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The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy; I mean that if you are happy you will be good. —Bertrand Russell
If it seems weird for a column about making work more fun and engaging to open with a quote from the philosopher Bertrand Russell—then honey, you don’t know Bert.
Some philosophers spend their time working out obscure problems that don’t seem to have much to do with you and me. But Bertrand Russell spent a lot of his time thinking about everyday things—like happiness, and what it means to be good.You know how it is when you read something that’s so true it nearly knocks you out of your chair? That’s pretty much what happened when I first came across that quote at the top. Russell NAILED it when he said happiness leads to goodness.
When it comes to begin a good person, most of us don’t think very clearly. We think it has something to do with “knowing right from wrong.” It almost never does. Nearly EVERYONE knows right from wrong. In fact, NOT knowing right from wrong is so rare that it’s a felony defense.
Suppose I whacked somebody with a two-by-four and they hauled me before a judge. If my lawyer can show that I literally didn’t know it was wrong, I’ve got a ticket to a rubber room instead of prison. And it’s a defense that almost never works. That’s how rare it is for someone to not know the difference between right and wrong.
Morality is not about knowing the difference—it’s about choosing to do what you already KNOW is right instead of what you KNOW is wrong. And what’s the best way to make the right choice?
By being happy.
People who do the wrong thing—cut you off on the freeway, steal from the petty cash, backstab a coworker—are almost always operating from a place of deep unhappiness. They are dissatisfied with their lives, they feel screwed over, and they’re trying to rebalance the scales.
Seriously, why would a happy and satisfied person rob a convenience store? It doesn’t happen.
A lot of companies that have been caught with their ethical pants down had cultures simply dripping with dissatisfaction, backstabbing, and just plain unhappiness. Is it any surprise then that they ended up choosing to do things they knew were corrupt?
If you want to create a workplace transformation to build a company that operates on the highest ethical plane, work toward a company of happy people—engaged employees who have fun at work and who find ways to make their work of profound service to others.
Bertie Russell will be so proud of you.