Earlier this morning, the Soyuz space capsule carried UK astronaut Tim Peake to the International Space Station. Major Tim, along with his fellow American and Russian crew members will spend six months on board the ISS conducting scientific experiments and educational projects.

 

I won’t ever be able to imagine what he felt as he took off, docked 10 minutes late (it didn’t quite go to plan), and made history as the first official UK astronaut. It took him six hours to reach the ISS, in four orbits of the earth. Not bad for a day’s work.

 

Yes, he’s a highly trained, skilled, talented professional who’s trained for this mission and has much serious work to do while he’s there. But I couldn’t help thinking that he must have felt just a teeny bit of excitement as he orbited the Earth and looked at it from outside in. I expect it made him very happy.

And then I thought that perhaps happiness is relative.

At work today I had a brilliant day working with amazing people, so much so that it made me very happy too. But I hadn’t been to the ISS and I will never see Earth from space.

I simply got to eat the cherry on top of the cake by working with a lovely group of colleagues, talking about leadership and self‑awareness and self‑development. Together, I think we had a very good day too.

And thanks to my daughter here for helping me put that into perspective.

On a normal day at work – and probably because I’m naturally positive anyway – I have a normal amount of happy.

But when it’s good, it’s usually very, very good, and the happiness factor increases.

What’s your normal amount of happy, and what does it feel like when your day goes exceptionally well?

And next time this happens . . . and especially if you’re a manager . . . note what people are saying around you, notice their behaviours, imagine what they might be feeling.

Some of their amount of happy might even be down to you.