Thanks for the warm welcome!
I haven't personally taken any courses to date, but I'm sure they can be helpful for the right person at the right time. I've just been stumbling my way through everything, learning and living, living and learning. Maybe it's my personality type, how I'm encoded/nurtured, or some combo of everything, but I prefer the autodidactical, self-taught approach of just following my curiosity, jumping from topic to topic, connecting dots along the way, learning on my own time/schedule, etc. This is how I came to discover that "synthesizing" comes naturally to me and thinking itself may be my passion.
Regarding working with values and impact statement: that probably comes from how I'm wired from my time in marketing. In a nutshell, I worked a decade in the marketing/advertising industry doing the typical corporate ladder climbing and lifestyle inflation (cycle of higher-paying jobs leading to buying a bigger house and nicer cars—I had to learn the hard way that none of that stuff fills a lack of purpose). In 2015, I was working insane hours at a job with zero purpose (Marketing Director of a global apparel brand) which led to a massive existential crisis questioning if I was really here to just sell people more stuff they don't need. My existential crisis planted the seed for everything, and I'm incredibly grateful for it now that I'm on the other side (I even refer to things in life now as pre-crisis and post-crisis). This kicked off a deep dive into life purpose in 2016. I worked a couple more years until mid-2018 when the cognitive dissonance of what I was learning about life (in my free time) and how I was living (in my work time) hit a breaking point, and I quit my career to attempt solopreneurship with Sloww. Here's a bit more detail about me.
In terms of where I'm at in my own journey, last year I gave myself an Ego Development Theory "self-assessment" (subject to self bias of course). I think my "center of gravity" may be around stage 5 of EDT (the three stages I think I span the most right now are 4/5, 5, and 5/6). Most importantly, I do feel that I’ve crossed the watershed between stages 4 and 4/5 (moving from conventional to postconventional). I feel like I have progressed into stage 5/6 in several ways. However, there’s still quite a bit “in progress” here. It doesn’t seem like this stage is fully integrated/embodied like prior stages. While I cognitively understand and even experience some of the stage 6 description, stage 6 still seems like a ways off.
Thanks again!
Kyle
