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

The Happiness of a Liberated Heart

With Ulla Koenig recorded on June 16, 2019.

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

What is pleasure and what is happiness?

Why is my pursuit of happiness not working?

Is there any lasting happiness?

Together we inquire into the nature of happiness. We reflect on different attempts in our lives to find happiness and what stops us from being contented. Inspired by the Buddha’s own quest for a genuine and deep happiness, we investigate what a healthy and supportive approach towards ease and freedom could look like.

This 90 minute long session consists of a guided meditation on happiness, a Dharma Talk and the opportunity to ask questions and share experiences.

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

Discussion

Leave a Reply

Discover more from the Dharma Library

  • Miles Kessler

    Daily Meditation Recordings, with Miles Kessler – Week of 19 January, 2026

    This week’s theme is: The Seven Stages of Purification in Insight Meditation

    The Seven Stages of Purification in Insight Meditation is a 5-day exploration of how insight naturally unfolds through practice, as described in the classical Theravāda map of purification. Each day will combine a short teaching with guided meditation, helping practitioners-whether new or experienced-recognize how challenge, insight, clarity, and release arise as part of a single, coherent developmental process. Rather than presenting the stages as goals to attain, this series offers them as an orienting framework: a way to understand what is already happening in your practice, normalize both ease and challenge, and cultivate confidence, patience, and continuity on the path of awakening.

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

    Read More

  • Awakening from fear.

    We need not avoid fear. Fear belongs to the illusion of a self that is separate from life. It is the byproduct of identifying with that illusion. Often, fear arises in the very moment that our awareness practices are bringing us closer to a direct experience of who we authentically are. For this reason, in…

    Read More

  • Daily Meditation Recordings, with Jaya Rudgard – Week of Jan 31, 2022

    Embodied and Awake: Meditations for Body, Heart and Mind.

    Mind, body and emotion form a constant feedback loop. As the traditional teachings on mindfulness make clear, all three equally deserve our interested, caring attention. When mindfulness is balanced in this way our whole being benefits. Our practice this week will include some gentle movements and mindful breathing practices as a prelude to each day’s meditation. These can be done seated or standing, or adapted for lying down, according to your ability and levels of energy.

    Each morning this week we’ll dive into one of the images from the natural world and daily life that the Buddha used to explain his teachings. Let’s see how how these similes and metaphors from the Buddhist texts can support our understanding and enrich our practice. We may also discover how practising with them can enhance our appreciation of the world around us.

    Read More

  • I Call on My Inherent Wellbeing

    In the territory of inherent health we are all equal. To really know this with the heartmind impacts our practice at all levels. One of the more important shifts in our practice is recognising the depth and sacredness of our shared humanity, goodness and nobility. 

    Read More

  • Asking Better Questions

    In this session author and communication trainer Oren Jay Sofer offered guidance and reflections on how to approach difficult situations like stress from the pandemic and conflict with family with more skill, clarity and compassion. (Please note that this live stream experienced some technical difficulties, so the recording has been edited accordingly.)

    Read More

  • Your Most Expensive Resource

    There is a substance we need for every meaningful part of our life. We only have a small amount of it, it’s being spent constantly, we can’t get more, and we’re surrounded by predators hungry for it. Attention: every moment we give it to something, and if we don’t choose wisely, a salesperson or an…

    Read More

  • Chris Willard

    The Joy of Letting Go: Simplicity and Renunciation

    In our consumer culture, we fall for the illusion that more choice-in things, work, people, even spiritual paths-leads to more freedom, when often the opposite is true. As Jack Kornfield says, we live “in an era of unlimited desires but limited resources, when we think it’s the opposite.” More mindful awareness of our consumption isn’t…

    Read More