Brian JohnsonChairman & Philosopher in Residence at Heroic

The Missing Piece of a Happy Life

19 Jul 2026 · 1 min

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In this concise monologue, Brian Johnson draws on classical Greek philosophy to argue that living with arete—virtue and excellence—cultivates a good soul and leads to the summum bonum, the greatest good of life. He explains that practicing arete results in eudaimonia, a deep sense of well‑being, meaning, and purposeful joy that modern language would call happiness but more accurately reflects flourishing. While acknowledging that life remains challenging, Johnson emphasizes that striving for one's best self through virtue ensures personal growth and a profound, lasting sense of fulfillment.

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Be your best self. Live with arete and you will experience the summum bonum, the greatest good of life. You live with arete to experience with virtue, with excellence, expressing your best self to experience eudaimonia. When you live with arete, you have a good soul. You experience this deep sense of well-being, meaning, purposeful joy. Doesn't mean life's easy, but you know that you're doing your best. And when you do that, you, in modern English, we translate that word roughly as happiness, but it means something closer to Flourishing, knowing that you're, you're growing and becoming and expressing that best version of yourself.