“If ur not having a good time, it’s your fault” is so 1980 (Part I)
The game of Integrated Thinking
Yesterday a longtime friend advised me to pursue my own happiness and forget about trying to manage anyone else’s. “If ur not having a good time in this short life, it’s your fault,” he texted.
This friend is close friends with someone we both love, a family member of mine whom I believe is wrestling with a pretty severe depression. His depression has affected me significantly. I’ve stood by him as best I know how. I sometimes wonder if his friends' well-intended advice is helpful to him, or to me.
I believe that the formula that one’s happiness is entirely up to pleasing one’s own self, and within one’s sole control, is like the formula "the business of business is business".
Very 1980.
Instead, today, “integrated thinking" is where it’s at.
In business, integrated thinking means the recognition that our ability to create financial value depends on more than just the input of money, IP and manufactured assets typically managed by businesses. Our ability to generate financial value also depends on natural capital– nature’s resources. It depends on human capital– the people doing the work. And it depends on social and relationship capital– the trust and approval of the community in which we’re doing business. And in return, all of those types of capital are also changed– grown or shrunk — by the business activities we do to make money. So, if we ignore the environment when we design our business models, eventually that will come back to bite us. If we exploit people, their misery impoverishes all of us, sooner or later. Yeah, the profit maximization thing was fun for the winners while it lasted, but its time is running out.
But if instead we recognize that our ability to succeed financially depends on the ecological resources we use; the trust, effort and creativity of the people around us; and the license to operate and loyalty they give us if what they care about is not harmed or is even helped by our work; and if we strive to ensure all of these are at least not damaged while we pursue moneymaking, and at best are grown, we realize risks and opportunities we didn’t see before. This mindset– that sees that the well-being of others is also an asset to ourselves– sparks great ideas, and enables us to come up with solutions that are not just financially valuable, but also inspiring and gratifying at a whole other level.
Think of Wells Fargo and how (in the face of coming close to losing their social license to operate by exploiting their own customers) they’ve started an initiative to provide credit counseling to struggling borrowers, helping them get on their feet. It’s not only profitable and helpful to those customers, it’s also a highly sought-after program for WF’s employees to work in-- they get hundreds of applications for every slot. The guy who started it says it’s the most fun he’s had at the company in all his years there– the most fun he’s had at work, period! And think of AlterEco, which strives not only to make delicious chocolate, but also to eliminate ecological harm from its products and packaging, and grow social justice for every participant in its value chain. The company is not only beloved for exactly this by its customers, but by its suppliers and employees too, all of whom will go the extra distance to ensure all is well, and to help AlterEco succeed.
Likewise, the game of individual happiness is a game of integrated thinking. An integrated thinking (“IT”) approach to happiness is knowing that our ability to be happy in a deep, sustained way, instead of a superficial, temporary way, depends on the well-being of 5 key parties:
- Self
- Child
- Coparent/partner
- Employer/coworkers
- Other family members and friends
The well-being of each is both an input to our individual ability to be happy, and an outcome of it: that is, their happiness is affected by our happiness, or lack of it.
The IT game, then, is attending to them all; that is, nurturing and safeguarding of them all, given that one cannot directly control another’s feelings (and shouldn’t try!). Doing our part to ensure that none is in negative territory, at least, while key others are optimized.
It’s messy, because despite one’s reasonable best efforts, sometimes another person is just going through some tough times or illness, and they’re going to be unhappy. Deciding what’s appropriate to expect of one’s self, or to do to help, is a judgment call, and not always an easy one. There are few no-fail formulas. It’s more art than science.
But over-focus on the well-being of any one one of these parties at the expense of the others for long leads to depletion of the 'soil’ that nourishes our own happiness, and to collapse.
My beloved family member has striven mightily — mightily! — to secure his own happiness and well-being first, thinking it a prerequisite to the others. But, tragically, this approach has led to the destruction of many things he once held dear: family, love, even his own health.
By changing the rules of the game to integrated thinking, I believe he is more likely to finally find in his hands the kind of fruit he longs to taste.
As for me? I can see our friend’s point: that if I am happy, it’s good for me and it helps those around me to be happy too. I’ve focused far more on my family member than myself, and my friend has a point that I’m probably not in balance either. So I’m going to take that part of what he said to me on board. Tango, anyone?
Go to Part II of this article now.