First the "Ikigai" seems related to a slogan I see quite often (e.g. on T shirts ) in Japan "No X, no life" where X can be car, cycle, mountain, chocolate ... I guess that's also kind of the joking version of /ikigai/ too come to think of it.
Second it occurs to me that Fight (Faito) is making it back to English with the Japanese implication. For example when Donald Trump was shot at he got up and said "fight!" which seemed to me to be very much using the Japanese implication rather than literally telling his supporters to launch a war
So just right! I have heard the term, read the books, listened to the TED talk and just last week, my daughter was watching an anime where the protagonist is denied of her 3 most pleasurable activities (playing videogames, eating chocolate and her cat), and she was lamenting describing her ordeal as "being deprived of her ikigai" in Japanese. It hit me then as how different I thought of that concept, and your post has been enlightening <3
Thanks for another perceptive essay. The "ikigai" thing has been bugging me for a while....
I found the term appropriate to use in the past when talking with Japanese students who seemed lost, to talk about remaining open if they could to things they could find, work-related or not, that would be meaningful enough to them to build at least part of their life around. When I saw that the internationally popularized "ikigai" concept had money-earning at its core, I rankled. And as you point out, the Japanese gov't seems to want to redefine it as merely a "happy job."
This was very enlightening! I've heard about the "ikigai" concept before, but how the Japanese term might be different had never crossed my mind. The downsides of _ikigai_ (focusing too much, becoming fixated on something) also strikes me as wise. Thank you for sharing! :D
Among other things, some of us Muslims have long equated it (ikigai) with what the universal sage of love, Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi, has said: "Let the beauty we love be what we do."
Language is fascinating in how it twists and warps over time or when shared cross-culturally.
As someone who grew up here in Japan from a young age, I’ve been a bit confused the last couple of years when “Ikigai” started to show up in conversations among my international friends, who would tell me about their life passions while explaining that it’s a Japanese concept.
Whenever I tried to explain that I’d never really heard it discussed before, let alone the way they use it, they’d be incredulous and insist that it’s Japanese 😅
Like you said though, nothing wrong with the new usage that's become commonplace. Just fascinating how differently words can get bent out of shape over time or across cultures
Interesting read! It reminds me of issues in translating words from ancient language where there is not an easy 1-to-1 way of doing so. Some translations are more literal, but if we don’t know the cultural context of the time, we can end up with a very wrong impression (or things that sounded beautiful in an ancient language don’t sound that way translated).
On the other hand, there are translations that are not literal but aim to capture the spirit of what was said. This means more creativity on the part of the translators and different translators may disagree (it may even get into philosophy and other such things rather than purely translation at that point!)
Anyway, different from what you wrote about, but made me think of that!
Your story about the teachers who advised you not to look for your ikigai but rather to keep an open mind sounded familiar. I remember once I was talking to someone who is married to a husband of Japanese ancestry, and she said something similar: in looking for their children's ikigai, he was not letting them explore the broader variety of activities they could be trying. This was eye opening for me. I do think we all need to find a reason for living, but not an excuse for becoming narrow-minded...
My favorite word related to faito-ing is エール "yell", because it's completely unclear what it means to a native English speaker (cheering as in cheerleading), especially since it sounds like it's about beer.
I just started learning Japanese, and I had no idea about the differences in ikigai in Japanese vs English. I'm very new to the language, but from what I can tell, the Japanese are much more careful about what and how they say something than the rest of us. More thoughtful, might be a better way to put that, and I suspect that may be a remnant of the Shinto belief system. I'd love to hear your thoughts on that! 😊
Update! I grew curious about that claim that there is no word for retirement in Okinawan dialect. So I looked it up. The word ヤクヌンガーリ (yakunungaari) appears to mean retirement, so there we go. https://www.jlect.com/search.php?r=kunuN&l=ryukyu&group=words
I really enjoyed reading this. Ikigai is an interesting concept to me but I always found the venn diagram problematic and it doesn't resonate with me at all. I appreciate your explanation of the differences, it's really helped my understanding. Thank you.
I love this.
A couple of thoughts.
First the "Ikigai" seems related to a slogan I see quite often (e.g. on T shirts ) in Japan "No X, no life" where X can be car, cycle, mountain, chocolate ... I guess that's also kind of the joking version of /ikigai/ too come to think of it.
Second it occurs to me that Fight (Faito) is making it back to English with the Japanese implication. For example when Donald Trump was shot at he got up and said "fight!" which seemed to me to be very much using the Japanese implication rather than literally telling his supporters to launch a war
Thanks for this serious and funny essay about a word I thought I knew, but obviously did not.
Does it mean next time I Kanpai, I can say 生ビールは私の生きがい ?
So just right! I have heard the term, read the books, listened to the TED talk and just last week, my daughter was watching an anime where the protagonist is denied of her 3 most pleasurable activities (playing videogames, eating chocolate and her cat), and she was lamenting describing her ordeal as "being deprived of her ikigai" in Japanese. It hit me then as how different I thought of that concept, and your post has been enlightening <3
Thanks for another perceptive essay. The "ikigai" thing has been bugging me for a while....
I found the term appropriate to use in the past when talking with Japanese students who seemed lost, to talk about remaining open if they could to things they could find, work-related or not, that would be meaningful enough to them to build at least part of their life around. When I saw that the internationally popularized "ikigai" concept had money-earning at its core, I rankled. And as you point out, the Japanese gov't seems to want to redefine it as merely a "happy job."
I find it grating and reductive too. I like the original Japanese meaning more.
Another great essay. Sometimes the words get in the way of mutual understanding.
This was very enlightening! I've heard about the "ikigai" concept before, but how the Japanese term might be different had never crossed my mind. The downsides of _ikigai_ (focusing too much, becoming fixated on something) also strikes me as wise. Thank you for sharing! :D
Among other things, some of us Muslims have long equated it (ikigai) with what the universal sage of love, Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi, has said: "Let the beauty we love be what we do."
Lovely words to live by!
This was such a balanced explanation for something that has bothered me for some time! Thanks so much.
Another interesting read!
Language is fascinating in how it twists and warps over time or when shared cross-culturally.
As someone who grew up here in Japan from a young age, I’ve been a bit confused the last couple of years when “Ikigai” started to show up in conversations among my international friends, who would tell me about their life passions while explaining that it’s a Japanese concept.
Whenever I tried to explain that I’d never really heard it discussed before, let alone the way they use it, they’d be incredulous and insist that it’s Japanese 😅
Like you said though, nothing wrong with the new usage that's become commonplace. Just fascinating how differently words can get bent out of shape over time or across cultures
.
Interesting read! It reminds me of issues in translating words from ancient language where there is not an easy 1-to-1 way of doing so. Some translations are more literal, but if we don’t know the cultural context of the time, we can end up with a very wrong impression (or things that sounded beautiful in an ancient language don’t sound that way translated).
On the other hand, there are translations that are not literal but aim to capture the spirit of what was said. This means more creativity on the part of the translators and different translators may disagree (it may even get into philosophy and other such things rather than purely translation at that point!)
Anyway, different from what you wrote about, but made me think of that!
Your story about the teachers who advised you not to look for your ikigai but rather to keep an open mind sounded familiar. I remember once I was talking to someone who is married to a husband of Japanese ancestry, and she said something similar: in looking for their children's ikigai, he was not letting them explore the broader variety of activities they could be trying. This was eye opening for me. I do think we all need to find a reason for living, but not an excuse for becoming narrow-minded...
Are you a native speaker of Ryukyuan? :)
My favorite word related to faito-ing is エール "yell", because it's completely unclear what it means to a native English speaker (cheering as in cheerleading), especially since it sounds like it's about beer.
Thanks for the catch. I am not a native speaker of Ryukyu dialect, so I fixed that. But great example of another wasei eigo phrase!
I just started learning Japanese, and I had no idea about the differences in ikigai in Japanese vs English. I'm very new to the language, but from what I can tell, the Japanese are much more careful about what and how they say something than the rest of us. More thoughtful, might be a better way to put that, and I suspect that may be a remnant of the Shinto belief system. I'd love to hear your thoughts on that! 😊
This is just so beautifully and artfully done.
Thank you very much.
Update! I grew curious about that claim that there is no word for retirement in Okinawan dialect. So I looked it up. The word ヤクヌンガーリ (yakunungaari) appears to mean retirement, so there we go. https://www.jlect.com/search.php?r=kunuN&l=ryukyu&group=words
I really enjoyed reading this. Ikigai is an interesting concept to me but I always found the venn diagram problematic and it doesn't resonate with me at all. I appreciate your explanation of the differences, it's really helped my understanding. Thank you.