Ep. 71 Nick Childs: Finding Our Life's Purpose

“If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favourable.” So said stoic philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca. And certainly, if we all knew what we wanted to be, we’d all either be there by now, or at ease we’d be well on our way there. When we were kids it’s easy to get excited about being an astronaut, a movie star, a scientist, or lumberjack. But for many of us, with growing up came a dulling of these lofty ambitions until, rather than a seat on rocket ship, most of us end up settling for a comfy chair and a widescreen TV to take the edge off another hard day at the office. Zadie Smith seemed to capture it well when she observed: “What modest dreamers we have become.” We focus so much on the being – the end result – that all too often we lose sight of the doing. It is the doing, the action, that leads to the being, after all. We’ve all heard the saying, fall in love with the process, but we rarely stop to think what the process looks like. The idea of being a brain surgeon, highly revered, wandering around fancy hospitals in a nice clean white coat sounds fantastic. But for most of us, the years of studying, dissecting brains, learning the phrases and the stress of the daily job don’t seem so palatable. The idea of being a Hollywood actor sounds fantastic. But the years of working in restaurants to make ends meet, desperate to be chosen by casting agents, only then to have to spend weeks, months, learning lines and waiting around all day in dusty studios, might not sound so fantastic. So, as I discuss in this week’s podcast, maybe the quest of being a fulfilled, happy human, is not about seeking the thing that we want to be, but instead the thing that we want to do. The thing that lights us up, floats our boat, that is most definitely our cup of tea. This week I’m chatting with Nick Childs. Nick is the co-founder of Dirt, an agency that uses neuroscience and big data to enable creators to gauge the impact of their work upon their audiences. I approached Nick after I saw a video he created during lockdown – part of an initiative called IsolaTED talks – where he talked about: Knowing what you want Choosing a life plan Facing up to life and its challenges Going into the day with courage And these are some of the themes we discuss in today’s conversation. You can find out more about Nick by following him on Twitter where he is www.twitter.com/nickchilds, and Dirt can be found at www.wearedirt.com. You can watch his IsolaTED talk at www.isolatedtalks.com/talks/facing-things/