Welcome to the daily podcast with Jonathan Doyle, where we explore the journey to finding your calling and passion in life. In today’s episode, Jonathan delves into the concept of following your bliss, as famously coined by mythologist Joseph Campbell. Join us as we uncover the vital importance of aligning with your unique gifts and talents, and the transformative power of pursuing what truly brings you alive.
Listen on:
Welcome Aboard: Embracing the Path of Passion
Hello there. My friend, Jonathan Doyle, is with you. Welcome to the daily podcast. I never know who’s listening. I wish I could see through this studio mic and see who’s on the other end sometimes because I know I’ve got regular listeners that have been with me for many years, but you could be a brand new listener. Who’s had this sent to you? So welcome aboard, everybody, to my faithful old friends. Some of you have been with me for, like, many years, and I just love doing this to be really honest with you.
It’s Saturday afternoon and I’m recording five episodes today. If you’re listening earlier this week, on Saturdays, I go surfing. But it was 5:00 AM this morning. And go to the coast, and then back here in the studio today. And I honestly was saying to Karen, I’m just gassed, like I’ve been training hard. I have this ultramarathon coming up. I’ve got to literally run a marathon tomorrow morning at 4:00 AM. I’ve got a training round for 45 K.
I’m wrecked, and I’m tired. I just got into the studio, and I just got pumped. It’s such a privilege, like the fatigue disappears, and I just love the opportunity to just share some ideas with everybody and just hope that there’s going to be some blessing for you, so please make sure you’ve subscribed.
If you haven’t subscribed to the podcast, it’s really helpful. If you do, If you could leave a review, if you’d know how to do that,. Google, Apple, or Spotify. That’s really helpful, too. For everything else, there should be links here. You can find me on Instagram at @jdoylespeaks. And send me a DM if you’ve got a challenge or a problem in some sort of motivational business, life, career, or pretty much any topic. Hit me up with the DM there, and I’ll get back to you with an episode as soon as possible. There’ll be links to the YouTube channel. You can see me live. And the website is jonathandoyle.co, where you can find out about booking me to speak on consultancy projects and everything else that I do.
The Essence of Following Your Bliss
Let’s press in. Friends, you know how the old Discovery Channel used to be Shark Week? There was shark week on discovery. This is Joseph Campbell‘s week here. I just took a different tack coming into the studio today. I’m someone who loves ideas. I read very deeply,I have for many years; I’m just such a nerd. And I just love thinking, reading, pondering, praying, synthesizing, I love the life of the mind. So I look back now, I turned 50 this year and late last year.
The number of books that have gone into this brain over the years, and I hope in the time that I have left, I can start sharing it with people. Joseph Campbell is a famous mythologist and thinker and we’ve shared a few quotes. If you haven’t heard the first two episodes from this week, I think they’re March 4 and March 5. You might want to go check those out.
Friends, I want to give you another quote from Joseph Campbell today. And we’re going to talk about it, then we’re going to get you on your way. So here it is. So I’ll introduce it first, Campbell came up with the idea. They steal a little soundbite from it which ends up being contentious, but people don’t give you the full context. A few famous things that he said talked about this concept of following your bliss. Finding what gives you bliss, and following that in life.
It got hijacked by their hippie and drug culture, I guess, the Haight-Ashbury district in San Francisco through the early to mid-sixties, and then into the summer of love and 68. This “follow your bliss” became licensed to basically do whatever the hell you want.
The Misinterpretation of "Follow Your Bliss": From Inspiration to Misguided Pursuits
One of the things I talk about when I’m talking about the impact of people like Sigmund Freud is that the reason people like Freud are so successful is because, firstly, they talk about sex. Because Freud made a thesis, the entire arc of human civilization is nothing more than the mood, or, as he would say, the fundamental impulse of being human is genital sexual pleasure. You’re all going, Jonathan. What the hell are you talking about on your motivational podcast?
So whenever you’re talking about whenever you’re an intellectual or philosopher, giving people reasons to indulge themselves, you’re always going to have an audience. I think that’s my point. That’s why Freud was partially what made him so influential. He was one of the first people to really go into these topics in great depth, and he was a hell of a thinker.
But I guess my point is that whenever you’re saying something to people, if it feels good, do it or follow your bliss, you’re going to have an audience. Because if you like Thomas Aquinas and you’re saying to people, restrain yourself, restrain your impulses. It’s always a tough sell. It’s always a tough sell.
Finding Your Unique Track: Unveiling Your Purpose Amidst Uncertainty
Anyway, that’s the introduction. So let me give you the more comprehensive quote from Joseph Campbell about following your bliss. He says,
“Following your bliss is not self-indulgent but vital; your whole physical system knows that this is the way to be alive in this world. And the way to give to the world is to offer the very best that you have to offer. There is a track just waiting for each of us, and once on it, doors will open that were not open before and would not open for anyone else.”
There is a lot in the quotes from this week. I looked and the first thing I want to draw your attention to is this piece about how there is a track just waiting for each of us. This is really important because a lot of people are very unsure about this one. Especially if you hate your job and your life. I hate going to work. I don’t.
Earlier this week, last Thursday, I did a live Q&A with a large group of young entrepreneurs in the U.S. Big organization, and they got me to do a live Q&A with their young entrepreneurs and one of the questions was, How do you really find your thing? And I really pressed into this because I’m genuinely convinced that every single one of us has something specific to do in this life and the specific skill set by which to do it. I’m deeply convinced of that.
I genuinely cannot fathom a God who would allow a Tom Brady or a Patrick Mahomes or Beethoven or whatever, to have a full, rich life of engagement, contribution, and success. And everybody else doesn’t get to do that. Now, of course, there are structural inequalities. There have been financial, economic, and all sorts of problems throughout history where people have not had a chance to pursue their individual capacities. Slavery, for example. Or crushing economic conditions that people could never discover their unique gifts or talents.
I think of my grandfather, my mother’s father, who I met only a few times. Because they lived in England, he’s a lovely and very simple man. He spent his life as a bus conductor. Which meant that he would just be on buses, collecting people’s tickets. My mother told me quite a few times that he was actually a highly intelligent guy, really bright in terms of IQ. There was a point in his life where he knew a wealthy doctor, and with this doctor, they became friends, and this doctor offered to put my grandfather through medical school. But he didn’t feel confident in doing it and didn’t think he could be able to sustain it financially. So he never did it.
It was just a fascinating insight because there’s somebody who perhaps could have had a unique and successful other life but never got to live it. I think my father was the same. He’s been dead for 14 years. But he was born into a wealthy construction family in England. His father died in front of him when he was 16. And then my father was sent to boarding school, and then he had a lot of trauma, abuse, and suffering, and then he was dragged back and then made to go into the family business. And my grandmother, his mother, was I think she found it very difficult; she tried to run the business itself, and then my father got dragged into it, and he spent his whole life there in the construction industry and literally hated every single second of it.
So much of what I’ve done in my life in a lot of dimensions, it has been a reaction to seeing him constrained and miserable in what he was doing. There’s a very strong thread in me that believes that you listening to me right now have unique gifts, abilities, and talents put forth by God for the blessing of other people. The sooner that we all get on that track, the better.
Embracing Risk and Uncertainty: Journeying Towards Your True Calling
This is a contentious idea because people just don’t think it’s true. But Jonathan, not everybody can do this. I’m just not convinced by that, I don’t see why not. You might say somebody has got to empty the trash. Someone’s got to drive the garbage trucks. I guess you could say that some people really just love driving trucks and are really happy with the lifestyle, enjoy it, make good friends, and like the dependability and stability of it. Who knows? You could make a case; that’s possible.
My first offering to you today is that finding that place in which you are most engaged and alive is a very important thing. Karen and I have recently been doing some work in what’s called the M code / motivation code, which is sort of a pretty high level, I guess corporate, sort of analysis of personality and strengths. Like a real way to look at your core strengths and it’s been fascinating, particularly to watch her really get clear on her unique gifting, and just finally, the pieces all fit. Then it was beautiful to watch, really. Why shouldn’t we get that? Why shouldn’t we get to do that?
I’m basically made to speak onstage, around the world. I just think that is my place. I look back to being in New Orleans late last year; we had six and a half thousand people in the room for the keynote that I gave. I’m never more alive than when I walk up on that stage. Zero ego, there’s just this massive desire to bring a game and bless people. That’s it. I just want to help everyone. I just come alive, and I feel as if I could stay out there for hours. Why not you? Are you doing something with your life right now?
It might be difficult. I’m not saying it’s not going to be difficult, and there might be times of uncertainty and a real challenge. But if you began to pursue it, it’d be quite an adventure. And if Campbell’s right, if you begin to pursue this beautiful thing here, doors will open that were not open before and would not open for anyone else. I think that’s true and I’ve experienced that.
I’d love to tell you that the success that I’ve had has come from brilliant strategy, manipulating people, and building relationships. You know where it’s coming from; it’s coming from just trying to be authentic and do a good job each time there is an opportunity. And then weird things happen.
I’ll tell the story of the first big keynote I did in the U.S. in St. Louis back in 2017. There were 10,000 people in the room for that one. And the organizers of the convention kept emailing me, wanting to organize a time to talk to me. I knew who they were, I knew what the convention was about, but I kept thinking that they were reaching out to me because they wanted me to book advertising.
I keep getting these emails saying, Jonathan, could you please contact us we’re representing the convention here in St. Louis, and we really want to talk to you. And I’m going here, you want me to get a booth at your expo or something for the work that we do. And finally, when we got on a call, I was expecting them to go, we’ve got this great offer for you and I remember the woman saying to me, No, Jonathan, she said, we don’t want you to book advertising. We want you to do the keynote.
It was hilarious and it was the coolest time. Like we took the kids and we went, we started in the middle east, then I had to speak in London. Then we went to Iceland as a family, and then we finished up with a US tour speaking in St. Louis, it was just the best. And my point here is that the doors opened. It was just profound, doors just kept opening.
That’s this idea here from Campbell: if we follow what we’re drawn towards. Even if it’s scary, even if it’s difficult, the doors begin to open. But we’ve got to risk it. And some of you are listening to me going, I’ve tried, and I’ve been hurt. I’ve been let down and it didn’t work. I don’t think there’s any other way to live.
Recognizing the Fingerprints: Tracing Your Path Through Life's Clues
What’s that old saying, the coward dies a thousand times, but the brave person dies only once. Sometimes you’ve got to risk it. Risk loss and risk your fear. To press into that one thing that you are really here to do. Often people go, how do you know what it is? And my answer has always been what I call fingerprints. I say it’s almost always the case that there have been fingerprints of it in your life.
The example I give is that, if you see me on stage in front of 10,000 people, I look like somebody who’s done a lot and feels really comfortable doing it. The truth is that when I was like five years old, I used to make my family sit down in front of me. I would put a sock on my hand, and I’d do puppet shows. Because I was like, even at five, I was like, Hey. Hey, I need an audience to sit in front of me. Look at these. Look at these. I’ve got a sock. And now when I get on stage, I’m like, Hey everybody, look at me; I’ve got these things I’ve got to tell you about. You can hear it in my voice.
So look for the fingerprints. Look for the things that you are always good at. I just do not believe that you have been born to not experience this beautiful track that’s been prepared just for you.
Trusting the Journey: Faith, Purpose, and Divine Guidance
There’s a beautiful line in the Bible. Psalm 37:4 is quite a famous, one that says,
“Delight yourself in the Lord. And he will give you the desires of your heart.”
There’s a lot of imagery in the Bible around God preparing a way, making a way, and smoothing the path. So I just think we’re terribly slow learners.
I think I’m a terribly slow learner. It’s like somebody wants to use the analogy of a little kid who’s tired, trying to get their own way at something, and kicking and screaming. And the parents scoop them up and are trying to carry them. The kid doesn’t want to be carried.
I think we’re afraid to be carried, I think many of us have this deep anxiety that if we trust, if we risk, if we try and pursue something that’s important to us but that we’re passionate about will fail. I get that, I understand it, but Campbell is smarter than me, and he’s pointing to this bigger truth. That probably one of the only ways you can be sure you’ll find real happiness in life is to be operating in that area of unique, personal excellence and giftedness. And when you do that, you are also going to bless people. Your gift will be bigger than you, and it will serve other people.
Conclusion: A Whisper of Encouragement
So I just want to encourage you. Go find that thing. Listen to that really quiet whisper. Maybe today that’s what I’m helping to accomplish God’s purpose, is just to be a little whispering voice to say to you, Are you happy? Are you doing the right stuff? If you get the sense, you might want to do something else. Because time is not infinite and eventually, the clock stops. And you don’t want to be caught on the wrong side of that transaction for too long.
God bless you. My friend. Go and find your track; please make sure you subscribe to get the links for me on Instagram @jdoylespeaks. Everything else is on the website: jonathandoyle.co. God bless you. I’ll have another episode for you tomorrow.
