The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World

by Dalai Lama XIV

According to Lyubomirsky, the three factors that seem to have the greatest influence on increasing our happiness are our ability to reframe our situation more positively, our ability to experience gratitude, and our choice to be kind and generous.

“We are wired to be caring for the other and generous to one another. We shrivel when we are not able to interact. I mean that is part of the reason why solitary confinement is such a horrendous punishment. We depend on the other in order for us to be fully who we are.

I didn’t know that I was going to come so soon to the concept that we have at home, the concept of Ubuntu. It says: A person is a person through other persons. “Ubuntu says when I have a small piece of bread, it is for my benefit that I share it with you. Because, after all, none of us came into the world on our own. We needed two people to bring us into the world.

And the Bible that we Jews and Christians share tells a beautiful story. God says, ‘It is not good for Adam to be alone.’ Well, you could have said, ‘No, I’m sorry, he’s not alone. I mean, there are trees, there are animals, and there are the birds. How can you say he’s alone?’ “And you realize that in a very real sense we’re meant for a very profound complementarity. It is the nature of things. You don’t have to be a believer in anything. I mean I could not speak as I am speaking without having learned it from other human beings. I could not walk as a human being. I could not think as a human being, except throug...

“In fact, survey after survey has shown that it is unhappy people who tend to be most self-focused and are socially withdrawn, brooding, and even antagonistic. Happy people, in contrast, are generally found to be more sociable, flexible, and creative, and are able to tolerate life’s daily frustrations more easily than unhappy people. And, most important, they are found to be more loving and forgiving than unhappy people.”

We cannot bring peace if we do not have inner peace. Similarly, we cannot hope to make the world a better, happier place if we do not also aspire for this in our own lives.

You are made for perfection, but you are not yet perfect. You are a masterpiece in the making.”

As the Dalai Lama has described it, if we see a person who is being crushed by a rock, the goal is not to get under the rock and feel what they are feeling; it is to help to remove the rock.

We spend so much of our lives climbing a pyramid of achievement where we are constantly being evaluated and judged, and often found to be not making the grade. We internalize these other voices of parents, teachers, and society at large. As a result, sometimes people are not very compassionate with themselves.

People tend to feel anxious and depressed because they expect themselves to have more, be more, achieve more.

In short, bringing joy to others is the fastest way to experience joy oneself. As the Dalai Lama had said, even ten minutes of meditation on the well-being of others can help one to feel joyful for the whole day—even before coffee.

Generosity is so important in all of the world’s religions because it no doubt expresses a fundamental aspect of our interdependence and our need for one another.

Generosity was so important for our survival that the reward centers of our brain light up as strongly when we give as when we receive, sometimes even more so.

“I hope that books such as this one will awaken in us that sense of being human. And then we will realize just how obscene it is for us to spend the billions or trillions that we spend on what we call a budget of defense.

I mean, children die daily, die because they do not have clean water. That should not be the case if we were aware of our interconnectedness. And there’s no way in which one nation is going to be able to prosper on its own. It can’t. That’s not how we were made. We were wired for this complementarity, this togetherness, this being family. And even if you think it is sentimental, it isn’t sentimental. It’s for real.

“You don’t have to have scriptural or religious teaching. It’s just the truth: You can’t survive on your own. If you say you are going to be totally selfish, in next to no time the person who is totally selfish goes under. You need other people in order to be human.

We people who care must be attractive, must be filled with joy, so that others recognize that caring, that helping and being generous are not a burden, they are a joy. Give the world your love, your service, your healing, but you can also give it your joy. This, too, is a great gift.”

experiences. Now you should study hard, because this generation has the responsibility to rebuild Tibet. Then

“We must promote basic human values, the inner values that lie at the heart of who we are as humans.

“Religion is not sufficient. Religion has been very important in human history, and perhaps for another thousand years it will continue to bring benefit to humanity.”

Just to pray or rely on religious faith is not sufficient. It will remain a source of inspiration, but in terms of seven billion human beings, it’s not sufficient.

No matter how excellent, no religion can be universal. So we have to find another way to promote these values.

In our age of instant gratification, any information can be googled in a matter of seconds, but real knowledge and wisdom take time.

“What is my heart’s desire? What do I wish for myself, for my loved ones, and for the world?”