You started exploring what better means for an area you want to improve. Another way to put this is understanding what has value. Congratulations, you’ve entered the field of ethics.
There are many standards you can use to decide what good is, what better means, what has value, and how people should behave. Without getting into the history of it, people around the world have been considering how people should behave for a good life, and for a good society, for thousands of years.
We’ll jump into it. An approach that may sound familiar is Jeremy Bentham’s “it is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong“.
Let’s use this statement as an entry point to make some observations and ask some questions:
– this approach is based on the outcomes of actions, as opposed to motives. The road to hell is paved with good intentions, goes the saying, so it seems to make sense to focus on consequences.
– it isn’t time-bound. Does it mean short-term happiness, or long-term?
– whose happiness counts? Only humans? Only those living right now?
– what’s happiness, or what contributes to it? How can we measure it for self and others?
– is happiness the only or the best thing to focus on for the rightness or value of all actions?
– are there situations that come to mind where the statement seems to be clearly wrong or unhelpful?
– what other questions come to mind?
Exercise
Review what you wrote in the last exercise. Apply Bentham’s criterion, and the questions I’ve posed, to your answers.
If this is your first exposure to this field, be patient with yourself. If you can take away just a few things to think about and apply, that is a big step. I do recommend an ethics course for everyone, very much enjoyed my university course, but if you don’t have time for that, check out the references below.
About Learning
In addition to thinking about frequency of self-improvement work, it’s important to consider how much time you will devote each session. Choose a duration that feels manageable but meaningful. It takes time to put aside your other concerns and activities, to focus, to think, to write. About a half hour per post including associated exercises would be a minimum in my view to make significant progress, but do what you can! Some is better than none.
References
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethics
Online lectures from an ethics course – I have only watched enough to think it’s promising but it is serious college-level stuff https://youtu.be/lSazDI2wBCA
A lighter set of videos https://youtu.be/FOoffXFpAlU