跟讀練習: IKIGAI | A Japanese Philosophy for Finding Purpose - 通過影片學習英語口語

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Have you ever asked yourself this question: what is my purpose?

With so many opportunities that life has to offer, and all these different jobs and careers, it’s quite difficult to decide what we want to do with our lives.

Society demands us to make decisions at a very young age, about what path we’re going to take.

Most of the time, children have no clue about what life’s like in adulthood, and what they want to do when they’re grown-up.

In fact, many adults don’t even have a clue.

Now, the Japanese invented a philosophy named Ikigai, which stands for ‘reason for being’, Ikigai can help us to determine what it is, that we want to wake up for in the morning.

You know, that very thing that we can pour our heart and soul into.

When we’re totally immersed in our activities, so much so that nothing else matters, we’re in a state of flow.

Ikigai helps us to identify the necessary ingredients to get into this flow state and make our pursuit sustainable, and useful for the world.

Many people work in these jobs they hate.

When we do this, the misery that we associate with these activities often creeps up on us on Sunday evenings, when we start to think about this dreadful Monday morning, on which we have to drag ourselves out of bed, knowing that we’ll spend the next week in hell.

When we arrive, we still experience this nostalgia for the weekend, and as soon as we begin with our tasks, we count down to the first break and then the next and then the next, until we can finally go home again, and repeat the process.

Now, this isn’t a very enjoyable way to live.

Think about it.

Doing something we hate, is a disservice to ourselves, and also to our surroundings.

Especially when we see other colleagues that actually enjoy what they’re doing.

And on top that, they’re doing a great job.

Again, many people get miserable because of their jobs, which in turn can lead to serious health problems, like depression.

Some even go as far as killing themselves, because they cannot cope with the feelings of uselessness, hopelessness and this nagging idea that they’re failures in life.

But we have a certain degree of control over our circumstances.

We can try to change our position towards the situation, and make our current job more enjoyable.

Or we can reassess our own nature and the nature of our surroundings and likely come to the conclusion that it’s better to find something different to do.

Thus, the change we need to make is twofold: on the one hand we need to change our mindset.

On the other hand, we need to change our circumstances.

Because when we do the right things with the right mindset, we’re able to enter a state of flow.

Ikigai helps to identify what’s the right thing to do for a certain individual, so this person is able to get out of bed in the morning with a sense of purpose and, therefore, is able to work with almost no effort.

Now, Ikigai consists of four dimensions.

Firstly, we need to pick something that we’re good at.

Secondly, it must be a thing that we love to do.

Thirdly, the world should need it.

And lastly, we have to get paid.

Let’s talk about each dimension separately.

(1) Doing what we’re good at.

Everyone has a different skill set.

Some things are based on nurture, and some things are based on nature.

For a great part, we can learn skills.

But we also have inborn characteristics that make different people suitable for different things.

For example, we see differences in IQ, motor skills, empathy, physical strength, et cetera.

Oftentimes, people focus on improving the things they’re bad at.

They spend their whole lives repairing themselves while rejecting the things they’re naturally good at.

So, we might want to focus on the latter, and improve those skills so we become masters at it.

Because why put so much energy into becoming mediocre at best when we have the opportunity to become great?

Not to mention how the world benefits from us manifesting our true potential.

However, according to the Ikigai philosophy, this should be something that the world needs, which I’ll address in a minute.

(2) Doing what we love to do.

This is very obvious, but it’s also a tricky one.

While a level of skill can be measured, this dimension is kind of subjective and a bit complicated.

For example, you might love to be a fulltime YouTube content creator.

But there might be some aspects of the process that you don’t like at all.

You might love editing videos, writing scripts, but hate filming.

In this case, filming becomes a bottleneck.

Now, we can try to make filming more enjoyable.

Perhaps, we can change our workflow or go to different locations, so we can still be immersed in this task and experience a flow-state.

Mindset is key, here.

And with the right focus, we’re able to effortlessly do the tasks that are necessary but that we don’t like that much.

Of course, outsourcing is an option as well.

But when our activities as a whole make us dreadful, and we don’t see any way to develop a certain enjoyment while doing them, it might be a better idea to find something else to do.

Perhaps we’re just not interested in this field, or our skills are lacking which frustrates us.

At the end of the day, there’s no accounting for taste.

So, it’s probably much easier to just listen to our guts, and let intuition decide where to go.

(3) Doing what the world needs.

It’s all great when we’ve determined what we’re good at and what we love to do.

But that isn’t enough to call it Ikigai.

Because our activities should, in one way or another, benefit the world.

If they don’t, it’s simply a passion.

Luckily, the needs of the world come in many different flavors.

Jobs that are looked down upon by some people are often highly important.

Someone has the pick up the trash, someone has to fix our sink, and we wouldn’t be able to thrive as a society without people cleaning up the mess.

If we find enjoyment in these kind of jobs, that’s absolutely terrific.

To discover what the world needs, we can simply do some market research, to find out the current demands.

Or can we look at the world from a wider perspective, asking ourselves how we, with our skill sets, can make it a better place?

(4) Doing what generates money.

Some argue that money isn’t important, or shouldn’t be a factor.

But when we look at reality, we see that money makes the world go round.

And without money, we can’t pay the bills.

So, to make our efforts sustainable, and truly a ‘reason for being’, they must generate income.

If not, our activities become more of a hobby.

There’s nothing wrong with a hobby of course.

However, this also means that we need a job we might not like to pay the bills, and, therefore, sacrifice the majority of our time and energy for something we’re not passionate about, and don’t see as our life’s mission.

So, we could see money as a form of energy, that fuels us in our pursuits.

Now we’ve addressed the four dimensions of Ikigai, it’s essential to explore how these dimensions relate to each other, and how a combination of them form an Ikigai.

When we do what we love, and what we’re good at, we have a passion.

But this passion isn’t sufficient to be an Ikigai.

Because it could very well be something that the world doesn’t need, or is even destructive to our environment.

Also, it may not generate money or even cost us money.

Yet, being passionate about something is part of an Ikigai.

Doing what we love, and what the world needs, we call a mission.

But a mission alone isn’t an Ikigai.

Because we might not be good at it, and not earning a dime doing it.

Yet, seeing our activities as a mission is an ingredient for a reason for being.

When we do something that the world needs, and what we get paid for, we’ve found a vocation.

But does that mean that we like what we do and that we’re good at it?

Not necessarily.

And that’s why a vocation may be something that the world demands, and that we do out of a sense of duty, but we may absolutely hate doing it.

So, a vocation alone isn’t an Ikigai.

Lastly, doing what we’re good at and what we’re paid for, is called a profession.

Does that mean that the world needs it and that we love what we do?

Again, not necessarily.

Some people hate their profession.

100

And some professions are even destructive to the world.

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So, a profession alone isn’t an Ikigai.

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What makes an Ikigai, is the combination of all four dimensions.

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This means that a ‘reason for being’ includes a passion, a mission, a vocation, and a profession.

104

These are all the ingredients that facilitate us to engage in a worthwhile pursuit that we love to get up for in the morning.

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And when we love what we do, it’s so easy to immerse ourselves in it and get in a state of flow.

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The secret lies in aligning our own nature with the nature of our environment, to establish an optimal interplay between ourselves and our surroundings so that our pursuit becomes effortless.

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The Taoists call this Wu-Wei, which can be translated as ‘effortless action’.

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It’s essential to remember that what we’re looking for is not set in stone.

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Many factors play a role in deciding what our Ikigai is.

110

In a constantly changing world, remaining in that flow state means that we continually need to adapt and finetune our position within the whole.

111

Ikigai, therefore, isn’t static.

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It’s an active entity, that changes with the flow of time.

113

Thank you for watching.

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本課的詞彙與口語要點

影片中反覆出現的詞有：Ikigai, skill, flow。這段影片共有 113 個句子、1691 個單詞可供跟讀。講話部分時長為 10:11。說話人語速自然，每分鐘約 166 個詞，接近日常對話。 85% 的單詞屬於英語最常用的 3,000 詞，其餘的詞建議在練習前先學一下。

影片中的重點詞彙

影片中最難的 15 個單詞，附發音和釋義：

單詞	發音	釋義
dimension 名詞	/daɪˈmɛn.ʃən/	方面, 特點 /特點
vocation 名詞	/vəʊˈkeɪʃən/	天職 /天職
ingredient 名詞	/ɪnˈɡɹiːdi.ənt/	成份, 材料
surroundings 名詞	/səˈɹaʊndɪŋz/	周圍 /周圍
mindset 名詞	/ˈmaɪn(d)ˌsɛt/	心態 /心態, 思維模式 /思維模式
enjoyable 形容詞	/ɛnˈd͡ʒɔɪ.ə.bl̩/	愉快
dreadful 形容詞	/ˈdɹɛd.fl̩/	可畏
circumstance 名詞	/ˈsɝ.kəmˌstæns/	情況 /情況, 狀態 /狀態
enjoyment 名詞	/ɪnˈd͡ʒɔɪ.mənt/	享受, 愉快
destructive 形容詞	/dɪˈstɹʌktɪv/	破壞性的 /破壞性的
hobby 名詞	/ˈhɑ.bi/	愛好 /愛好, 嗜好
passionate 形容詞	/ˈpæʃənɪt/	多情, 熾熱 /熾熱
bottleneck 名詞		瓶頸 /瓶頸
frustrate 動詞	/ˈfɹʌsˌtɹeɪt/	令人失望, 挫折
hopelessness 名詞		絕望 /絕望

影片中出現的短語動詞

單詞	釋義
find out 動詞	找出, 查明
grow up 動詞	長大 /長大
pick up 動詞	拾取, 撿 /撿

影片中的語法

說話人最常用的結構，並附上影片中的原話：

結構	影片中的用法
被動語態 be + 過去分詞 — 強調發生了什麼，而不是誰做的	are based · can be measured · be immersed
現在完成時 have/has + 過去分詞 — 過去發生但與現在仍有關聯的事	Have you ever asked · we've determined · we've addressed

需要注意的發音

說話人用了 44 次縮略和弱讀形式，例如 we're, isn't, don't。請按聽到的簡短形式來說。

“th” 音: thirdly /ˈθɚdli/, empathy /ˈɛmpəθi/, thrive /θɹajv/, worthwhile /ˌwɜː(ɹ)θˈwaɪl/
“sh” 和 “zh” 音: dimension /daɪˈmɛn.ʃən/, vocation /vəʊˈkeɪʃən/, passionate /ˈpæʃənɪt/, intuition /ˌɪn.tjuːˈɪʃ.ən/
長單詞——注意重音位置: ingredient /ɪnˈɡɹiːdi.ənt/, effortlessly /ˈɛf.ɚt.ləs.li/, mediocre /ˌmidiˈoʊkəɹ/, intuition /ˌɪn.tjuːˈɪʃ.ən/, continually /kənˈtɪnjuəli/

中文母語者容易讀錯的音：

/v/ — 不要讀成 /w/，上齒輕觸下唇: vocation /vəʊˈkeɪʃən/, destructive /dɪˈstɹʌktɪv/, disservice /dɪ(s)ˈsɝvɪs/, invent /ɪnˈvɛnt/, thrive /θɹajv/
詞尾子音 — 要讀清楚，後面不要加母音: immerse /ɪˈmɜɹs/, ingredient /ɪnˈɡɹiːdi.ənt/, surroundings /səˈɹaʊndɪŋz/, mindset /ˈmaɪn(d)ˌsɛt/, effortless /ˈɛfə(ɹ)tlɪs/
/r/ 和 /l/ 的區別: effortless /ˈɛfə(ɹ)tlɪs/, dreadful /ˈdɹɛd.fl̩/, interplay /ˈɪn.tə(ɹ)ˌpleɪ/, firstly /ˈfɜɹstli/, worthwhile /ˌwɜː(ɹ)θˈwaɪl/

如何用這段影片練習

先完整聽一遍影片，不要開口，記下不認識的單詞。
先用 0.75 倍速逐句跟讀，熟練之後再回到正常速度。
錄下自己的聲音並與原聲對比，特別注意 dimension, vocation, ingredient 這類單詞。

什麼是跟讀法？

跟讀法 (Shadowing) 是一種有科學依據的語言學習技巧，最初開發用於專業口譯員的培訓，並由多語言者Alexander Arguelles博士普及。這個方法簡單而強大：您在聽英語母語原聲的同時立即大聲重複——就像是一個延遲1-2秒緊跟說話者的影子。與被動聽力或語法練習不同，跟讀法強迫您的大腦和口腔肌肉同時處理並模模擬實的講話模式。研究表明它能顯著提高發音準確性，語調，節奏，連讀，聽力理解和口語流利度——使其成為雅思口語備考和真實英語交流最有效的方法之一。

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