I share a few examples of doing something as a duty or duty mixed with pleasure.
- Writing or reading- do you do it as a duty or with pleasure to immerse in what you are doing?
- When you lead do you it as a responsibility or feel the pleasure of doing it?
- When you go to work do you do it to earn a salary or because you want to go and feel the pleasure of going?
- When you eat do you do it to satisfy hunger or to enjoy the pleasure of eating?
We read about pleasurable leadership, pleasurable eating, and pleasurable marriages. These descriptions have reasons that this post explores.
Pleasurable Eating and its Relatedness to Pleasurable Leadership
We have all experienced this scenario. When we eat when feeling very hungry we tend to eat fast. We want to satisfy the hunger of our stomachs. We hardly chew the food and feel its flavor.
When we feel very hungry and it becomes a duty to eat we may not care about the quality of food. We are tempted to eat any food. The pleasure of eating is eaten before even we eat.
It is the same with workers going to work. If they report to work because it is only a duty their engagement shall drop resulting in a high percentage of workers leaving their jobs or having their productivity halved.
I dare say that
Performance = Ability X Pleasurableness
Great leaders and managers realize the value of keeping the workers’ pleasure to work. They keep the workers hungry with the desire to work but not overly hungry to finish the work soonest.
That is to say, setting unrealistic finish dates for tasks may rush the workers to do the work in a hurry. They perform the same way when they eat while feeling extremely hungry. The appetite falls down, the flavor of doing the work diminishes and they just do the work regardless if what they do is junk or not.
One other way for the pleasure of working to fade is the tendency of leaders to overly focus on certain tasks. Research shows that people who excessively focus on the nutritional value of what they eat they too lose the pleasure of eating.
Leaders should realize that introducing some variety of tasks may keep the pleasure of workers up so that they may produce more.
The problem compounds when leaders lead because it is their responsibility. They lose the pleasure of leading. They suffer from pleasure poverty and make workers feel the same too. The fun of being at work vanishes and productivity drops.
Great leaders make Monday days of pleasure than days of depression for workers.
Pleasurable Marriages
A married couple needs to know that keeping the pleasure of their marriage is vital for them to stay married not only as a duty but also for its pleasure. They care to keep the pleasure in their marriages.
Mental pleasure, physical pleasure, charisma pleasure, and appearance pleasure are all possible ways to keep and keep the marriage pleasurable.
This shall reflect on the upbringing of their children too. Then shall eat or study with pleasure and do the right things the right way.
The parents know the value of pleasure in studying. So the parents know how to encourage their children to study with pleasure and do their homework with delight.
When we suffer from pleasure poverty our lives shall suffer too.
Expectations is a subject that has always fascinated me and I have often made it a reason for discussion with those who continue to confuse expectations and desires, the latter being much more realistic in my opinion. In fact, I believe that both have a proactive function, in the sense that they are projected towards a future with the intention of preventing and planning events. The substantial difference between the two is that desire predisposes us to an action, on the other hand, expectation is something passive.
Thank you Ali for your continued support and inspiring comments.
Congratulations on the usual brilliant use of the metaphor.
There is no doubt that our well-being depends above all on feeling pleasure, satisfaction, contentment or interest in carrying out daily activities.
Change is a fact in all of our lives. We constantly experience big and small changes, in private life and in our work. To deal with this now essential dynamic in our lives, we need a vision of change that not only leads us to understand and accept it but also to seek it as a source of personal growth and satisfaction.
Therefore, I believe that at the basis of everything there is also our flexibility, understood as the ability to freely adapt one’s thoughts, attitudes and behaviors to the changes that occur in our private or working lives.
Some people are naturally adaptable – they enjoy experimenting, deal naturally and positively with changes and unexpected events and spontaneously tend to change habits and routines often.
We have to anticipate change; control the change; adapt quickly to change; change our patterns and attitudes; appreciate the change; be ready to change quickly and above all with ever greater joy.
Spot on Aldo and your thoughts about change are excellent.
In fact your comment here is also relevant to your great post here on expectations. They are closely related and I appreciate your comment. I find the last two lines an excellent summary of both posts.