There are over 8 billion human beings on the planet. And if there's one thing we all have in common, it's that we all want to be happy.

A UNIVERSAL CONCEPT

This search for happiness is expressed differently from one individual to another, depending on his or her personal situation, age, culture, socio-economic background, experiences and the way in which he or she has lived them, in suffering or in awareness.

Wisdom and hindsight teach us that happiness is accessible to each and every one of us, every moment, right now, without waiting, legitimately, and regardless of the external circumstances we experience, since it is exclusively the fruit of inner expression and our way of perceiving life*.

And since this aspiration is the one that unites us all, it becomes extremely interesting and powerful to make happiness part of your company's DNA, to make it its key value, its purpose, even!

If you think about it, you'll realize that all the other values generally endorsed by companies are derived from the search for happiness and well-being, and are in the final analysis, fragments of it: respect, benevolence, satisfaction of the various stakeholders, listening, sharing, trust, transparency, unity, care for others, sustainability, passion, freedom, audacity...

I'm excluding the verbs from this list, which ultimately correspond to actions based on these values.

WHY HAPPINESS?

So why choose happiness as your company's purpose ? And how can you be sure it's not social-washing or manipulating others?

Everything starts with intention, which is a deep aspiration of the heart, not a reflection of the mind. It's not a question of wanting, but of feeling and expressing, with depth, sincerity and integrity, what you really want to create and achieve through your business.

What is it about your job that moves you, mobilizes you, makes your heart swell and fills you with energy and pride? Do you feel that making the people you work with, your teams, your clients, your partners, your suppliers... happy gives you a powerful, transcendent aspiration that makes you stronger and lifts you up? Does it give you the feeling of being able to express the best of yourself, of helping to achieve something greater than yourself?

So, yes, you're ready to make happiness part of your values and make it the leitmotif of your company!

CONSISTENCY ABOVE ALL

Have you ever asked yourself what your life's purpose is, not just in a professional sense of course, but also in a personal sense, the one that drives the complete individual that you are?

Herein lies one of the secrets of this approach, which does not separate the world of everyday life from that of work. The opaque boundaries erected around the company fade away to reveal a universe made up of women and men working together to create and build projects, goods and services. These are the same women and men who evolve in their everyday world, taking on the roles of parents, families, consumers, travelers, creators, athletes, community members...

So considering your own unity of being, as well as that of those with whom you collaborate, will lead you towards a more holistic and empathetic approach to your profession. You'll be able to speak to people's hearts, eliciting their buy-in, support and creativity to enrich your projects by sharing your common goals. Your interactions will no longer be limited, if that were the case, to a simple partial and mechanical approach to realization, because you'll be addressing the whole of their being. They'll become active players in your projects, rather than simply executing them, and will enrich them in ways they never imagined before.

In other words, it allows you to move from doing tobeing.

THE ILLUSION OF MASTERY

What if your life objective, and therefore that of your company, were to become happiness, for yourself and for others? How can you put this into practice without being accused of ridicule, falsification or manipulation?

This, of course, requires the utmost sincerity, combined with the greatest humility, and a modified vision of the world.

Integrating happiness into our reality means moving from a way of thinking based on mastery, control and planning, validated by figures and performance, to a more open mode of experimentation, in which we bring together all the best possible conditions for realizing our projects, while leaving room for the emergence of what will be.

It's about focusing on the path rather than the goal, marvelling at the success of certain projects, realizing that their outcome doesn't really depend on us in the end, and accepting that other initiatives may fail, learning from them. As Nelson Mandela said, "I never lose; either I win, or I learn".

Anyway, that's how life goes, far from any illusion of mastery or control. When I was an organic farmer, I knew I could plant the best seed, at the best time, in the best soil, with the best exposure. But I had no control over the weather, red spider attacks or the voracity of a wild boar digging up my seed. I then realized that the seed didn't depend on me to grow and expand, and that even if I created the best conditions for its production, applied the best of my technique, accompanied its growth and preserved its living environment, it was ultimately a miracle that it could produce a fruit or vegetable. It was a lesson in life.

CHANGE YOUR WORLDVIEW

Transforming our vision means accepting this reality of non-control, of our simple participation in the living world, and relying more on weak signals than on our intellect to inspire our progress. Accepting that we're not much, and that the universe has billions of solutions to offer us, when we're only capable of finding a handful.

By transforming ourselves, we transform our creations, because we create according to who we are. And we'll transform our projects, the way we carry them out... and even their results.

So, rather than getting hung up on achieving an uncertain goal dictated by our credos and ambitions, or making it a personal challenge or that of one of our stakeholders, it's now a question of taking advantage of every moment of our projects to live and enjoy the experience to the full, as a learning experience and a source of wonder, and finally, to be happy along the way. Let's relax and take a deep breath!

RALLY AROUND THE NOTION OF HAPPINESS

By transforming your corporate approach from a place of performance to a space for experimentation, sharing and innovation, and by making happiness the driving force behind your progress, you'll attract people who are motivated by this approach: employees, associates, clients, suppliers, partners... You'll be able to generate an ecosystem driven by this approach to life, which does so much good! Because one of the main principles of happiness is that it must be shared. When you're happy, you can't just keep it to yourself. And the happier you feel, the more you share it, and the more you spread it around.

By placing happiness at the heart of your company's life and activities, you'll be able to create a different reality, one that's attractive and powerful, and fundamentally, one that creates the best for you and those around you.

And if you want to know how, contact me! I'll be happy to discuss it with you and guide you along this beneficial path.

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Also on LinkedIn, read the newsletter dedicated to happiness:
‍https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/
7057809549537206272/‍