Dwight: My first job requirement for everyone who works for me is that they enjoy their job independently of the fact that they're getting paid for it.

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Aiko: That's a striking requirement — what do you do when someone insists the paycheck is the enjoyment?

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Dwight: If that attitude convincingly spills over into their expressing genuine pleasure and satisfaction as they perform their job tasks — including their interactions with me — then that's fine. But most people merely tolerate their job for the money, so I would be surprised to find someone like that.

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Aiko: So you're drawing a line between the internal motivation and the lived experience of the work itself — the paycheck can be a reason to show up, but not a substitute for actually thriving in what you do.

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Dwight: It's okay to have some motivation from the money, but they must reap genuine enjoyment from the work process itself.

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Aiko: You're describing enjoyment not as a bonus, Dwight, but as a baseline requirement — non-negotiable regardless of what else motivates them.

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Dwight: Some employers might argue that this is an unreasonable or unobtainable requirement for the people who work for them — but it isn't for me. And I think the benefit I get from my assistants genuinely enjoying their work is crucial in supporting my own enjoyment in working with them.

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Aiko: So the enjoyment isn't just something you require of them — it flows back to you, making it less a demand and more the foundation of a mutually sustaining working relationship.

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Dwight: Maybe some people can ignore or shut out any concern for whether the person working for or with them gets pleasure from what they do — but that seems like a very low "survival" bar to set for relationships, especially ones that are going to last days, weeks, months, or even years.

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Aiko: You're suggesting that indifference to another person's experience of the work isn't neutrality — it's actually a kind of impoverishment of the relationship itself.

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Dwight: Yes, and it's likely to spill over into the quality of the work, their loyalty to you, and their ability or desire to contribute more than the bare minimum.

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Aiko: So the enjoyment requirement turns out to be quietly practical — indifference to it doesn't just cost you relationally, it costs you the best of what they have to give.

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Dwight: One of the fundamental principles of the ethics of Élanism, in contrast to the ethics of Pyrrhicism, is that it insists on looking longer term — with sustainability both for oneself and in one's relationships with others. The ethics of Pyrrhicism honors sacrificing the journey for the results, and doesn't look long term in terms of keeping relationships healthy — in fact, it advocates sacrificing yourself for others.

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Aiko: So requiring your assistants to enjoy their work is itself an Élanist move — you're refusing to extract value from the relationship at the expense of its long-term health, for either party.

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Dwight: It's quite enlightening to note that almost all people will say they would not want another person to sacrifice for them — although they may insist on equal sacrifice as if it were a kind of fair trade — yet they will often think they have to sacrifice for others in order to be the good guy.

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Aiko: There's a real contradiction there — they reject being the recipient of sacrifice while volunteering to be its source, as though self-denial is what qualifies them for moral standing.

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Dwight: Being the recipient of sacrifice would brand you as "selfish," yet somehow it's okay for the other person to selfishly take your sacrifice — until it isn't.

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Aiko: So the whole arrangement is unstable from the start, Dwight — built on a double standard that eventually collapses under its own weight.

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Dwight: There was a time in Colombia where I had an assistant, and it became obvious to me that he was simply tolerating working for me just for the money. Although I had some compassion for him, continuing to keep him on would have meant sacrificing myself.

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Aiko: And by letting him go, you were arguably doing neither of you any favors by prolonging it — the compassion was in the honesty, not the tolerance.