Most people suppose that happiness is the result of success, particularly financial success. Although the evidence is amply to the contrary, we continue to fancy that amassing money will buy happiness, as if happiness itself were a commodity.
But what if there is evidence, actually, that it is the reverse: that cultivating happiness wherever you are, under even adverse conditions, may hold a key to success, particularly in business. Here is a video interview with my friend of over 50 years, attorney Mark Davis, who by any standard is wildly successful, explaining how happiness holds the secret to his many significant legal victories and resulting financial fortune.
Highlights
- Mark is a social creature. He is extremely close to his wife, Janie, their children, and grandchildren, and also their extended families, and this closeness has been intergenerational. Mark’s and Janie’s parents were also very close and caring of their children and their families.
- Mark naturally brings this sense of caring and closeness to the management of his firm, in his treatment of his junior lawyers and employees, and a strong commitment to his community in Hawaii.
- His life is balanced. Despite his full dossier of cases, even after the age of 76, he somehow finds large amounts of time to play tennis and golf, enjoy his friends, dine well, and travel to exotic places.
- He has a keen sense of equity and social justice.
- He is a social innovator. He persuaded Hawaii’s Governor Josh Green to establish a special fund to compensate the families of those who died in the 2023 Lahaina Maui fire.
- And yet, he never loses his sense of play and adventure.
- He has a quick wit and advanced sense of humor.
- He celebrates frequently, making ordinary events special.
- He is loyal and generous to his friends.
- He and Janie have established a special foundation to support young people in learning about democratic institutions.
- These virtues along with a focused mission for his firm, an unusual legal gift, and a sharp business eye for which cases to take on and which to pass have all contributed to his long list of legal victories.
- It would appear that Mark’s life is blessed. A lucky man you might say. He and Janie have had their share of sorrows, crises, and travails. But still, they flow and are happy. The good life is a process.