We've got about 15 minutes left in this webinar, so actually we'd love to dive into some questions.
Rebecca:
[inaudible 00:43:25].
Gus:
Let's have a look and see what's going on over here. The other thing I wanted to tell everyone before we dive into these questions is that you've got a podcast because you are a purpose geek and you've been talking about purpose for two or three years now, and you've got a bunch of fantastic episodes where you talk about purpose at length. Then the button at the bottom over here you can see it says decoding purpose, and if you want to follow that to Beck's podcasts you should go check it out.
Gus:
All right. Tane, let's get some questions here. Do you want to go through some questions and [crosstalk 00:43:56]?
Tane:
Yeah, absolutely. Remember, if you click on that, the questions tab, ask a question, you can upload the questions. The more voted, those are the ones that are going to be asked. The top voted question is Beck's. Rebecca Tapp, can you share how you daily, weekly, monthly, I mean, by the minute of seconds deliberately exercise your purpose? How do you come back into that state?
Rebecca:
Yeah. Again, I'm going to come back to the narrative because I think the story we tell ourselves is probably the most influential story we will ever connect with. For me, I think showing up daily for my purpose, it's about being purposeful. It's about really understanding firstly, the vulnerable why. For me, why am I showing up? Why have I got out of bed today? How can I help? How can I build? How can I build hope and why does that matter because that's my legacy creation? That's really aligned to why bother at all for me. But the other part of it is if we go to the marketing, why, mine is amplifying voices, changing the world. That is my mantra is what I'm focused on right now, amplifying voices, changing the world and everything that I do really sits within that framework.
Rebecca:
Even if I look at my courageous, why, what am I pioneering? What am I inventing? It still will sit within that framework of bringing all of those things together, bringing together the tools, the talent, the time, my vulnerable why, my marketing why and what am I pioneering tomorrow? For me, it's really about that narrative piece and really, really getting clear on what my stories are.
Tane:
I mean, to sum it up for me, it's about continuing to ask a question, right? Just like [inaudible 00:45:51], why are you doing this?
Rebecca:
Totally.
Tane:
It brings you back into presence, it's like a mindfulness presence exercise to really stay on purpose.
Rebecca:
Absolutely. I think that you might know, but I think there are some studies that show that as soon as you ask a question, your brain can't help but answer it.
Tane:
Yeah. They're actually epigenetic changes that go on in [crosstalk 00:46:17] pathways. Yeah.
Rebecca:
There you go.
Tane:
We won't get too nerdy into science so Gus what's the next question?
Gus:
The next question is this one is from Randall [Dobbs 00:46:27]. Thanks Randall. Isn't organizations' purpose a stronger driver or should people or clusters of people within the organization drive the purpose? Is purpose something that comes from the top down from management or is it something that comes from the bottom up from the people within the organization? What's the best way of doing that?
Rebecca:
Yeah. That's a big question because what I'm going to say maybe not everyone would agree with it and I love that organizations do have a purpose, I think that's an amazing thing and as I said earlier in the webinar, anything that's about social impact and changing the bodies so I want to preface what I'm about to say with that. I don't believe an organization can have purpose, I believe purpose is like DNA and it is fundamentally human. Any organization who thinks they can have a purpose can give the purpose, can motivate a team with purpose, doesn't understand purpose because they haven't understood the purpose of that individual.
Rebecca:
I think the trick for organizations is to really spend the time to understand your people. Purpose is not a CSR function, it is an HR function, and it's about really going deep with every individual in your organization and then ensuring that their DNA is aligned to their role purpose and then their role purpose is aligned to the organizational mission. I don't believe an organization has a purpose, people have a purpose.
Gus:
I love that answer. Great answer. I love that it's slightly controversial as well there. Excellent.
Tane:
Could be notes to the HR people.
Rebecca:
[inaudible 00:48:06]. You can't give someone purpose, it's theirs. You can't give someone their DNA.
Gus:
Okay, great. Got other question here Tane this is a nice question that's got three [inaudible 00:48:18] on there.
Tane:
This is a really good one. What would you suggest for a team or an adult who can't find the North star? Tough question but it's such a good question?
Rebecca:
A team or an adult who can't find their North star?
Tane:
Yeah.
Rebecca:
Well, firstly, let's start with the individual and coming back to the question I just answered. Purpose is deeply, deeply personal so if they can't find their North star, that's okay. Go into that process. Firstly, of uncovering your purpose so scan your past. Really spend the time and don't rush it. This is deeply unconscious work. I often think purpose, I don't know if anyone out there has looked into Yummy in psychology and I'm not going to even go down that rabbit hole today but Yum speaks specifically about the shadow self and there are parts of us that we hide away in our unconscious.
Rebecca:
I thoroughly believe that our purpose is often hidden in the unconscious parts of ourselves, and a part of our process of growth of transformation is uncovering purpose to bring it into the conscious mind. That takes time and it takes work. But that said, my first piece of advice would be we'll start doing that work, start uncovering your purpose, start going into a process where you step into the shadow to bring up your tools, your talents, and your trials and that's where the hard work put is.
Rebecca:
Your trials may also bring up emotions. It may also bring up parts of you that need healing that you need to look at. This is about peeling the layers of an onion. But that's the first part of the process so if you can't see the North star yet, well, let's look back, let's do the work over here. Let's dive into the shadow and bring your tools, your talents, your time, the trials you've been through into the lot. From there, we can then start to look at what is required to step into your DNA, which is the forward focus piece. That's not about finding your North star, that's about creating it and remembering who you already are.
Gus:
Yeah, that's fantastic. I think what I want to do now is, is this is a really great question. This one came from Mikey Leon.
Rebecca:
I love Mikey. Hey Mikey.
Gus:
Michael from Digital Storytellers.
Rebecca:
I know him [inaudible 00:50:48].
Gus:
Given this is all well and good, but the world got turned upside down a few months ago and the world is still upside down. A lot of these ideas, these things that we were working towards from before the crisis hit just suddenly feel like they're... All this work that you've done around purpose perhaps maybe it doesn't have as much context anymore. How have you found the sort of... Where's Mikey's question? Let me get back to that actually here. Sorry, give me two seconds.
Tane:
It's basically what has changed or will change with your purpose with the onset of COVID, either within yourself or within society as a whole so-
Gus:
I'm interested in that society question, that bigger society question, how does COVID-19 change purpose on a societal level?
Rebecca:
Yeah, I think on a societal level, Gus, this comes back to economics and I might actually invite you just to frame this up, Gus, just because this is your area. But I was reading through the work of Kate Raworth in particular and I might get you to talk a little bit about what that looks like, because I'm sure you'll do a much better job than I will, but I actually had jotted down their ideas under the courageous why. These are economists who are really pioneering, a brave new world that is moving away from this idea that we need to continually move towards growth and having more and having the GDP as this idea of a successful society and pulling that back and going, actually, well, no, that's not success. What we need to do is find a circular economy where we exist in the very safe space between survival ensuring our needs are met and sustainability.
Rebecca:
Now on a social level, I believe that in essence is a truthful purpose economy because it is really about the planet and the people and ensuring everybody's looked after that, that we are all cared for and nurtured and supported and have roofs over our head. That is the tribe. That is where I believe the future of purpose sits on the back of COVID-19. You may want to explain that model a little more effectively than me.
Gus:
I think you've explained it absolutely beautifully.
Tane:
[crosstalk 00:53:24].
Gus:
They can read it. There's a link in the chatroom over there. Is purpose something that is... Is it an illusion that as human beings we spin up for ourselves that we need to find meaning as superfluous sacks of meat spinning on a rock through space and so we invent these lofty concepts like purpose, or is it something more than that? This is a question that came here. Where is it? What makes purpose different for us as human beings as opposed to any other life form on the planet?
Rebecca:
I don't believe it is different for us. My first response to that question for me was, does it matter? Does it actually matter? Because from my perspective, even if at the end of this life, I dissolve into the soil, never to be heard of again, all that exists then is my story, my legacy. That is a story that my daughter will take forward and tell her daughter or her son, that is a story that if I pioneer and build something bigger than myself that is still giving back after I've gone, then that is what purpose has created. It doesn't actually matter what it is, if it's something that means that my legacy, here on this earth is a golden one.
Gus:
Right.
Tane:
I think perspective is very important here. It really depends on perspective. If you're looking at the planet as your perspective than the environment, the entire biome, the health of the planet matters hugely. If you get in down to your gut flora and fauna, your microbiome, in that perspective matters hugely as well, because we are an ecosystem within ourselves. Being able to flexibly move through perspective and look at purpose through different perspectives is one of the most, I think, powerful things that anyone can do. It's not easy, it's intangible, it's almost impossible, you're going to fail, but that ability to flexibly shift and look at other perspectives and the purpose, especially when the purpose is to make a better environment, I think that's one of my ultimate goals, one of my ultimate purposes, that's what I wrote down.
Rebecca:
Totally. To use that example, what is the purpose of DNA? You're asking the same question, what is the purpose of purpose?
Tane:
It's getting too meddled. Let's break it up a little.
Gus:
Becks, you've given us a taste of this incredible work that you've been doing over the last two, three years, but actually work that you've been doing over the last 10 or 20 years it sounds like. The only way I can think about it as you are a purpose geek, that it really is about decoding purpose. People can go to your podcast where there are many episodes and you've done something... I wonder if you could tell us, very quickly, what you've done around your podcast for COVID-19.
Rebecca:
Yeah. In coming back to where we started today, once I got over my three weeks of whiplash and I don't know what to do, I then was like, okay, what can I do? What I do is produce a podcast. I'm very lucky that my partner in life, love and business is also a music producer so we have a recording studio. I was like, okay, well, what I have are the resources to share really valuable information with people around how they navigate the pandemic with purpose. From there, that's exactly what I did.
Rebecca:
I started a podcast series where I went out, I interviewed you guys, I also interviewed Julie Masters, some other incredibly bright minds who are in my network and that was the other resource I had available to me to ask them what they thought and hence I released the turning point, which is the COVID-19 part of the decoding purpose podcast. There are some awesome interviews there.
Gus:
Are there any that you would recommend top of the list ones that were really good?
Rebecca:
Of course, the information I had Future [inaudible 00:57:55].
Gus:
You can't use the Future Crunch one.
Rebecca:
Actually, the last episode I did was with an American guy from Oklahoma called David Berkus and he's an incredible thought leader. He's had something like more than two million views of his Ted Talk, written quite a few books, but his most recent book was called Pick A Fight: How Great Teams Do It With Purpose. I loved his take because the one thing we didn't realize with COVID-19 is that we would be going into a war, and for the first time that wasn't a war where we'd be fighting each other, but we would come together to literally fight this other thing, being the virus.
Rebecca:
We talked a lot about what purpose looks like in that context, when how do we form an army? How do we come together and create a shared mission and how do we really fire ourselves up for the fight? I think that's so beautifully captures some of the energy of what purpose is, is that warrior energy, "Right, let's do this and let's come together," and that's what we are all doing as humanity United at this point in time.
Gus:
Yeah. That's great. Look, we're going to start wrapping it up. Becks, and Tane I'm going to pass over to you at the end, just for any final thoughts. Before we do that though, just wanted to tell people if they are interested in following Future Crunch the other work that we do, we've got our social media over here, you can find that pretty easily. The other thing is that this webinar series is something still very new for us, we're still figuring it out so if you have any suggestions, any things you'd like to see included more in the future please let us know and also please tell people about it. We're doing this for free, we're doing this as a service because we think it's important.
Gus:
Our next guest we will let you know who that's going to be, but I think our next episode we'll let you know through the newsletter. If you're not signed up to the Future Crunch newsletter you should. Go to our website, there's a button there that says subscribe, the newsletter is free, these webinars are free and we hope that you really enjoyed today's episode and we also hope that you'll join us in thanking Becks, who has been awesome and just helping us uncover purpose.
Gus:
That's everything from my side. Tane, I'm going to leave it up to you and then Becks maybe you can leave us with some final words.
Tane:
Cool. Yeah, I think this idea of the world uniting. Instead of the term war, I'd use purpose; reuniting for a global purpose instead of like patent we're protecting each and improving the health of not only ourselves, but the environment. I think this could be the great turning of the great unraveling. It's up to us and if we get the purpose right, if we get the narrative right, then I think we can really do a lot of great things. In this unprecedented dark times that North star is shining pretty bright, we just need to move forward towards it.
Rebecca:
Yeah. Yeah. Just to frame the pace on pick a fight, it's funny, David said he got a lot of pushback around the languaging of that book, and I've noticed a few comments come up. It's a war of love. It's not a war, it's just this idea of everyone coming together as warriors of love, whose intention was not to be violent in any way. Just to frame that up for everyone and finally, I feel so grateful to be here and mostly so grateful to be a part of the Future Crunch family and to be included on the Future Crunch series. Thank you so much for having me Gus and Tane.
Gus:
Thanks Becks. We hope to see you around two weeks from now for the next webinar.
Tane:
Yeah. Love to everyone, love in the time of Corona and yeah, wash your hands after the session, please. All right, ciao.
Gus:
Ciao.
Rebecca:
Bye.
