Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris - What is Happiness? | Bonus Meditation with Jay Michaelson

Episode Date: December 4, 2020

What is happiness? Investigate how happiness is created, what it’s really like, and learn to access the simple happiness of right now. About Jay Michaelson: Dr. Jay Michaelson is the Editor of Wisdom Content at Ten Percent Happier and the author of six books on meditation, including his newest, Enlightenment by Trial and Error. In his “other career,” Jay is a columnist for The Daily Beast, and was a professional LGBTQ activist for ten years. Jay is an ordained rabbi and has taught meditation in secular, Buddhist, and Jewish context for fifteen years. You can always share these Friday bonuses with your friends, but we're also running a sale to help you and a friend kickstart your meditation practices. For a limited time, if you buy yourself a subscription to Ten Percent Happier, we'll send you a free gift subscription to share with whomever you'd like. Note that nothing is permanent, and this offer is no exception: get it before it ends by going to www.tenpercent.com/december See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

What does it even mean to live a good life? Is it about happiness, purpose, love, health, or wealth? What really matters in the pursuit of a life well lived? These are the questions award-winning author, founder, and interviewer Jonathan Fields asks his guests on the Top Ranked Good Life Project podcast. Every week, Jonathan sits down with world renowned thinkers and doers, people like Glenn and Doyle, Adam Grant,

Young Pueblo, Jonathan Height, and hundreds more. Start listening right now. Look for the Good Life Project on your favorite podcast app. Hey y'all, it's your girl, Kiki Palmer. I'm an actress, singer, and entrepreneur. On my new podcast, Baby This is Kiki Palmer. I'm asking friends, family, and experts the questions that are in my head. Like, it's only fans only bad.

Where did memes come from? And where's Tom from MySpace? Listen to Baby, this is Kiki Palmer on Amazon music or wherever you get your podcast. From ABC, it's the 10% happier podcast. I'm Dan Harris. Hey, hey, it's Friday, so we're dropping a bonus meditation. This one comes from Jane Michelson, who is a frequent guest on this show. He's also an ordained rabbi, a long time meditation teacher, and an author. His latest book is Enlightenment by Trial and Error. Oh, and also on his CV, he's the editor of wisdom content here at 10% happier.

And in this guided meditation, he's going to get us to contemplate a question that seems simple, but it really isn't. The question is, what is happiness? A lot of us get the answer to this question wrong either consciously or subconsciously, and it has serious consequences. So here we go with Jay Michaelson. Hi, this is Jay. When we're feeling happiness or joy, it needs no definition.

It's just the feeling of happiness. But we don't really want to be happy all the time. That would be weird. Human life has its ups and downs. It would be really odd to just feel happy all the time at Cemetery's or reading news of injustice or war. So what is happiness then? Let's do a little guided meditation together to take a look. We'll begin by settling the mind, resting in the body, coming to rest in the present moment. Go ahead and close your eyes or leave them open if you prefer and find a stillness in your posture, a comfortable position where you won't have to move around much for the next little while. Maybe take a nice deep breath just to start.

Alright, let's bring to mind something you really want. Something that you're pretty sure will really bring you happiness. Choose something that's real for you. Whatever it is for you, bring it to mind. Get in touch with the yearning. That's a big part of what it is to be human, to yearn for something or someone. Getting in touch with what you really want and what it feels like in your mind and your body to want it. Now, next step. Shift your imagination to what it would be like to have that thing.

What would it feel like to have that be real in your life now? Take just a moment to feel that. And then see if you can put some words to this feeling. Maybe contentment, love, acceptance. Let's take some time now and explore that for a bit. You might also notice that any feeling can coexist with this kind of happiness, this natural ease, the mind resting. You can feel profound sadness for the suffering in the world, or among people you love, and And yet, it's still now. Still this moment. Still here. This kind of happiness isn't a feeling that comes and goes. It's the ease of the mind at home with itself. See if you can explore this a little bit.

Thought comes up, rest in the mind, and see how it feels in the body. Go ahead and open your eyes to the fave and closed and do a quick check. Is it now? Is it here? See you next time. Big thanks to Jay. I really hope you enjoyed this meditation on happiness. You can always share these Friday bonuses with your friends. But we're also running a sale to help you and a friend kickstart your meditation practice together. For a limited time, you can buy yourself a subscription to 10% happier.

And we will send you a free gift subscription to share with anybody you'd like. As we like to say, in Buddhist circles, nothing is permanent. This offer is no exception. Get it before it ends by going to 10% .com slash December. That's 10% one word all spelled out .com slash December. We'll see you back here on Monday with a fresh episode. Hey, hey, prime members. You can listen to 10% happier early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen early and ad-free with 1-3-plus

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