There’s an old joke that says a lot more about wellbeing than most surveys ever will.

A man dies and finds himself in hell.
The devil greets him politely and explains the rules.

“You have three doors. You may look inside each one. Then you choose where you’ll spend eternity.”

The devil opens the first door.

As far as the eye can see, people are standing on their heads on a wooden floor. Endless rows of them. Silent. Inverted. Miserable.

The second door opens.

The same scene — people standing on their heads — but this time on a concrete floor. Worse posture. More discomfort. Less forgiveness.

The third door opens.

Inside, people are standing around chatting, drinking tea, laughing. The only downside? They’re all standing in six inches of manure.

The man thinks carefully about eternal happiness.

Wooden floor? No.
Concrete floor? Definitely not.
Manure… unpleasant, sure — but at least people seem relaxed.

He chooses door number three.

As he steps inside, one of the senior devils claps his hands and shouts:

“Right everyone — tea break’s over. Back on your heads.”

Why This Joke Works

The joke lands because it exposes something deeply human:

We don’t assess wellbeing in absolute terms.
We assess it relative to the alternatives in front of us.

Compared to concrete, wood looks good.
Compared to standing on your head, manure looks tolerable.
Compared to suffering alone, shared discomfort looks almost cosy.

This is how most of us quietly evaluate our lives.

The Ladder Problem

Modern wellbeing measurement does something similar.

When people are asked to rate their wellbeing from 0–10 — with 10 being “the best possible life” — most don’t pause to define what that actually means.

Instead, we subconsciously ask:

• Am I doing better or worse than people like me?

• Better or worse than last year?

• Better or worse than what I see around me?

Just like the man in the joke, we don’t choose good.
We choose better than the next option.

Relative Wellbeing Feels Rational — But It’s a Trap

Relative comparison is not a flaw.
It’s a core part of how humans think.

But it becomes a problem when we mistake it for clarity.

If your sense of wellbeing is defined only by:

• who you’re standing next to

• which door is worse

• what looks tolerable by comparison

then you may never stop to ask a more uncomfortable question:

“Is this actually good — or just less bad?”

The man in the joke didn’t choose happiness.
He chose the least awful hell on offer.

And most of us do something similar, without realising it.

A Quiet Provocation

When you next think about your own wellbeing, it’s worth asking:

• Am I judging my life against others — or against my own potential?

• Have I defined what “good” looks like for me?

• Or have I simply picked the door that smells least unpleasant right now?

Relative wellbeing helps us survive.

But it’s a poor guide for deciding how we actually want to live.

Sometimes the most important question isn’t
“Which door is better?”

It’s
“Why am I choosing between these doors at all?”