In a world where career choices are often influenced by pressure, prestige, or paycheck, many individuals—especially students and young professionals—struggle to find paths that feel personally fulfilling and spiritually aligned. The book Designing Your Life by Bill Burnett and Dave Evans offers a powerful framework to reimagine career development not as a fixed track, but as a creative, life-long design process. But what happens when we infuse that framework with the SHAPE model—an intentional approach that honors one’s Spiritual gifts, Heart, Abilities, Personality, and Experiences?
This article explores the intersection of Chapter 1 of Designing Your Life and the SHAPE model, drawing out seven powerful lessons that can help individuals design careers rooted in divine purpose, emotional authenticity, and practical clarity. Whether you’re a student trying to figure out what’s next, a parent helping your teen navigate options, or a professional seeking realignment, these insights will challenge you to shift from simply “making a living” to designing a life worth living.
Each of these seven lessons is inspired by the book’s call to action—that you are the designer of your life—and grounded in the SHAPE model’s deep, personalized understanding of who you were created to be. Through this lens, career development becomes more than finding a job; it becomes a sacred journey of becoming.
Let’s dive into these seven SHAPE-powered lessons and see how Chapter 1 of Designing Your Life sets the foundation for a fulfilling, God-aligned career path.
1. You Are Not Your Job → Identity Through SHAPE
Designing Your Life Insight: Your job doesn’t define your worth.
SHAPE Integration:Your Spiritual Gifts, Heart, and Personality contribute to a deeper identity and calling than any job title can.
Career Development Application:Help clients explore:“What do your gifts say about your purpose?”“What causes ignite your passion (Heart) regardless of your career title?”
2. Start Where You Are → SHAPE Inventory
Designing Your Life Insight: Begin your career design from your current reality.
SHAPE Integration: Start by assessing your Abilities, Personality, and Experiences as a foundation.
Career Development Application:Inventory key moments where your SHAPE elements showed up powerfully, Ask: “How have your experiences shaped what matters to you in a career?”
3. Reframe Dysfunctional Beliefs → SHAPE-Driven Mindset Shift
Designing Your Life Insight: Challenge myths like “I need to find my one true passion.”
SHAPE Integration:
You are multi-dimensional. Your SHAPE allows for multiple expressions of purpose.
Career Development Application:Re-frame belief: “I must find one perfect job” → “I can explore multiple paths aligned with my SHAPE.” Use your SHAPE as a filter to evaluate opportunities, not a rigid career box.
4. You Can Design Your Way Forward → SHAPE as Prototype Lens
Designing Your Life Insight: Careers are built through prototyping and iteration.
SHAPE Integration:
Use your Heart, Gifts, and Abilities to test-fit roles, environments, or problems you’d love solving.
Career Development Application:Prototype career roles through internships, shadowing, or passion projects that align with SHAPE. Ask: “Which expression of your SHAPE energized you the most?”
5. Life Is Not a Problem to Be Solved → Embrace Your SHAPE Journey
Designing Your Life Insight: Life is something to be lived and designed.
SHAPE Integration:
Your SHAPE grows with time. It’s not about solving your life—it’s about serving with your SHAPE through seasons.
Career Development Application:Support clients in seeing their SHAPE as dynamic and evolving. Guide them to embrace where they are now and design the next best expression of their purpose.
6. Curiosity is Key → Explore SHAPE-Inspired Curiosities
Designing Your Life Insight: Follow what sparks your interest.
SHAPE Integration:
Your Heart often reveals itself in your curiosities, causes, and connections.
Career Development Application:Journal: “What topics, people, or problems are you naturally curious about?” Prototype small projects or conversations around those areas to test alignment.
Your CV should do more than just list your experiences—it should tell your story and highlight your Spiritual gifts, Heart, Abilities, Personality, and Experiences (SHAPE) to position you for the right opportunities! 🔹 Do you feel your CV isn’t truly reflecting your strengths? 🔹 Are you struggling to stand out in job applications? 🔹 Do you want a CV that aligns with your passion and purpose? 💡 Let’s transform your CV into a powerful personal brand! 📋 Start by filling out our SHAPE Questionnaire! This will help us tailor your CV to highlight your unique value, ensuring you land roles that truly resonate with your skills and aspirations. 👉 Fill Out the SHAPE Questionnaire Now! and take the first step toward a career that fits YOU! 🚀
7. Be a Design Thinker → SHAPE-Based Career Experiments
Designing Your Life Insight: Empathize, ideate, prototype, test.
SHAPE Integration:
Design your career experiments based on your SHAPE:
Empathize with your past experiences. Test and iterate to refine your path. Ideate roles and spaces your SHAPE could serve. Prototype using short-term engagements
Career Development Application:Create SHAPE-aligned job shadowing, volunteering, or side hustle plans. Reflect regularly on emotional, spiritual, and physical energy in each experiment.
🧩 Bonus Coaching Prompt Template (for Clients)
Prompt: “Based on your SHAPE, design 3 small career experiments you can try this month. What will you learn from each one, and how will you know if it’s aligned?”
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