‘Joy Will Take You Further’

What do some of the world’s most successful movie stars, professional athletes, models, bartenders, inventors and musicians all have in common? Happiness has driven their success. Formula One World Champion and McLaren Honda driver Jenson Button, Oscar-nominated actor Jude Law and Chinese actor Zhao Wei are among a growing number of people who epitomise a way of thinking that challenges the conventional wisdom that success guarantees happiness and instead celebrates the fact that happiness actually helps people achieve more.

The positive outlook of these successful celebrities – people who seek a competitive edge – has led to them being featured in a new global campaign from Scotch whisky brand Johnnie Walker called ‘Joy Will Take You Further’, alongside a range of other extraordinary people from all walks of life. “Throughout my career I have had to have joy to succeed,” said Jenson Button. “Because I love this sport so much I feel that I’ve been able to enjoy the good times and when things have been harder I’ve been able to find a way out of the situation, be more positive and help the team move forward.”

Actor Jude Law said: “Keeping positive and finding the joy every day in the job that I do is part of my philosophy and I think that’s one of the things that has helped me keep moving in my career.” Other celebrities who advocate this approach to life and appear in the new campaign include US alt-rock band OK Go and Mexican supermodel Montserrat Oliver. Their understanding of success and progress aligns with the results from a growing body of scientific research into the power of happiness.

Commenting on the campaign launch Johnnie Walker Global Brand Director Guy Escolme said: “As a brand Johnnie Walker has always stood for progress – it’s been the story of our whisky since our founder John Walker started it all nearly 200 years ago. What two centuries of experience have taught us is that progress doesn’t have to be an endless uphill journey – we can enjoy the steps we take and the more happiness we find in them the more likely we are to achieve our goal. Evidence is confirming a conviction that sits at the heart of our brand: ‘Joy Will Take You Further’.”

Dr Matt Killingsworth, a US-based psychologist and scientist who studies human happiness, acted as a consultant for the campaign. He said: “People sometimes think of happiness as a far-off, distant prize only to be won by their years of hard work or when they achieve conventional markers of success, like a higher income or a bigger house. But there is a growing body of evidence that enjoying happiness along the way makes success more likely.” As well as globally known celebrities, world record breakers also credit the power of joy with taking them further.

Eva Håkansson – the fastest woman on three wheels who holds a world record, using a homemade electric powered motorcycle – said: “To be successful you truly have to enjoy what you are doing. You have to realise that it is the journey that is the adventure not the goal.”

And Romi Garduce, a Filipino climber and environmentalist who has scaled the seven highest summits on all continents, said: “Mountaineering is at least 80% mental approach. You don’t entertain doubt – it’s the instinct of believing I can do this, it’s positive thinking. Most of the time, climbing is challenging but afterwards there is, what I call, undefined fulfillment, a memory that is there forever.”

(Featured Image: Formula One World Champion and McLaren Honda driver Jenson Button features in a new campaign by Johnnie Walker entitled ‘Joy Will Take You Further’)