Made For This Place Leadership Intensive
Join me for a 6-week leadership intensive on creating language around purpose and calling when you feel like a cultural outsider
“Those who have a 'why' to live, can bear with almost any 'how.” - Viktor Frankl, Holocaust survivor
Our next 6-week leadership intensive for paid members, Made for This Place, begins August 13th. Designed for folks who feel like cultural outsiders and misfits, this intensive will help you name your deepest “why,” reconnect with your unique calling, and develop creative expressions for your purpose in places that don’t always reflect who you are. If you’re not yet a paid member, you can upgrade anytime for full access to this and all previous intensives.
Why does purpose matter? Can knowing our why – our deepest, most honest reasons for living and working in a culturally diverse (or, cross-cultural) context – be the difference between thriving and surviving?
Yes.
I’ve written about this before (here and here).
Anyone who feels like a cultural outsider knows we are constantly haunted by the questions: Why do I exist here? What exactly am I called to do?
No one, and I mean no one, wrestles with the question of purpose more than cultural outsiders (or, as I sometimes call myself, “a cultural misfit”). It’s not simply that we often look different than everyone else. The struggle goes much deeper. We are different at our most fundamental level; in our values, life experiences, and perspectives. We’re relationally warm when the culture we’re in is cold. We’re collectivists when they’re individualists. We’re highly expressive and affectionate, but they are not. We value hierarchy in leadership while they want egalitarian decision making. These are the things that make us feel like we’re going crazy, that leave us constantly triggered, mentally exhausted, and overwhelmingly alone. More than that, cultural differences can make us question who we even are.
Because we don't reflect the dominant culture, it's easy to believe we don't belong, or that our presence has no value. The more misaligned we feel, the more invisible our “why” becomes.
I’ve worked with 800+ people around the world and the question of purpose always comes up. Recently, a client of mine who lives abroad said:
“I just want to be able to easily answer the question ‘What do you do?’. I want language around my unique design and the giftings God has given me for the work I’m passionate about.”
Another client shared:
“I just want to be in a good place, settled, and focused on my calling.”
What they mean is: they long to find a space where they can just be themselves, use their giftings, and feel good about what they do.
Living into our purpose in culturally diverse (or, cross-cultural) contexts isn’t merely helpful; it’s a necessity. Our WHY is the source of understanding our value and living effectively in a place that wasn’t built for us.
That’s why we’ll take up our Placed on Purpose leadership intensive for 6 weeks starting Wednesday, August 13th. This intensive will help you name your deepest “why” in a culturally diverse context, reconnect with your unique calling, and explore how to utilize your strengths in fresh, energizing ways. If you're in a place that wasn’t built for you, this is your invitation to start living like you were meant to be here. To participate, all you need is a paid membership; no other sign-up is needed.
Our purpose is deeply connected to our identity and behavior. How we show up in a place directly informs how we understand our value and what we have to offer…which is why people who live as cultural chameleons have the hardest time naming their purpose.
As the lone bicultural Indian American girl growing up in an all-white community, I struggled to understand my value and place. My efforts were muddled because I was constantly changing how I presented myself based on who I was with. In the very first pages of my book, Becoming All Things, I write:
“Being able to mold myself to the people around me is a unique skill. Even now I instinctively withdraw when I enter a new space and ask myself, ‘Who am I? Who do others want me to be?’ These questions play on repeat in my head as I silently observe which words and gestures are welcome and which are not. I pay close attention to social cues and cultural expressions so that I can adjust how loud I am, how many of my emotions I can share, and which personality traits I can express.
I play a role, and often quite well–with success being measured by how positively the person I’m with treated me in return. But this process can also leave me tired and discouraged. I wonder what the real me would look like, and whether I could be different, whether I could stick out of the crows and still be accepted.”
Even now–20 years after being a gangly, braces-wearing middle schooler–I remember the deep heartache and confusion of navigating a cultural space that wasn’t built for me. It wasn’t until after college that I realized how common the struggles of purpose and calling are for “cultural chameleons.” As Marilyn Gardner writes in Between Worlds, “When you don’t know who you are, you don’t know how to live effectively or honestly.”
Cultural adaptation is a double edged sword. It is one of our greatest tools for effectively interacting with others. If you are a cultural outsider, I’ll wager you’re probably the most emotionally and culturally sensitive person in whatever space you show up. You are constantly shifting your language, tone, and body to accommodate the other (despite that same kind of treatment not reciprocated). The problem, however, is that without having its proper place, cultural adaptation will become our catalyst to losing ourselves.
We need a more robust definition of purpose than simply passion + service. This is perhaps why, as a cultural engagement professor and leadership coach, I encourage folks to take American author and theologian Frederick Buechner’s often quoted phrase with a grain of salt. Buechner writes, “Calling is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” No doubt, there is caution in being too inward and never focusing on the needs of others. BUT for those living in culturally diverse contexts, who do everything in service to those around them, purpose defined as solely what we do will fast track us to mental and spiritual weariness and eventually a complete loss of self.
We need balance. We need an understanding of purpose that robustly marries who we’re designed to be as cultural beings with our unique giftings in cultural flexibility and even at times cultural ambiguity. We need a deep sense of self and our unique values, strengths, and purpose along with how to creatively express ourselves in culturally authentic ways when no one else looks or thinks like us.
To give language to our purpose and calling, then, in a culturally diverse (or, cross-cultural) context is to not merely create clarity on what we do, but who we are, and to shape a truly authentic version of ourselves that embodies the best of our complex personhood.
As cultural outliers, we are more than our abilities to adapt. Our purpose is found when we return to wholeness and can respectfully engage people who are different from us without losing the core of who we are. Naming our why should be less about our job titles and professional capacities and more a process of unearthing what’s already within us. In places where we often feel silenced or misunderstood, being able to confidently name and embody your strengths, story, and calling is how you find your way back to joy and your most authentic self.
I hope you will join me for the Made for This Place Leadership Intensive starting in August.
What’s included in the Made for This Place Leadership Intensive
Paid members of the Success Culture community receive:
6 lessons, starting August 13th and sent every Wednesday (Aug 13, 20, 27, Sept 3, 10, 17), with short readings, discussions, and reflection exercises (submitted via my Substack newsletter to paid subscribers only).
2 zoom calls (The first is a masterclass on August 13th to kick off the intensive. The second is a Q&A + reflection zoom call with me at the end of the intensive on Sept 19th. Both calls are at 2 pm central).
A private chat channel with me and the participants to receive direct feedback, suggestions, and answers to questions/exercises.
Access to the private and supportive comments section where, each week, participants share questions, insights, and answers to the post’s prompt.
All participants will gain:
A deeper understanding of who you are and how you want to show up in culturally complex spaces without losing yourself
A reimagined sense of calling that empowers you to lead from cultural alignment, not adaptation
Language to express your unique giftings and strengths
Practical tools to develop a voice that reflects your true self and leadership style in a culturally diverse (or, cross-cultural) context; not just what’s expected of you
Some Things People Have Said About Success Culture Intensives:
I highlighted so much. It really made me think about what I want and how I can better express myself in cross-cultural spaces.
This has really helped me heal from old wounds.
It was your encouraging words that helped me realize I do belong here and I can speak up. I don’t have to shrink myself.
I’m happy to answer questions if you have them! Share thoughts into the comments or respond via email to this post. I can’t wait to deep dive into Made for this Place with all of you in August–naming your deepest “why” in a culturally diverse context, reconnecting with your unique calling, and exploring how to utilize your strengths in fresh, energizing ways.
Be Intentional,
Michelle