WorkLife Stories from School of WorkLife
Character-Driven WorkLife Stories That Shift How You Think
Short, character-driven stories about real WorkLife challenges — how we communicate, lead, make decisions, and navigate what happens at work.
Each story shows a moment where something shifts: a conversation changes, an idea lands, a different approach opens up.
Working examples you can recognise and use — designed to be useful immediately.
The stories explore five themes, each a different lens on the same essential question:
How do we create WorkLives that matter?
Self-Discovery — understanding what truly matters to you.
Book Club Books — learning from the wisdom found in great books.
The Art of WorkLife Storytelling — crafting your distinctive narratives.
Character Traits — enhancing your natural strengths.
Mental Health and Wellbeing — navigating workplace wellbeing challenges.
Every episode is complete and free to listen.
Each story connects to a full Story Lesson — a deeper, structured resource with frameworks, reflection, and practical application.
And for those who want to go deeper still, Story Lessons connect to Guided Programmes — comprehensive learning journeys available at School of WorkLife.
New episodes every Tuesday.
WorkLife Stories from School of WorkLife
The WorkLife Question: Lisa
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
SHOW NOTES
Today's Question: What does this passion reveal about who you are?
What does this passion reveal about who you are? In this episode of The WorkLife Question, I stay with Lisa and the question — exploring what her passion revealed about who she was, not in one moment, but over months of living it more consciously. The answer she found went deeper than sustainability. It went to the heart of who she was.
RESOURCES
Today’s question is from Creating Three Fundamental Stories That Define Your Identity: Success, Failure and Passion Stories Question Bank — from the section Discovering Your Passion Story.
Lisa is the main protagonist in the Story Lesson: How to Build Authentic Connections Through Storytelling.
Her story is featured in the episode: The Stories Behind the Stories: Lisa.
Lisa's story was told in WorkLife Stories: How to Build Authentic Connections Through Storytelling. (Free to listen).
Deepen the practice with the WorkLife Compass Guided Programme:The Art of WorkLife Storytelling: Creating Three Fundamental Stories That Define Your Identity Programme Crafting Success, Failure, and Passion Narratives with Powerful Beginnings, Engaging Middles, and Memorable Endings
Welcome to the Work Life Question from School of Work Life, a weekly question to ponder what matters in your Work Life. Each question is drawn from the School of Work Life Question Banks. I'm your show host, Carmel O'Reilly. This week's question is, what does this passion reveal about who you are? That's the question I want you to sit with today. What does this passion reveal about who you are? Let's explore the question through a character I created, Lisa. Lisa is the main protagonist in the story lesson, How to Build Authentic Connections Through Storytelling. Her story is featured in the episode The Stories Behind the Stories, Lisa. Lisa's story was told in WorkLife stories, How to Build Authentic Connections Through Storytelling. If you haven't already, listening to that story will help you identify your own passion story and go deeper with this question. Lisa's passion was this sustainability works best when it honors what already exists. Not imposing change, finding what's already there, building from that. But what did that passion reveal about who she was? Lisa discovered the answer slowly, not in the moment, over months of living the passion more consciously. In client meetings, she noticed she never arrived with a fixed solution. She always arrived with questions. What did a founder value? What practices had survived decades? What was already working that nobody had named? In collaboration conversations, she noticed she was drawn to people who share that instinct, not people who had the same expertise, people who had the same way of seeing. In networking, she noticed that when she finally shared her passion, the conversations that followed weren't about what she could deliver, they were about how she thought. And slowly, through all of it, something clarified. Sustainability was where the passion lived, and beneath it something deeper, a profound respect for what already exists in organizations, in people, in ideas. She didn't want to replace things. She wanted to reveal them, to show people the value in what they had already built, to help them see what they couldn't yet see themselves. That's who Lisa was, not just a sustainability consultant, someone who found a hidden value in things and helped others recognize it. That's what the passion revealed. And once she saw it clearly, she understood something important. The passion hadn't changed. It had always been there. She had just finally found the words for it. That's what sitting with this question does. It doesn't ask what you do. It asks what the doing reveals about who you are. So the question isn't just Lisa's, it's yours. What does this passion reveal about who you are? Today's question is from the creating three fundamental stories that define your identity success, failure, and passion stories question bank from the section Discovering Your Passion Story. You'll find all the resources mentioned in the show notes. Thank you for listening.