You were intentionally and specifically designed by God. Not only that, but you can know and name the One Thing He designed you to do.
We can say those two things with such confidence because we see evidence of each person’s specific design in the writings of the earliest followers of Jesus … and because we’ve guided thousands of people through an intentional process to discover and name their One Thing.
The purpose of this post, though, isn’t to prove that you were intentionally and specifically designed by God. Instead, we want to give you a few hints as to HOW you can know and name your One Thing in a way that fuels and energizes everything you do.
Your One Thing is An Intersection
When you think about how you were created or designed, you may think of some popular personal assessments like the Enneagram, Meyers-Briggs, Insights, DiSC, APEST, and StrengthsFinder. All of these assessments are helpful in their own ways, but all of them are limited in scope.
A holistic understanding of your One Thing lies at the intersection of three areas: your passion, your abilities, and your ideal context. Most personal assessments only help in one of those areas … we haven’t found one yet that encapsulates all three.
In the Younique process, we encourage people to take these assessments and include them in their understanding of their One Thing, but to treat them as what they are—data points to be included in your ongoing self-discovery.
Have you ever heard someone say something like, “Follow your passion?” That’s really bad advice. The things we are passionate about tend to grow and develop over time. We believe your passion should provide fuel and energy for your One Thing, but should be informed by your abilities and your ideal context as well.
In order to really understand your One Thing, you need to spend time understanding your passion, your ability, and your ideal context. Finding that intersection (we call it your Sweet Spot) is critical to knowing and naming your One Thing.
Your One Thing is the Meat in a Sandwich
It might sound weird to say that your One Thing is the meat in a sandwich, so let me explain what we mean.
Some people, in trying to understand their God-given design, stay too general. They talk about loving God and loving others, making disciples, or living their life for the glory of God.
All of those things are great! But they’re too general. Those things should apply to everyone who is following Jesus. In some ways, they’re too big, too broad, too wide.
When other people are naming their unique calling, they will get too specific. They focus on only one aspect of who they are. They end up being too small, too confining, too narrow.
We describe this challenge of general/specific in the Younique process with the image below—the Calling Sandwich. Your One Thing is the “meat in the middle” between an articulation of your core design that’s too general and one that’s too specific.
The most helpful and accurate articulation of your One Thing will be found right in the middle between too general and too specific.
Your One Thing Can be Expressed in Two Words
When we tell people at the beginning of the Younique process that they will be able to articulate their unique, God-given design in two words, they usually laugh at us. Then, after they’ve completed this part of the process, they sometimes apologize for their cynicism.
We use a simple construction that goes something like this:
[YOUR NAME] is created to honor God and serve others by …
__________________ _________________.
We use this construction to help guide people away from a too general description of their One Thing. We’re all called to honor God and serve others … but how are YOU designed to do that specifically?
And, the framework is also designed to end with a verb and a noun. Here are some examples.
Will Mancini is created to honor God and serve others by applying essence.
Kelly Kannwishcer is created to honor God and serve others by empowering momentum.
Dave Rhodes is created to honor God and serve others by fostering congruence.
Caleb P. is created to honor God and serve others by cultivating growth.
Kelly R. is created to honor God and serve others by intentionalizing integration.
For more examples and a story behind each example, visit www.lifeyounique.com/twowords.
Find Your One Thing
We’ve designed practical tools to help you find your One Thing. These tools, along with video teaching to guide and coach you along the way, are available in our Find Your One Thing online course.
We’ll show you how to discover your passion, your abilities, and your ideal context. We’ll help you to name your sweet spot with increasing clarity. And we’ll give you helpful tips on how to brainstorm and evaluate your potential two-word constructions until you’ve cut through all the complexity and layers of life to arrive at your One Thing.
There’s a freedom and personal momentum that flows from walking through an intentional process to identify and articulate the way you, specifically, were created. We want you to experience that freedom and momentum. So start the Find Your One Thing course today!
