Happiness or Fulfillment… To Which are You Aspiring?

I hope you’ve enjoyed the first two articles in this series. Please share this newsletter with others and take a few moments to leave a comment or reaction. This week’s offering was prompted by Arthur C. Brooks’ article in The Atlantic, ‘Ben Franklin's Radical Theory of Happiness - The Atlantic.’ Check it out…

I’m a fan of Arthur Brooks’ Atlantic column, ‘How to Build a Life’, and his regular writings on the topic of happiness. So, I was intrigued to find out what was so radical about old Ben’s perspective. The author interviewed documentary film maker, Ken Burns, who had done extensive research on Franklin. He asked him how ‘Ben’ defined happiness. Burns said it had nothing to do with pleasant feelings… not even close. “For Franklin, happiness meant lifelong learning in the marketplace of ideas. In other words, self-improvement.”

That might make total sense to anyone familiar with Franklin’s many accomplishments. He was a prolific, creative, influential person. In his day he seemed to have his hand in everything… not just holding a kite string! His inventions – and interventions – left his mark on the world, everything from inventing the lightning rod to editing The Declaration of Independence and being the first Postmaster General.

That begs the question… with all those accomplishments, was he happy with his life as a whole and his impact beyond public service?

Brooks wrote, “My work finds that happy people rely on?four building blocks?to boost their well-being”, and then ‘grades’ Franklin on each. “They engage in work that gives them a sense of accomplishment and that serves others (he gets an A+); they practice some form of faith (Franklin scores a B+ here); they invest in friendships (he gets a C here… Burns told him that most of Franklin’s friendships were focused on what others could do for him); and they spend time with family (alas, he gets an F in this domain… Burns’ research reveals they didn’t matter to him.)

You get the impression that Benjamin Franklin was not just obsessed with self-improvement and public accomplishments… much of his life seemed to be all about himself and his own happiness.

So… What Does This Have to Do with Us?

The picture of Benjamin Franklin that emerges is unflattering… but, of course, we’ve all known people like that. What’s worse is that, at times, we’re all like that. We get caught up in looking for happiness as we define it, often in our pursuit of career or financial advancement, or a lower golf score, or some other self-absorbed objective. When that happens, we don’t really see the needs, objectives and challenges of our families, friends, and communities. We live for the ‘rush’ of accomplishment and a sense of personal validation. We’re less concerned with helping others who would benefit from our investment in their lives, and the different sense of fulfillment doing so would bring.

Happiness & Fulfillment… It’s About Change and Seeing Others with Fresh Eyes

Happiness is seductive, even when we know it’s self-indulgent. The ‘happiness trap’ is that it tends to pay off immediately – like procrastination! Engaging in enjoyable activities is fun! The problem is that the benefits aren’t usually long-lasting, and we need a regular ‘boost’ to sustain the feelings. Over time, we can become addicted to happiness and ignore the evidence that we need to change our approach to life. Even when we know what we should do differently, we avoid doing it.

The first article in this newsletter outlined the critical transition challenges we all face over the course of our lives. As stated there, the secret to overcoming those challenges is to have a clear sense of purpose. The stage that’s especially pertinent to this article is ‘Lifer.’ It’s also, for most people, the longest stage. We begin to develop our webs of life-long relationships early in adulthood, and we become aware of the steadily increasing needs (and demands) of others on us. Are we ready to rise to the challenge of integrating them with our own… seeing others the same as we see ourselves?

As we become aware of our escalating relationship needs, we must come to grips with two essential truths about healthy change. First, any commitment to pursuing a newly defined meaningful purpose will inevitably require change. Second, intentional, purpose-driven change isn’t always fun, especially when it involves sacrifice or leaving behind our old ‘happier’ – and perhaps self-serving – ways. We’ll need to remind ourselves that doing so will pay off down the road… but also that delayed gratification will be our companion along the way. Our hope is built on the promise of our future fulfillment of our current aspirations.

Exercising Our Freedom: Taking Advantage of the Pandemic

For months now, we’ve been bombarded with news stories about the so-called ‘Great Resignation’, and the efforts by businesses to stem the tide of people leaving. Most of those efforts are predicated on the assumption that people just need incentives, and they’ll hang in there or perhaps even come rushing back. But that’s built on another assumption… that the people leaving just wanted to get away from something they didn’t like in their pre-pandemic jobs. And, of course, some didn’t leave and couldn’t wait to return to ‘normal’… an impossible dream if there ever was one.

Recently, however, in a Harvard Business Review post, Whitney Johnson suggested that we reframe this upheaval as the ‘Great Aspiration.’ I think she’s dead on, at least for an increasing number of people quitting their jobs. For some, to be sure, the pandemic has forced changes on them that necessitated a switch. For others, it provided an opportunity to escape from things they genuinely disliked… bad bosses, toxic cultures, crushing workloads, and an expectation to return to an office environment that no longer felt safe, or didn’t make sense given the successful pivot to remote work.

To Johnson’s point, as the German social psychologist and philosopher Erich Fromm described in his landmark book, ‘Escape from Freedom’, there are two very different types of freedom… freedom from and freedom to. So, before we conclude that the exodus was all about the former, we should consider Johnson’s thesis. I too believe that an increasing number of people quitting are pursuing the latter… they’re exercising their freedom to change their lives in fundamental ways. They’re not trying to escape from a bad situation. Rather, they’ve learned through the pandemic that there’s more to life than their work-centric former existence, and they want to escape to that healthier, fuller, more integrated life.

The challenge now – and again, always for ‘Lifers’, is to build that new life. That involves embracing new roles, rebalancing commitments, leaving some of the ‘old life’ behind, developing new competencies, and realigning it all.

An Escape Strategy: Goodbye Toxic Productivity & Hello Realignment

First a confession. Several years back, during a long run of teaching productivity courses at a university, I thought I was ready to write a book on how to squeeze every possible ‘result’ from our limited time. I’m glad I didn’t write that book… it’s tough to walk back one’s wrong-headed thinking.

What I noticed in the assignments and comments – in-class arguments at times – from students was that most didn’t really want that. They felt overwhelmed and often guilty about what they knew they could never get done. Oliver Burkeman, in his book ‘Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals’, begins by proving that, despite what seems like a lot of available time, no-one can ever get it ‘all’ done. Perhaps his most useful piece of advice is this, “The real measure of any time management technique is whether or not it helps you neglect the right things.”

That clarifies a change in my own thinking about what I call ‘Whole Life Performance’ and what I now see as involving three foundational areas of focus: Growing, Serving and Leading.

Growing is about increasing your capacity to function at a high level across all of life. It consists of five resources that support personal performance: spiritual (however you define that), physical, intellectual, emotional, and social. What are you doing to build up each of these, and how could you improve where you’re lacking?

Serving is about ‘showing up’ in the world in a way that sees, and responds to, the needs and objectives of others with whom you are connected, and for whom you could help things go right… or, at least, better. Who do you see who could benefit from your encouragement or practical support, and what’s your simplest step to begin?

Leading is about ‘stepping up’ in high-stakes situations (and not just in your work) where you can make a significant contribution without which results will suffer. We’ve all had experiences where we know that ‘for such a time as this’ we must get involved. It might be taking the lead on a project or dropping everything to support a family member or friend in crisis. Where do these situations exist in your life? Why are you the right person to take the lead? How will you free yourself TO do that?

A fourth element brings these three areas together – alignment – and it’s always changing. Time is linear (unless you’re a mathematician), but life is not. Life has cycles, and unpredictable twists and turns. Sometimes we have to jump off the curve we’re following and onto another track. Perhaps we should replace the term alignment with adaptiveness. How well do you handle change, and how can you more adaptive?

Final Thoughts

I’m not suggesting that our goal is to avoid happiness in favor of fulfillment. Rather, I’m saying that happiness will also come from considering others as well as ourselves, and doing so will add a deeper sense of fulfillment. Also, I’m left wondering, what impact might that have had if Benjamin Franklin had embraced this principle? Actually, that's the question we all need to address.