First Belly Laugh

Last night, I went to a talk by Whole Foods CEO John Mackey, and Mackey talked about the concept of Conscious Capitalism. According to him, a conscious business does two fundamental things:

• Stays true to the business's deeper purpose—that is, a purpose other than maximizing profits


• Maximizes the value to an interdependent system of stakeholders—employees, customers, suppliers, shareholders, community, environment, and so on

When I got home, Erik was holding Abby while I was relaying everything I'd just heard about, and Abby was watching me intently as I gesticulated. I was right in the middle of talking about the second bullet when Abby suddenly started laughing! This was no short little chuckle like we've heard from her up to this point—we're talking full-on belly laugh!

I stopped talking, and we just stared at her while she laughed for a good 30 seconds. I've got to admit that at first I thought my child was possessed. It took a few seconds before I realized what was going on, but once I did, my single most important goal in life suddenly became to make her do that again and again. I tried saying "interdependent system of stakeholders" again, we smiled, we laughed, and we made funny noises—but no dice.

Now that I know we're not dealing with a demonic possession, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that Abby's belly laugh is the most beautiful sound I've ever heard.