Use code SUMMERPRACTICE for a 25% discount on all On Demand Courses through August 31.

Awakening Joy: Practice as a Path of Happiness

With James Baraz recorded on January 13, 2019.

Found our teachings useful? Help us continue our work and support your teachers with a donation. Here’s how.

Joy is both a Factor of Enlightenment and one of the four Divine Abodes. Today, as we are bombarded with news that heightens our fear and sadness about the world, more than ever it’s vital to understand the importance of joy as a central aspect of spiritual practice. We need to remember how to stay connected to that place inside that makes life worth living. In this session we explore principles and practices from the teachings to incline the mind towards true well-being.

Listen to the audio version below, or click here to download the mp3.

Discussion

Leave a Reply

Discover more from the Dharma Library

  • Daily Meditation Recordings, with Ulla Koenig – Week of July 10, 2023

    This week’s theme is “The Compassionate Heart”. Karuna, usually translated as compassion, is our hearts’ ability to relate with care towards ourselves, others and experience in general. Living in a complex world with imperfect others and self, an attitude and practice of compassion can be an immense support. But when misunderstood, it can equally turn into pity, generate overwhelm, make us lose balance and create friction with the concept of responsibility. We will therefore dedicate this upcoming week to an indepth exploration into the concept of compassion.

    Read More

  • Zohar Lavie

    Daily Meditation Recordings, with Zohar Lavie – Week of February 13, 2023

    This week’s topic is “Awakening in the Midst of Life”. Our relationship with life is revealed through our words, thoughts and actions. Reflecting on these in the light of the Dharma opens up possibilities of transformation and wellbeing. During this week we’ll explore ways of perceiving and engaging with experience that can help us to deepen our understanding and awaken to a fuller way of being in the world.

    Read More

  • photo of Martin Aylward smiling

    Don’t be realistic. Be real

    Through the cultures within family, education and work, we are constantly orientated towards ‘realistic’ expectations and visions for our lives. Dharma practice asks us to abandon the realistic in favour of the real; listening deeply to life and to how things actually are, so as to respond wisely and lovingly, fully and freely. In this…

    Read More

  • Body and Heart: Qigong and Meditation for Harmony and Ease

    Our heart’s experiences do not only affect our mental and emotional states. They also impact bodily experience, creating tension, tightness, spaciousness or ease. Likewise, our bodily experiences do not only generate physical sensations, but also inform and determine the energies of our heart. In this Sunday Sangha session, we will use qigong and meditation to…

    Read More

  • Two Wings to Fly – Cultivating Both Wisdom and Compassion

    In traditional Theravada Buddhism it’s said that for one to truly experience freedom one needs to engage in the practices of both wisdom and compassion. Like a bird that needs two wings to fly, wisdom and compassion are two necessary parts on the path to a well-rounded enlightenment. At first glance, practices that cultivate loving-kindness…

    Read More

  • Zohar Lavie

    Daily Meditation Recordings, with Zohar Lavie – Week of 12 January, 2026

    This week’s theme is: In Service of a Boundless Heart:

    An exploration of the rich breadth of the teachings and their capacity to transform our experience into something beautiful and liberating. As we include more aspects of our lives in our practice and emphasise interconnection, ethics, compassion and wisdom, a precious process unfolds; a process of unbinding the heart and expanding it to be as wide as the world.

    Our Dharma Library thrives through collective generosity. Your donation helps sustain this offering for our entire community.

    Read More