Happiness is elusive! How do I let go of an ever-present feeling of being discontented? If there is one weed in a field of roses, you can bet the weed is what I will see. Is real happiness actually effortless? The inner work I know is needed seems to be a constant struggle.

ED: Hello. I'm Dr. Ellen Dickstein. Welcome to a Fireside Chat with bestselling inner-life author, Guy Finley. Today I thought we would talk about happiness. We all spend probably 99.9% of our time and energy doing things that we think will make us happy. Yet, judging by the way most people walk around, and by the state of the world, we're not doing a very good job of it. Guy, where are we goi...

Part 1: The four conditions of happiness are simple: clear eyes, a quiet mind, a sense of beauty, and an open heart. Unhappiness is the dark effect of refusing to cultivate these essential elements for having imagined, by a false light, a contentment that does not exist. Part 2: The real limitation in life is a creation of the illusion that outside of us exists something that -- if...

In this answer to a viewer's question, "letting go" author Guy Finley dives deeply into the concepts of "joy and happiness," noting the important distinction between imagined "joy" and the kind of joy that is the natural outcome of life's authentic wholeness. Imagined joy turns into painful resistance to anything that interferes with the image. Seeing this with more and more clarity is freedom from the stressful compulsion to pursue an imagined happiness.

Any happiness we feel over the pain that someone else goes through -- regardless of who or why -- insures we remain a blind prisoner of the fact that hidden within our present idea of happiness also lies the source of our suffering.

Before we can know a happiness beyond the reach of conflict or sorrow, we must ourselves be whole; for any happiness apart from self-wholeness is only half a happiness and must, in time, prove itself so.

A whole new kind of spiritual happiness dawns in us as we realize that dark clouds do not ruin sunny skies... they merely pass through them to help us remember our love of the light.

Classroom Talk: 10/30/2021 - Most of us are filled with wants that change nothing about who we are, let alone fill the emptiness we all feel within. If we must ask for something, let it be for greater wisdom; for possessions and powers come and go, but Real Wisdom is now... and forever.

Searching for True Happiness anywhere outside of yourself is like hoping to catch a glimpse of the North Star by looking down at your feet!...

Classroom Talk: 10/31/2021 - Spiritual wisdom is our greatest wealth. And when, at long last we see this is true -- so that our first love in life becomes the wish to discover the truth of ourselves -- then each moment of every relationship serves as the doorway to the indwelling Divine.

Wishing to be free, without taking action toward our intention, is meaningless; we must employ the truths we uncover, or we will never realize the possibility of their true power, which is to help us walk away from what has been wrecking us. But with this new understanding in mind we must also realize that the truth that sets us free is not for hire; it does not so much "work" for us as...