Dennis Prager Show - The Lecture That Started It All: Happiness Is A Serious Problem
Aired: 2026-05-04
Duration: 01:09:17


=== Rabbi Schwartz on Happiness (07:12) ===

[00:00:00]  On today's episode of Timeless Wisdom.
[00:00:03]  By the way, I think it's one of the signs you know when you're hitting middle age is when you visit a podiatrist.
[00:00:08]  I never went to a podiatrist in my life.
[00:00:11]  But a couple of years ago, my feet started hurting.
[00:00:14]  At any rate, I went to a podiatrist, and it was incredible.
[00:00:17]  You know, I'm sitting above.
[00:00:19]  He's looking at my feet.
[00:00:20]  He's down there.
[00:00:21]  He looks up.
[00:00:21]  He goes, Mr. Prager, you were never a track star, were you?
[00:00:27]  And I say, well, that's absolutely right.
[00:00:30]  How do you know?
[00:00:30]  And then he described my feet as the feet of a speaker.
[00:00:35]  It's coming up in Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.
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[00:00:50]  If you want to understand why your body isn't cooperating, call PhD Weight Loss now and book your consultation at 864 644 1900.
[00:00:58]  Mention Dennis Prager and you get two weeks free in the program, and they'll pay for your food.
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[00:01:09]  Welcome to Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.
[00:01:12]  Hear thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs.
[00:01:16]  And to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles, go to DennisPrager.com.
[00:01:26]  This is an important subject to me.
[00:01:27]  It's the title of the book I'm writing Happiness is a Serious Problem.
[00:01:32]  And if you think happiness is a serious problem, writing a book on happiness is an even more serious problem.
[00:01:38]  And when you get in advance and you're two years late, it's an extremely serious problem.
[00:01:44]  Those are things I can assure you.
[00:01:47]  Well, I really am happy about the subject, as I said, and I want to give you a little introduction about how I ever got involved in this.
[00:01:57]  For somebody who talks about religion, good and evil, and what's happening to civilization and such heavy subjects, how do I get into this thing of happiness?
[00:02:07]  Well, it's a very long story, and I won't at all give you the whole one, but I want to give you an idea because I always feel, in a sense, a need to apologize for speaking on happiness.
[00:02:18]  Maybe I'll stop doing it eventually, but I got to tell you why I do feel apologetic.
[00:02:23]  I think that much of the stuff that is written and spoken on the subject isn't terribly deep, isn't terribly helpful, and that usually I have always felt that the only people who generally, not always, but generally get happier from happiness books are the authors as they cash their royalty checks.
[00:02:43]  So I'm always skeptical about this, and I never wanted to join.
[00:02:47]  That crowd of platitude writers who get a royalty check with your hard earned money.
[00:02:55]  So, I have to explain to you how this happened.
[00:02:57]  I had to convince myself that I had something important to say on the subject in order to actually write a book and then get all these lectures on it.
[00:03:05]  What happened was this it was about, I don't know, four or five years ago.
[00:03:09]  I guess four years ago.
[00:03:11]  No, five years.
[00:03:12]  Do you care?
[00:03:13]  Why am I. Is that stupid?
[00:03:17]  A few years ago, I.
[00:03:19]  I got a call from, at the time, the Chabad director at UCLA, Rabbi Shlomo Schwartz.
[00:03:28]  Some of you may know of him.
[00:03:30]  He's a very active rabbi.
[00:03:32]  He's known as Schwartz to the many people who admire him.
[00:03:37]  At any rate, Schwartz or Rabbi Schwartz calls me up and says, Dennis, would you give a speech at UCLA?
[00:03:45]  There are so many Jewish students here who would never come to a Jewish function, but they may know your name from the radio and so on.
[00:03:51]  So, would you come and give a speech?
[00:03:53]  Said, sure, I'd love to.
[00:03:55]  I said, I assume you want me to speak, though, once I come on Judaism.
[00:03:59]  He said, Oh, no, they'd never come then.
[00:04:02]  Never.
[00:04:03]  Which is unfortunately very true.
[00:04:07]  So I said, Well, what do you want me to speak on?
[00:04:13]  Something light?
[00:04:14]  Or he said something light.
[00:04:15]  One of us said it.
[00:04:16]  He said, Yeah, I'd like you to speak on happiness.
[00:04:19]  He said, But Rabbi Schwartz, happiness is not light.
[00:04:22]  Happiness is a serious problem.
[00:04:24]  And he said, That's an excellent title.
[00:04:27]  And that is exactly how it happened, this whole thing, when I was trying to get out of the speech.
[00:04:33]  It's not light, it's a serious problem.
[00:04:36]  Well, I had never given the talk and I worked feverishly.
[00:04:39]  I really worked very hard on the talk.
[00:04:42]  Well, thank God I recorded the talk.
[00:04:46]  And I did something that night afterwards I have never done with one of my own talks.
[00:04:51]  I actually listened to it the night I gave it.
[00:04:54]  I enjoy listening to me as much as you enjoy listening to you.
[00:04:57]  Okay, you have to understand that.
[00:05:00]  So, it is amazing that I actually not only listened to myself the night I gave the speech, but I enjoyed it.
[00:05:07]  And I kept saying, What a good point.
[00:05:08]  That's a very good point.
[00:05:11]  If only I would live by that, I'd be a happier person.
[00:05:14]  So, anyway, I was sure that that was it.
[00:05:17]  But I was thrilled I had it on tape.
[00:05:18]  And for the people who subscribe to my journal, Ultimate Issues, a lot of them order my tapes.
[00:05:24]  And this was, you know, I don't know, tape, whatever, would be added to the list.
[00:05:28]  And that was it, I figured, for the rest of my life.
[00:05:32]  Until a couple of weeks later, I'd say a month later, I get a call from a woman, non Jewish editor of Red Book magazine.
[00:05:41]  She tracked me down.
[00:05:42]  That's the way she put it.
[00:05:43]  I tracked you down in Los Angeles.
[00:05:45]  I would love you to write an article for Red Book on happiness.
[00:05:49]  I said, Really?
[00:05:50]  I'd love to.
[00:05:51]  Can I just ask you how come you're asking me?
[00:05:53]  She said, Oh, I heard your tape.
[00:05:55]  I said, Really?
[00:05:55]  You know somebody who gets my journal?
[00:05:57]  You write a journal?
[00:05:59]  So I said, Well, how did you hear it?
[00:06:00]  I said, I heard it on the radio.
[00:06:02]  You see, you heard my talk on happiness on the radio?
[00:06:05]  Well, it turns out some Jewish station in New York, which can only be described as a pack of thieves, against every conceivable law of the FCC, they violated, they could be practically removed from the air for this violation, took somebody else's tape, and it says copyright Dennis Prager, and one show, instead of broadcasting a show, they just put my tape on.
[00:06:33]  All I could say is, I thank those gun of him, those thieves, I thank them from the bottom of my heart.
[00:06:39]  I still don't know what station, whose show.
[00:06:42]  At least they did one honest thing.
[00:06:44]  They said who gave the speech.
[00:06:46]  I could imagine that they would have put on the speech and said, Well, what do you think of our Tony Schwartz?
[00:06:51]  Is he great?
[00:06:53]  That's what I could have imagined happening.
[00:06:54]  Anyway, they put mine on.
[00:06:56]  She found out.
[00:06:57]  She called.
[00:06:58]  And I write an article on happiness for Redbook.
[00:07:01]  After that, Reader's Digest calls.
[00:07:03]  Is it okay if we reprint your thing in foreign languages?
[00:07:06]  Reprint my article.
[00:07:07]  I said, Oh, sure, absolutely.
[00:07:09]  Then I get a call from the University of Judaism.
[00:07:11]  You want to give a course on happiness?

=== The Genetic Predisposition to Mood (15:41) ===

[00:07:12]  I give a course on happiness.
[00:07:14]  After that, I get a call from a book agent.
[00:07:16]  You want to write a book on happiness?
[00:07:18]  I think I could sell it.
[00:07:20]  And in two weeks, he sold it to Random House.
[00:07:22]  All of this because Rabbi Schwartz wanted to get Jewish students to UCLA.
[00:07:27]  All of this has led me to believe, and I have given this talk and I have given this course to Jews, non Jews, old, young, every conceivable background.
[00:07:37]  I gave it in San Antonio.
[00:07:39]  At a psychiatric hospital a few months ago.
[00:07:43]  Not to the patients.
[00:07:44]  No, no, no.
[00:07:46]  I would have been happy to, actually.
[00:07:48]  I'm just giving you an idea of the eclectic nature of those who have been hearing it.
[00:07:52]  And apparently, it really has some sort of positive effect.
[00:07:58]  Maybe the reason is that I'm very realistic.
[00:08:02]  I don't say, ladies and gentlemen, with Prager's 10 point program, you will be happy.
[00:08:07]  I have nothing like that.
[00:08:09]  This is what I can, however, promise you.
[00:08:12]  I do not promise you with this talk or with the book that I'm still writing that you will be a happy person.
[00:08:19]  But I have a much lower aim, which I think is much more realistic.
[00:08:24]  What I do aim for is to remove considerably gratuitous unhappiness, gratuitous pain in your life.
[00:08:33]  There are two types of pain that we suffer necessary, inevitable pain from living, unless you watch a lot of television, in which case you blunt your possibilities of pain and enjoyment.
[00:08:46]  I'm serious, by the way.
[00:08:47]  I'm convinced that eight hours average at home.
[00:08:50]  In America, a day of television is a way to blunt out reality.
[00:08:54]  But if you live life, and the more you live life, the more pain you will have, the more pleasure too, I believe.
[00:09:01]  But I, I, I, that is inevitable.
[00:09:03]  I accept that.
[00:09:05]  What I think is unnecessary and what bothers me is when you have pain for no reason, or a bad reason.
[00:09:12]  And that I would like to try to help out.
[00:09:15]  What I do in the book and I'm going to do in this lecture is very simple.
[00:09:19]  I list some obstacles to happiness.
[00:09:22]  And how I think we ought to deal with them.
[00:09:24]  I can't do all of them tonight, but I can do a handful, and I hope that these are of help to you.
[00:09:29]  The obstacles to happiness and how to deal with some of them.
[00:09:33]  The first obstacle, as I listed in the book, and as I will list it this evening, is genes.
[00:09:42]  G E N E S, not J E A N S.
[00:09:49]  I am convinced, and it's not a matter of a leap of faith, I am convinced because it's true.
[00:09:55]  That there are people with genetic predispositions to unhappiness and genetic predispositions to being happy.
[00:10:02]  And I think I can prove it to you in a terribly simple way.
[00:10:06]  If you have a child, and if you certainly have more than one child, it's a given.
[00:10:14]  Some children come out of the womb, and if they could speak, they would say something like this Thank you for having me.
[00:10:22]  I just can't express.
[00:10:25]  My gratitude to you for conceiving me and bringing me into a beautiful world.
[00:10:32]  Thanks so much.
[00:10:37]  The other 80%, I don't know what percent, but a large number of others, if they could speak, would say something else.
[00:10:48]  They might say, I never asked to be conceived.
[00:10:53]  Once conceived, I never wanted to be removed from that very.
[00:10:57]  Warm and self sufficient womb.
[00:11:01]  And as a result, I will ruin your life.
[00:11:08]  All right, so you have.
[00:11:13]  The reason you're laughing is solely because you recognize it's truth.
[00:11:18]  People come out with dispositions.
[00:11:20]  In fact, it is.
[00:11:22]  I tell you, if I had a list of things that I have learned as I have gotten older, that would be on top of the list.
[00:11:29]  That we are born with so many aspects of our nature intact.
[00:11:35]  Parents can help stymie their development, parents can help create an aura in which they can develop.
[00:11:44]  But basically speaking, we are what we are, and then society plays a role, parents play a role, luck plays a role, siblings play a role, and so on.
[00:11:54]  But we really are what we are to a very large extent, and that includes predisposition to being happy.
[00:12:02]  And this is very important for us to recognize.
[00:12:06]  First of all, it helps you make peace with who you are once you recognize this.
[00:12:11]  Let me give you an example how important it is to know what your basic nature is and then to live with it.
[00:12:19]  It really hit me, oddly enough, at a podiatrist's office.
[00:12:23]  By the way, I think it's one of the signs you know when you're hitting middle age is when you visit a podiatrist.
[00:12:29]  I never went to a podiatrist in my life, but a couple of years ago, my feet started hurting.
[00:12:35]  At any rate, I went to a podiatrist, and it was incredible.
[00:12:39]  I'm sitting above.
[00:12:40]  He's looking at my feet.
[00:12:41]  He's down there.
[00:12:42]  He looks up.
[00:12:42]  He goes, Mr. Prager, you were never a track star, were you?
[00:12:48]  And I say, well, that's absolutely right.
[00:12:51]  How do you know?
[00:12:51]  And then he described my feet as the feet of a speaker.
[00:12:57]  My feet, God gave me my feet in order to speak well.
[00:13:01]  They are good for a radio talk show, for writing, but not for running.
[00:13:08]  For running, he gave that gift to others.
[00:13:10]  Now, let me tell you something.
[00:13:12]  I have always been the tallest, I was always the tallest kid in my class.
[00:13:18]  A, I was always tall.
[00:13:19]  B, I was always Jewish.
[00:13:21]  And I went to Jewish schools.
[00:13:24]  And for a Jew, I'm a giant.
[00:13:29]  Okay?
[00:13:31]  And I can't tell you how embarrassing it was as a kid in Jewish camps, Jewish schools.
[00:13:38]  I would come in near the last.
[00:13:40]  I'd be the tallest kid and in any race come in near last.
[00:13:44]  And I was hard on myself.
[00:13:46]  I have always been.
[00:13:47]  It's Dennis, are you lazy?
[00:13:49]  Why can't you run?
[00:13:50]  You have the longest legs and you're coming in next to last.
[00:13:52]  What's wrong?
[00:13:52]  I mean, it wasn't a trauma, but it bugged me.
[00:13:56]  Turns out that it didn't matter.
[00:13:57]  I can't run fast because of my feet.
[00:14:01]  Now, had I known this at eight or 10 years of age, I could have made peace with the fact, Dennis, don't try out for the Olympics, okay?
[00:14:12]  You have other gifts or whatever.
[00:14:14]  What am I saying?
[00:14:15]  It's good to know what you have and don't have.
[00:14:19]  It's good to know if you are simply not one of those predisposed.
[00:14:24]  To a happy disposition.
[00:14:26]  You may not be.
[00:14:27]  You may be predisposed to a happy or an unhappy disposition.
[00:14:31]  It's good to know yourself.
[00:14:33]  Why is it good to know?
[00:14:34]  Because then you don't blame everybody else.
[00:14:37]  Then you don't look around and say, oh, if it only weren't for my husband or my wife or my kids or my parents or Reagan, which is the more common thing, if it weren't for one of those factors, gee, I'd really be happy.
[00:14:51]  It may not be.
[00:14:52]  It may be if you traded in your spouse, traded in your kids, traded in your parents, and traded in the president.
[00:14:58]  You'd be just as unhappy.
[00:15:00]  That is usually not always.
[00:15:02]  Sometimes others do make our lives miserable.
[00:15:04]  It is a possible thing.
[00:15:05]  I don't want to discredit that.
[00:15:07]  But very frequently it's not the case, and it's simply that that's your disposition.
[00:15:12]  Listen, let's be honest.
[00:15:14]  There are people who go through hell in life and are generally happier than some people who have no hell in their lives.
[00:15:22]  In fact, I must tell you that as a rule, as a rule, again, always having exceptions, I have never found a correlation between life's difficulties And person's happiness or unhappiness.
[00:15:36]  Some people seem to simply be positive and happy, whatever the situation.
[00:15:41]  Doesn't mean they ignore it.
[00:15:43]  It means that they rebound.
[00:15:44]  It means that they go on.
[00:15:46]  And there are people who are crushed by unripe cantaloupe.
[00:15:52]  There are, I know people, their day is ruined with a bad cantaloupe.
[00:15:59]  They're usually Jewish, as it happens.
[00:16:05]  Now, that means two things.
[00:16:09]  It means two things.
[00:16:10]  One is the predisposition that some of us have in one way or the other.
[00:16:14]  And the other is how the philosophical way we deal with adversity.
[00:16:19]  Both are factors, but there is this predisposition.
[00:16:23]  So you have to realize that you may, in fact, simply have been born a certain way.
[00:16:27]  What I do find fascinating, and this truly is worthy of its own thesis, if not book, is how come the moody and the unmoody always marry each other?
[00:16:40]  This is truly one of life's great riddles, to which I have concluded at least one thing.
[00:16:45]  The moody may be unhappy, but they're not stupid.
[00:16:52]  The Moody never marry one of their own.
[00:16:54]  Never.
[00:16:55]  Isn't that amazing?
[00:17:00]  I have never in my life, and my whole life, and I have met so many couples, have ever met a Moody married to a Moody.
[00:17:08]  There's always intermarriage in that way.
[00:17:11]  There's never.
[00:17:12]  So, my question to the unmoody is what gives?
[00:17:16]  What did you do wrong?
[00:17:17]  Did they fool you during dating?
[00:17:19]  Were they happy that?
[00:17:20]  No, it's a fascinating question.
[00:17:22]  By the way, I have a thesis on that too.
[00:17:24]  Maybe, seriously, maybe the unmoody, in fact, are drawn to someone who is unhappier than they are because they express the part of themselves that they don't express.
[00:17:35]  And a lot of our choice in spouse is to balance us.
[00:17:39]  It's a very interesting area where you might want to think of.
[00:17:42]  But anyway, they do marry each other.
[00:17:44]  And I'm saying to you who are married to the unmoody, just as the moody has to recognize that he or she may be that way simply because of genetic predisposition.
[00:17:55]  It may help you too, because a lot of people, a lot of happy people, have a sort of messianic complex that they were put on earth to make X happy.
[00:18:07]  But now let me tell you one of life's lesser happy rules.
[00:18:11]  Your ability to make other people miserable is infinite.
[00:18:17]  Your ability to make others happy is minimal, almost doesn't exist at all.
[00:18:22]  Think about it.
[00:18:23]  Take kids, take kids.
[00:18:25]  Your kids can ruin your life.
[00:18:28]  It's a fact.
[00:18:28]  They can.
[00:18:29]  If you, on the other hand, they cannot make you happy.
[00:18:35]  Let's analyze it.
[00:18:36]  Let us say that you are a happy person.
[00:18:38]  Your life is fine, but one of your kids' lives is miserable.
[00:18:42]  You'll be miserable.
[00:18:43]  But let us say that your life is miserable and your kids' lives are wonderful.
[00:18:48]  Yours life will still be miserable.
[00:18:52]  It's not fair, is it?
[00:18:54]  That's why happiness is a serious problem.
[00:18:56]  It's actually weighed against us, the whole system.
[00:19:02]  Others can't make us happy, but others can make us miserable.
[00:19:06]  That's the way it works.
[00:19:07]  What can I tell you?
[00:19:08]  But don't look to others.
[00:19:10]  Recognize this is the way you may be.
[00:19:12]  In this regard, an extremely serious point needs to be made.
[00:19:16]  There also may be something, though not genetic, may be physically based as well.
[00:19:22]  You may have a biochemical problem if you are fairly constantly depressed without real reason for it.
[00:19:29]  I deeply believe in psychiatry and psychoanalysis, deeply believe in them.
[00:19:35]  However, they are not panaceas.
[00:19:39]  And therefore, I want you to consider that if, in fact, it might be chronic in your life, a certain low-level or even deep-level depression, there may be a biochemical imbalance.
[00:19:51]  And you should thank God that you live in an age that has a pharmaceutical ability to correct that.
[00:20:00]  There is what we call psychiatric pharmacology.
[00:20:04]  So it is something for you to think about.
[00:20:06]  I am very annoyed at groups.
[00:20:08]  Like Scientologists, who say don't take any of that, that everything is curable through some sort of therapy.
[00:20:15]  It's not true.
[00:20:16]  On the other hand, pills can't correct what is psychologically wrong.
[00:20:20]  They can only correct what is biologically wrong.
[00:20:23]  So please understand that there may be, if you know someone or are chronically unhappy, there may be something else at work there.
[00:20:32]  Because there are Holocaust survivors who are not chronically unhappy, and none of you, to the best of my knowledge, went through Auschwitz.
[00:20:41]  There are people who went through Auschwitz who were happier than people who went through Encino.
[00:20:50]  All right, that's very important to recognize.
[00:20:53]  This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.
[00:20:59]  Is losing weight getting harder as you get older?
[00:21:01]  It's not your fault.
[00:21:02]  You're eating better, you're moving more, but your body isn't responding anymore.
[00:21:06]  At PhD Weight Loss, they help people identify what's actually blocking fat loss and help increase your lifespan.
[00:21:11]  If you want to understand why your body isn't cooperating, call PhD Weight Loss Now and book your consultation at 864 644 1900.
[00:21:19]  Mention Dennis Prager and you get two weeks free in the program, and they'll pay for your food.
[00:21:23]  That's a $1,500 value absolutely free.
[00:21:26]  Call 864 644 1900.
[00:21:32]  Now, back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.
[00:21:36]  So, if you have a chronic thing, it may not help.
[00:21:40]  You may need three things.
[00:21:42]  One is philosophical, which is what I'm addressing.
[00:21:45]  Another is psychological, which is what a therapist addresses.
[00:21:49]  And the third is biological, which is what pharmaceuticals can address.
[00:21:54]  There is a fourth area, but I include it in philosophical, which is lack of meaning, a lack of sense of purpose, which afflicts a lot of people, but that I put in the philosophical category.
[00:22:06]  Obstacle number two is nature, human nature.
[00:22:12]  Our genes or our biochemicals are individual to us, but nature is universal.
[00:22:17]  And I have a very simple statement about that.
[00:22:20]  Human nature itself, which is depressing when you think about it, but human nature itself is a major obstacle to happiness.
[00:22:29]  And it goes across the board.
[00:22:31]  This is true if you met somebody who was raised in rural Japan, someone who was raised in urban America, it wouldn't matter.
[00:22:38]  Human nature is a problem.
[00:22:41]  And the reason is one word human nature is insatiable.
[00:22:46]  Whatever it is we want, We cannot, our nature cannot be satisfied by it.

=== Human Nature Is Insatiable (10:27) ===

[00:22:54]  If whatever, think of all of you are primal urges intimacy, love, money, honor, sex, power, success, whatever it is, and I'm sure I missed some excitement, whatever it is, there is no time, and I won't say anything more important this evening, there is no time.
[00:23:20]  When your nature says to you, We now have enough, I am happy.
[00:23:26]  Your nature always says to you, More, more, more.
[00:23:32]  You're not happy, get more.
[00:23:34]  And that, by the way, I am not complaining about that.
[00:23:37]  Thank God for that.
[00:23:39]  The fact that we have a nature that is never satisfied is actually a good thing.
[00:23:43]  That's what keeps us going, it makes us passionate.
[00:23:46]  Anybody who says, You know, I have enough of everything, I seek nothing, is dead.
[00:23:55]  The person is dead, but the burial has not taken place yet.
[00:24:00]  So I have to understand that that's okay.
[00:24:04]  I live at peace with the fact that I have a nature, like you have a nature, that is insatiable.
[00:24:09]  Now, your drive insatiability may be not the same as another.
[00:24:13]  For X, it might be excitement.
[00:24:15]  For Y, it might be money.
[00:24:17]  For Z, it might be sex.
[00:24:19]  For A, it might be emotional intimacy.
[00:24:22]  We all have what I call our own demons.
[00:24:25]  You have yours, I have mine.
[00:24:27]  And there's a good chance we share very many together.
[00:24:30]  But the fact is that that is the way our natures are.
[00:24:33]  Now, what do you do about it?
[00:24:35]  It's very simple.
[00:24:36]  You don't listen to it.
[00:24:38]  You have to announce to your nature, shut up.
[00:24:42]  Take it easy.
[00:24:43]  Yes, it's good to keep seeking more, but I am now, I declare myself happy at this point because I know that at no point will I achieve the happiness that fulfilling my nature wants because it's insatiable.
[00:24:59]  I'll tell you how I learned this the first time I realized it.
[00:25:03]  It was an ad in the Los Angeles Times.
[00:25:04]  This was about 10 years ago.
[00:25:06]  It was an ad in the LA Times, and it said as follows If you are not completely satisfied with your sex life, give us a call.
[00:25:16]  So, of course, I was about to turn the page when, you know, those lights, those proverbial lights went off.
[00:25:22]  And I realized that ad is brilliant because everybody in Los Angeles, if honest, will give them a call.
[00:25:32]  With maybe with the exception of Hugh Hefner, who lives in LA, but I'm dead serious.
[00:25:37]  What great words!
[00:25:39]  Completely satisfied.
[00:25:41]  What does that even mean?
[00:25:43]  When is one completely satisfied?
[00:25:45]  Within a minute of orgasm?
[00:25:47]  At what point is one completely satisfied?
[00:25:50]  What does that even mean?
[00:25:52]  Completely satisfied as compared to what?
[00:25:55]  When?
[00:25:55]  How?
[00:25:56]  With whom?
[00:25:58]  And that it was a brilliant, Ed.
[00:26:00]  By the way, Ed.
[00:26:02]  Forget sex life.
[00:26:03]  Throw in anything you want.
[00:26:03]  How about this?
[00:26:04]  If you're not completely satisfied with your income, give us a call.
[00:26:09]  If you're not completely satisfied with your parents, give us a call.
[00:26:16]  Don't you understand?
[00:26:17]  That's the brilliance of it.
[00:26:18]  You throw in anything you want.
[00:26:21]  You're not completely satisfied with your children, it's your spouse.
[00:26:26]  It's endless.
[00:26:26]  You're not completely satisfied with yourself, with your job, with your boss.
[00:26:32]  It's endless.
[00:26:34]  Anyone who would take out an ad is guaranteed callers.
[00:26:38]  Now, the trick in life, and this is a tough one, I don't have a formula for this.
[00:26:43]  The trick is to know when something's really bad and when it's simply that you're not satisfied because you can never be fully satisfied.
[00:26:53]  When is a sex life truly bad and when is it not fully satisfied because you're a hog?
[00:27:00]  That's a very tough question.
[00:27:01]  Same thing with income.
[00:27:02]  When is your income enough?
[00:27:04]  And when is your income not enough because you crave the latest model of a car but don't really need it?
[00:27:09]  You just crave it.
[00:27:12]  I don't have an answer for you.
[00:27:13]  All I can say is that the line exists somewhere, and the truth is that more or less we manufacture that line.
[00:27:20]  And I say to you that what is best to do is this don't deny your nature, be in touch with its desires, but at the same time, be aware of what really life is about and that it can never fully satisfy you in any of those areas.
[00:27:35]  That will help you a great deal to appreciate and enjoy what you do have.
[00:27:40]  I mean, to take the sex life issue again, because it's such a difficult one and it's such a universal one.
[00:27:45]  How many times per month is it completely satisfying for a couple?
[00:27:52]  I think we are sophisticated enough to know by now that different couples have totally different needs in that regard.
[00:27:58]  And what is even a need?
[00:28:00]  How do you know exactly?
[00:28:01]  And how do you know?
[00:28:02]  Does it count hugs?
[00:28:03]  I mean, where does it end?
[00:28:04]  Does it mean only orgasms?
[00:28:06]  I'm serious.
[00:28:08]  If you analyze it, it becomes highly complex.
[00:28:11]  And it is highly complex.
[00:28:13]  There has to be a line between the chronic unhappiness or dissatisfaction that nature has and our ability to say, wait a minute.
[00:28:23]  It's not nearly as bad as my nature is telling me because nothing is perfect in that arena.
[00:28:29]  Which brings me to obstacle number three.
[00:28:32]  How do we know when we are happy or not?
[00:28:35]  It's an interesting question.
[00:28:37]  Many people do it on the basis of comparing their happiness to others, which is an absolute no-no.
[00:28:45]  If you do that, you are finished.
[00:28:49]  Because the moment you do that, you will always compare yourself only To people you think are happier than you.
[00:28:57]  And that is why you guarantee yourself unhappiness.
[00:29:00]  Whenever you think of your own happiness, do you sit down and think, well, you know, there are these people in Calcutta?
[00:29:09]  I doubt it.
[00:29:10]  You probably think of the single happiest person you know or think you know and compare yourself to that person and then find yourself wanting.
[00:29:20]  This thing about comparing ourselves to others whom we think are happier.
[00:29:26]  Can be answered in the best way by a brilliant statement of Helen Talushkin, one of America's finer thinkers, but who has not written anything as of yet.
[00:29:38]  She is what I call a wife, a homemaker philosopher.
[00:29:43]  And she's Joseph Talushkin, my co author's mother.
[00:29:47]  And she has come out, as long as I know her, with these brilliant little insights, which somebody ought to collect one day.
[00:29:53]  And she came out with one when Joseph Talushkin and I were in high school and we were sitting in her.
[00:29:58]  Kitchen, and we were, and Joseph and I were talking, and we were high school kids, we were talking about happiness.
[00:30:05]  And she closed the refrigerator door, looked at us, and said, You know, boys, the only people I know who are happy are people I don't know well.
[00:30:21]  That, I truly believe, summarizes the antidote to this problem best.
[00:30:26]  What we do is we manufacture some image of a truly happy person, compare ourselves to that person, and then find ourselves wanting.
[00:30:35]  We never compare ourselves to people we know well.
[00:30:37]  We know how screwed up their lives are.
[00:30:40]  Isn't that fascinating?
[00:30:41]  It is always removed one.
[00:30:44]  First, I always have this image, for example, of cousin Ira.
[00:30:48]  They have this fourth cousin who shows up once a year, and it just seems to have it all together.
[00:30:53]  He seems to have a great job, great kids, great relationship with his wife.
[00:30:57]  Leaves, and you don't know, you don't understand.
[00:30:59]  Boy, did he look out.
[00:31:01]  He has a great life.
[00:31:03]  Then, a couple of years later, you find that actually one of the kids was on drugs.
[00:31:06]  His marriage is miserable or already broken up.
[00:31:10]  So, what do you do?
[00:31:11]  You go to Cousin Irving.
[00:31:13]  You use another cousin as an example.
[00:31:15]  Once your whole family has been eliminated, because you know all of them have miserable lives, what you do is you go then to strangers, to public figures.
[00:31:27]  That is part of the fascination, the imagery that people have, for example, of Hollywood stars, overwhelmingly, that they have very similar problems, that there are certain problems innate to males and females relating every day, forever.
[00:31:41]  The question is not why are there marital problems, it's how come there are marital successes.
[00:31:47]  It is a semi unnatural thing when you think about it.
[00:31:50]  Every day till I die, what all the changes I will go through, all the changes he or she will go through, and we are together.
[00:31:59]  And we have kids that whole time who will not make things easier.
[00:32:03]  As I've always said about kids, God bless them, and I mean that very, very sincerely.
[00:32:07]  But one has to understand that they do come with some marital prices.
[00:32:12]  As I've often put it, it's one of God's practical jokes that which is produced by passion then destroys passion.
[00:32:26]  The sex lives of couples after their first kid look, if you put it on a graph, it looks like a ski slope.
[00:32:35]  It becomes very, very difficult and effortful.
[00:32:38]  Now, it doesn't mean it can't be conquered and then have the joy of a child.
[00:32:42]  Of course it can, but it's a very serious challenge.
[00:32:45]  Now, here is what I mean by comparing ourselves to others.
[00:32:48]  I have this vision of two couples going out to dinner.
[00:32:52]  Okay, two couples, couple A, couple B. Give them names, all right?
[00:32:56]  We'll have a worldly, two couples, the Coens and the Jones, are going out to dinner.
[00:33:05]  Right before dinner, the Coens have a real big fight.
[00:33:11]  Right before dinner, the Jones have a really big fight.
[00:33:15]  They then go to dinner, and at dinner, they act like everything's fine.

=== Comparing Couples at Dinner (05:10) ===

[00:33:22]  So, how are things?
[00:33:23]  Great.
[00:33:25]  I always love that on my radio talk show when I go, How are you?
[00:33:28]  Great.
[00:33:29]  Sometimes I just stop and go, Great?
[00:33:31]  All right, not so great.
[00:33:33]  You know, as soon as you challenge them, what is this great?
[00:33:36]  Who's doing great?
[00:33:37]  You know, Well, is pretty good, frankly, or not bad.
[00:33:42]  I could even live with that.
[00:33:43]  Great is a little hyperbolic for me.
[00:33:45]  Anyway, they are at dinner, and the Jones and the Coens are doing great.
[00:33:50]  They act like things are terrific between them.
[00:33:53]  What happens?
[00:33:54]  They go home in far worse condition, both of them, than they came.
[00:33:59]  The Coens are saying in the car, Did you see how wonderfully they get along?
[00:34:07]  The Jones are saying, Did you see the Coens?
[00:34:10]  Could you see the way they everything just seems terrific with them and then they're in worse condition?
[00:34:15]  Had one of them said to the question, How are things?
[00:34:18]  Well, to be honest, we had a big fight right before we came.
[00:34:21]  The odds are, I would say, very high, not guaranteed, but very high, that the other would have said, Yeah, so did we.
[00:34:30]  And then they would have said, Really?
[00:34:31]  What was yours about?
[00:34:33]  Oh, and maybe they would have said, Maybe one of the women would have said, Oh, he never listens.
[00:34:38]  To which she would have said, And the other, Oh, yeah, that's exactly my problem with him.
[00:34:42]  He never listens.
[00:34:43]  And then it would have calmed them down that it isn't that I'm married to a non listening jerk.
[00:34:50]  It's that men have very odd auditory nerves.
[00:34:57]  That's right.
[00:35:00]  It is true.
[00:35:02]  Men have different auditory nerves than women do.
[00:35:05]  For example, men don't hear babies crying.
[00:35:08]  It is a phenomenon, it is a medical phenomenon.
[00:35:13]  And, or men don't remember nearly as much as women do.
[00:35:19]  A man could be on a telephone for an hour.
[00:35:22]  All right?
[00:35:22]  The odds are he wouldn't be, but he could be.
[00:35:25]  And then his wife says, Well, oh, really?
[00:35:27]  Tony, your brother?
[00:35:28]  Oh, what'd he say?
[00:35:29]  Nothing.
[00:35:33]  How does somebody say nothing for an hour?
[00:35:36]  On the other hand, she's on with her best friend for two minutes, and you ask her, What did you say?
[00:35:42]  And you get an hour detailed thing.
[00:35:44]  How do you tell for an hour what somebody said for two minutes?
[00:35:48]  Because women hear far more than was said.
[00:35:51]  The tone, the idea.
[00:35:53]  I know this from speaking.
[00:35:54]  There are two separate audiences in this room.
[00:35:57]  Male audience and a female audience.
[00:35:59]  The men hear my words.
[00:36:01]  The women are wondering what makes him tick.
[00:36:04]  Is he for real?
[00:36:06]  How does he relate to his wife?
[00:36:09]  What can I really read into what he's saying?
[00:36:12]  Why did he choose those words?
[00:36:14]  Did you see the way he did that?
[00:36:16]  Totally different.
[00:36:18]  Men like to see it in black and white, women in 3D color.
[00:36:24]  I recognize that.
[00:36:26]  So the fact The fact is, therefore, that that will cause a certain amount of trouble in any given matter.
[00:36:32]  You know what I finally did?
[00:36:34]  I realized that I fell into the same thing.
[00:36:36]  I didn't remember conversations.
[00:36:38]  My wife would ask me what happened, and it was incredible.
[00:36:41]  Under torture, I wouldn't have remembered.
[00:36:43]  The issue wasn't that I didn't want to tell her.
[00:36:45]  I want to tell her everything.
[00:36:46]  I didn't remember.
[00:36:47]  I honestly didn't remember.
[00:36:50]  So I actually trained myself to write notes.
[00:36:54]  I would make notes on conversations on the phone.
[00:36:57]  I would make mental notes all day.
[00:36:59]  Remember to tell Fran the following.
[00:37:02]  This actually happened to you.
[00:37:04]  Major events in my life would go unreported.
[00:37:07]  I mean, major.
[00:37:08]  I don't mean that I, you know, little trivia, major stuff.
[00:37:11]  I would just, it just zoomed by.
[00:37:13]  There are books on this thing.
[00:37:16]  Deborah Tannen wrote a book on this, which is very important.
[00:37:19]  I don't recall it right now, but I'm sure one of you do.
[00:37:23]  You see, there you go.
[00:37:27]  There you go.
[00:37:29]  I could tell you eight arguments for God's existence, but the name of a book that I read on men and women communicating, I can't remember.
[00:37:37]  Anyway, these is all by way of saying people compare to images of others individually and as couples and as parents.
[00:37:48]  How many people think that the other people's kids are doing better?
[00:37:52]  It's so common.
[00:37:53]  You look at the other kid and you meet the other kid for 10 minutes.
[00:37:56]  It is such a common thing to think you have basically a juvenile delinquent for a child.
[00:38:02]  And then you find out when your child slept over at somebody else's home, they tell you how beautiful that child is.
[00:38:08]  And you are convinced they had a different child visiting.
[00:38:11]  For some kid walked around with my kid's name for a night.
[00:38:16]  I have seen that all the time.
[00:38:17]  I remember when I was the director of the Brandeis Bradian Institute, we'd have summer sessions for college kids.
[00:38:22]  I would often tell parents how wonderful their kid was, and I never made it up.
[00:38:26]  And sometimes they'd look at me, come on, come on, and they didn't realize.

=== Focusing on What Is Missing (06:11) ===

[00:38:33]  And because we magnify, understandably, the problems of our kids, we see everything that is wrong.
[00:38:41]  It's difficult to step back.
[00:38:43]  So I'm saying to you, stop this comparison stuff.
[00:38:46]  There is one thing you need to know.
[00:38:49]  The Helen Tolushkin quote that the only people I know who are happy are people I don't know well.
[00:38:53]  And the other thing is that everybody has real problems.
[00:38:58]  Everybody.
[00:39:01]  That nobody in the world is freed from problems, from demons, from wants that are unfulfilled, from desires that go unmet.
[00:39:11]  Everybody.
[00:39:12]  You have to know that.
[00:39:14]  It helps so greatly in life because it's normal to think, why did they have it better than I?
[00:39:19]  But you don't know that for a fact.
[00:39:21]  You only know that they have X better than I. Which brings me, therefore, to the next thing called the missing tile syndrome, wherein we all know exactly what's missing in our lives.
[00:39:36]  And I call it the missing tile syndrome for the following reason.
[00:39:38]  If you're in a room with a tiled ceiling and just one tile is missing, that's what you'll focus on.
[00:39:46]  It's inevitable, which is good for ceilings, terrible for life.
[00:39:52]  To focus on the one thing that is missing.
[00:39:56]  It always happens.
[00:39:57]  I learned this in a number of ways.
[00:39:59]  Let me give you two of them.
[00:40:02]  One is I learned it from a bald man.
[00:40:05]  A bald man once said to me, You know, Dennis, when I walk into a room, all I see is hair.
[00:40:14]  That was a fascinating, honest statement.
[00:40:18]  I don't see hair at all.
[00:40:20]  Since I have my hair, whether men have their hair or not is a non issue to me.
[00:40:25]  I don't notice it.
[00:40:27]  If I were in a room with seven men for a day and you asked me the next day which one of them was bald, which one of them had a receding hairline, I probably could not tell you.
[00:40:38]  The odds are I would not be able to tell you.
[00:40:40]  But I'll bet you that any bald man would know exactly every hair length in that room.
[00:40:46]  He could report to you who had a whole set of hair, who had a receding hairline.
[00:40:51]  It's very interesting.
[00:40:53]  Because I'm missing that, that's what I focus on.
[00:40:56]  Women, some women will walk into a room and all they see are thin thighs.
[00:41:02]  It is a room filled with thin thighs.
[00:41:04]  There is nothing else in the room.
[00:41:07]  It is a remarkable thing.
[00:41:08]  That is the way we think.
[00:41:10]  We walk around.
[00:41:11]  What is my missing tile?
[00:41:12]  If your missing tile is not having joy from your kid, every kid in the world is bringing his parents joy.
[00:41:20]  Except yours.
[00:41:21]  That's all you'll see are wonderful kids, a world of wonderful kids.
[00:41:26]  That is a very real problem.
[00:41:27]  I learned it much earlier than the bald man, though.
[00:41:30]  I learned it when I was in my 20s, a bachelor, or single.
[00:41:35]  I don't know at what point you move into bachelorhood, but I didn't marry till 32, so I guess bachelor is okay.
[00:41:44]  At any rate, I used to do the following.
[00:41:49]  After a day, oh, well, I shouldn't say, I should first tell you what I was searching for.
[00:41:53]  Prager was on a Diogenes-type quest.
[00:41:58]  What was the Diogenes type quest?
[00:42:00]  And I say this with embarrassment because it's so stupid that I have no words for it.
[00:42:05]  What it was, was I was looking for what is the most important trait in a woman.
[00:42:12]  This was the way I was thinking in terms of how I would then choose marriage.
[00:42:17]  Instead of thinking, who will you fall in love with, which is a relevant thing, I was thinking, what?
[00:42:21]  I was thinking all brain, all brain.
[00:42:25]  What is the most important trait in a woman?
[00:42:26]  So, what I would do is very frequently after a date, the next morning, I would call up my close friend, Joseph, and I would announce, I would say the following Joseph, I realized last night in this date that I had what the most important trait in a woman is.
[00:42:43]  And then I'd have different answers each time.
[00:42:45]  One time it'd be all brains.
[00:42:47]  Another time it'd be attractiveness.
[00:42:49]  Another time it'd be personality.
[00:42:50]  Another time it would be values.
[00:42:52]  Another time.
[00:42:54]  Different times, different things.
[00:42:57]  After doing this idiocy for about five years, and Joseph did an equal amount of this idiocy, he would call me as well.
[00:43:04]  Finally, to his credit, not mine, he figured out how it was an idiocy.
[00:43:09]  This is truly what happened.
[00:43:11]  Again, after a date, I give him a call.
[00:43:13]  Joseph?
[00:43:15]  I finally realized what the most important trait in a woman is.
[00:43:20]  I said, Dennis, don't tell me.
[00:43:21]  Don't tell me.
[00:43:21]  I know what you're going to say.
[00:43:23]  I said, Joseph, how could you possibly know what I'm going to say?
[00:43:25]  You don't even know who I went on a date with.
[00:43:27]  He said, it doesn't matter because you're going to tell me that the most important trait in a woman is whichever trait your date didn't have.
[00:43:36]  And I realized he was right and I never did it again.
[00:43:40]  I sat during the date thinking, what doesn't she have?
[00:43:44]  Which trait is missing and concentrated on it.
[00:43:48]  But you know what?
[00:43:49]  We're all missing a trait.
[00:43:51]  Who's not missing a trait?
[00:43:53]  I mean, there's no such thing as having all traits equally.
[00:43:57]  It doesn't happen.
[00:43:58]  It happens in fantasy stories.
[00:44:01]  And so what happens is we focus in our lives on that which is missing, which is guaranteed to make us miserable.
[00:44:09]  Here truly is a philosophic difference.
[00:44:12]  Abraham Lincoln, in your introduction, was absolutely right.
[00:44:15]  If you decide to be happy, it will be different.
[00:44:18]  If you decide to focus on what is missing, You will die unhappy.
[00:44:23]  If you decide to focus on what you have, life will be very, very different for you.
[00:44:29]  And that is your choice.
[00:44:30]  That is why in my book, I do believe I have isolated, like scientists look to isolate a gene or a chromosome.
[00:44:39]  I look to isolate the single most important factor in happiness.

=== Expect Nothing, Be Grateful (09:36) ===

[00:44:44]  And I believe I found it.
[00:44:46]  It's called gratitude.
[00:44:48]  This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.
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[00:45:27]  Now, back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.
[00:45:31]  The more gratitude you have, it's like an equation.
[00:45:34]  The more you're grateful for, the happier you will be.
[00:45:38]  The less you're grateful for, the unhappier you will be.
[00:45:41]  It is truly as simple as that.
[00:45:44]  Gratitude is the key.
[00:45:46]  And gratitude means appreciating what you have.
[00:45:49]  It is as simple as that.
[00:45:51]  But people don't.
[00:45:52]  They sit and wonder why am I missing this while I have all of this?
[00:45:58]  Which brings me to the next obstacle.
[00:46:01]  And that is that which most undermines gratitude.
[00:46:05]  What is it?
[00:46:07]  Expectations.
[00:46:09]  I would like here to thank another religious tradition other than my own.
[00:46:16]  Judaism has been a very major factor for me in happiness, but I have learned other religions and I have learned from other religions.
[00:46:23]  Buddhism taught me an extremely valuable lesson in my life.
[00:46:29]  Buddhism holds.
[00:46:36]  Buddhism holds.
[00:46:38]  That all pain in life comes from desires and expectations that are not fulfilled.
[00:46:47]  Therefore, the Buddhist answer to pain is don't have desires and don't have expectations.
[00:46:54]  I am philosophically and even morally unprepared to accept part one.
[00:47:00]  I do want desires.
[00:47:02]  Desires are very important.
[00:47:03]  If you don't desire to conquer polio, more kids will die of polio.
[00:47:07]  Just to put it in a macro ethical way.
[00:47:10]  But.
[00:47:13]  At the age of 20, I did adopt part two of the Buddhist teaching.
[00:47:18]  I decided to drop all expectations.
[00:47:22]  And I want to tell you, it has been one of the most important contributions to my own happiness.
[00:47:29]  And I like to explain what that means because it hits a lot of people the wrong way.
[00:47:33]  It's the only controversial thing in this speech.
[00:47:37]  And I want it to be non-controversial.
[00:47:40]  I want you to understand what I mean by it.
[00:47:44]  I believe that expectations must create unhappiness.
[00:47:50]  And therefore, I ask you to work on not having expectations.
[00:47:55]  Does that mean not having ambition?
[00:47:57]  No.
[00:47:58]  Does that mean not having goals?
[00:48:00]  No.
[00:48:00]  Does that mean not having wants or desires?
[00:48:02]  No.
[00:48:03]  You should have wants, desires, goals, ambitions, all you want.
[00:48:07]  Just don't have expectations, because expectations undermine the only The most critical thing to happiness is gratitude.
[00:48:16]  I'll prove it.
[00:48:18]  If you expect to be healthy tomorrow and you wake up healthy tomorrow, you will not be grateful for being healthy tomorrow.
[00:48:26]  If you don't expect to be healthy tomorrow and wake up healthy tomorrow, you will be grateful for being healthy tomorrow.
[00:48:34]  Therefore, you will be happier.
[00:48:37]  Isn't that something?
[00:48:39]  Therefore, you must train yourself to be grateful for what you have.
[00:48:43]  And the only way to do that is to expect nothing.
[00:48:48]  And I know that this will sound bizarre to you, but I don't expect things.
[00:48:53]  And I go through life marveling at my great fortune.
[00:48:58]  I am amazed.
[00:49:00]  Why should I not be hit by a drunk driver?
[00:49:03]  I don't believe I am immune.
[00:49:05]  When I get home tonight, hopefully, I will be grateful.
[00:49:12]  Now, I'm not going to declare a holiday in the house, get everybody there.
[00:49:16]  I want you to know, no, I got no tickets.
[00:49:18]  I got no drunk drivers.
[00:49:20]  I didn't run over anybody.
[00:49:21]  It's been a great night.
[00:49:24]  But in me is an awareness that I am fortunate for that fact.
[00:49:29]  I do truly believe that.
[00:49:31]  You see, I don't believe for a moment that I am immune to suffering, that I am immune to misfortune, that I am immune to bad luck.
[00:49:39]  I don't believe that for a second.
[00:49:41]  There, but for the grace of God go I, I always say whenever I see anything.
[00:49:46]  There are people who walk around who truly believe that they have a divine protection against being hit by drunk drivers.
[00:49:52]  Against getting cancer.
[00:49:53]  I don't believe that for a minute.
[00:49:55]  That is part of the reason I am such an intense person in what I do.
[00:49:59]  I want to do so much because I may die tomorrow.
[00:50:02]  That is one of the greatest sources of happiness in my life, knowing that I can die tomorrow.
[00:50:08]  Sounds bizarre to you.
[00:50:10]  It's not unhappy.
[00:50:12]  It's not obsessed with bad at all.
[00:50:16]  I just realize it could happen.
[00:50:19]  And I'm very grateful for my health and for driving safely and for living on airplanes that don't crash.
[00:50:25]  I spent a lot of time on airplanes.
[00:50:28]  And it is truly roulette.
[00:50:31]  It is all roulette.
[00:50:32]  Why did mine?
[00:50:33]  I'd fly in the winter to New York.
[00:50:34]  How come the icing worked?
[00:50:36]  But for those people on US Air, on their way to Cleveland, it didn't work.
[00:50:40]  I've gone New York to Cleveland.
[00:50:43]  There's no guarantee Prager's plane is going to always be de-iced, right?
[00:50:47]  Prager's brakes will always work.
[00:50:50]  Prager will not get involved with a drunk driver, but Smith will.
[00:50:54]  There's no such guarantee.
[00:50:57]  There's no guarantee I won't wake up sick tomorrow.
[00:51:01]  You and I know, you should know in your mind, if not in your gut, but you should know in your gut too.
[00:51:06]  There are people my age and your age who are perfectly fine today and will wake up tomorrow with a lump.
[00:51:14]  You know that.
[00:51:18]  Why won't it be you?
[00:51:20]  You're lucky.
[00:51:22]  Be very grateful for it.
[00:51:25]  I don't expect to be healthy tomorrow.
[00:51:28]  I hope I will be.
[00:51:30]  I think I will be.
[00:51:31]  The law of averages dictates that given my health in the past, it seems to be okay to presume on those bases that I'll be all right tomorrow.
[00:51:40]  But I don't have a guarantee on it.
[00:51:42]  I'm not certain at all.
[00:51:43]  I don't expect it.
[00:51:45]  That is why expectations undermine gratitude, which undermines happiness.
[00:51:50]  That is one of the reasons, incidentally, that I deeply believe in saying brachot, in saying blessings before eating, after eating, and for other things that our religion, that Judaism offers.
[00:52:03]  It's my way of saying I'm grateful for this food.
[00:52:06]  Thank you.
[00:52:07]  I know that it is, I can't expect it all the time.
[00:52:10]  I am grateful.
[00:52:11]  Not everybody has it like this.
[00:52:13]  I'll give you a classic example.
[00:52:16]  I bet you that very few of you leave the bathroom after relieving yourself a happier human being.
[00:52:25]  Very few of you, if somebody called you up and said, hey, how are you doing?
[00:52:29]  Great, really, really well.
[00:52:31]  How come just urinated?
[00:52:35]  However, however, I bet you if you had a urinary tract infection, you will be deliriously happy when you urinate.
[00:52:47]  Ask people in the urology ward how they feel about urinating.
[00:52:50]  It's the happiest moment of their lives when it finally works.
[00:52:54]  Why do you have to lose it in order to be happy about it?
[00:52:58]  Therefore, I want to tell you something.
[00:53:00]  There is a blessing, you will find it in a Jewish prayer book in the Sidur, is a blessing that you say after going to the bathroom.
[00:53:09]  And it basically is as follows it's in an article I wrote on this, The Missing Tile Syndrome, and it's an article.
[00:53:17]  Or, as in the expectations, I don't recall, article I wrote, and I have the translation, but basically it says as follows Blessed are you, O God, King of the universe, who has created the human body, so that those which orifices which should open, open, and those which should close, close.
[00:53:34]  For if one of them should close when it should open, or open when it should close, nothing will work.
[00:53:42]  That is a basic translation, so help me God, of this prayer.
[00:53:47]  Which religious Jews say every time they go to the bathroom or ought to say.
[00:53:52]  Now, what does that do?
[00:53:54]  It creates gratitude for relieving yourself every time you go.
[00:53:58]  It is a religious way of saying what I once read over a urinal scratched into a wall in a college bathroom.
[00:54:07]  You are now engaged in life's most underrated pleasure.
[00:54:12]  This bracha is a religious way of saying that.
[00:54:16]  Now, therefore, I must tell you, I'll give you one more example.

=== Finding Confidence Without Expectation (04:03) ===

[00:54:21]  I must tell you this example of where I have applied this non expectations to my life.
[00:54:26]  This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.
[00:54:32]  Is losing weight getting harder as you get older?
[00:54:34]  It's not your fault.
[00:54:35]  You're eating better, you're moving more, but your body isn't responding anymore.
[00:54:39]  At PhD Weight Loss, they help people identify what's actually blocking fat loss and help increase your lifespan.
[00:54:44]  If you want to understand why your body isn't cooperating, call PhD Weight Loss now and book your consultation at 864 644 1900.
[00:54:52]  Mention Dennis Prager and you get two weeks free in the program, and they'll pay for your food.
[00:54:56]  That's a $1,500 value absolutely free.
[00:54:59]  Call 864 644 1900.
[00:55:04]  Now, back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.
[00:55:09]  Almost 10 years ago to the day, I was called into KABC Talk Radio Los Angeles for an interview.
[00:55:17]  There was an opening, and they called me in.
[00:55:20]  So I was going to try out on the most, I think, the most successful talk station in America.
[00:55:26]  And it was a great, great chance.
[00:55:28]  I was thrilled.
[00:55:29]  That's what I wanted deeply to do was get my ideas to more people.
[00:55:33]  This was incredible.
[00:55:35]  And I remember vividly my way of dealing with it.
[00:55:40]  I said, Dennis, do not expect to get the job.
[00:55:44]  To which most of you will immediately respond, that will undermine his ability to do a good job.
[00:55:52]  That is not a good positive attitude to have at a job interview.
[00:55:56]  That's wrong.
[00:55:58]  I want to preserve my sanity.
[00:56:01]  Okay, I do.
[00:56:02]  It's important to me.
[00:56:03]  I want to be happy.
[00:56:04]  I don't want to undermine my own chances at happiness.
[00:56:08]  So what I do as follows, I remember exactly.
[00:56:10]  If you would have said, Dennis, do you think you'd be good on radio?
[00:56:12]  I said, sure.
[00:56:13]  You think you're the best for the job?
[00:56:14]  I said, probably.
[00:56:15]  I don't know.
[00:56:15]  I haven't seen everybody else who's trying out, but I think that I may very well be.
[00:56:21]  Certainly anybody who knows me knows I do not suffer from a self-effacing personality.
[00:56:27]  So it's hardly like not expecting to get the job reflects some sense of insecurity or lack of confidence.
[00:56:35]  I have deep security and deep sense of confidence, but I also know not to expect it.
[00:56:41]  A, the number of things that could happen.
[00:56:44]  A, I got laryngitis the night of the tryout.
[00:56:47]  B, the owner's nephew is also trying out.
[00:56:51]  Okay?
[00:56:53]  C, who knows what, right?
[00:56:55]  C, who knows what?
[00:56:56]  C, I get a flat tire driving to the station and don't even get there for the night I'm supposed to try out.
[00:57:03]  It could happen.
[00:57:04]  It happens to people.
[00:57:05]  You're living in a real fantasy world if you think that everybody who's successful in any area of life really deserves it because they're the best.
[00:57:14]  The number of nitwits who do radio talk shows is so high that the only possible reason that they have it is luck.
[00:57:23]  It's the only possible reason.
[00:57:24]  That's true for most professions.
[00:57:27]  For people who rise to the top, as for example, presidency, do the best, do the best, best Americans become president?
[00:57:37]  And it's not to at all pick on any given president.
[00:57:41]  Sometimes yes, sometimes no.
[00:57:44]  There's a tremendous amount of fortune, of coincidence, of luck.
[00:57:48]  Now, to stay there and be successful usually implies an ability, but to get there is a lot of luck, too.
[00:57:55]  It was luck that they called me.
[00:57:58]  I will say how it happened.
[00:57:59]  Roberta Weintraub had heard me give a lecture.
[00:58:02]  She was friendly with the president of the station and mentioned me to him.
[00:58:04]  What if she didn't hear me lecture?
[00:58:06]  Or what if, like those officers who met Joseph in prison in Genesis, they forgot to tell Pharaoh about Joseph?
[00:58:15]  What if she forgot?
[00:58:16]  Does everybody think about telling somebody else good things about other people?
[00:58:21]  Who knows how it could happen?
[00:58:23]  I don't have expectations.

=== Success Beyond the Image (09:32) ===

[00:58:25]  I have massive gratitude.
[00:58:26]  And I deeply, deeply suggest that for you as well.
[00:58:30]  It is a better way to lead a life.
[00:58:34]  Finally, because there are so many others, finally, I would like to mention one other thing.
[00:58:43]  And that is the equation of happiness with success.
[00:58:48]  I don't know if this is quintessentially American or it's universal, and it certainly tends to afflict men in particular.
[00:58:56]  Macro success.
[00:58:57]  is equated, success in the outer world, that's what I mean by macro, is equated with happiness.
[00:59:04]  This is one area where I truly can help you, I think, immensely.
[00:59:10]  Let me make something very clear.
[00:59:12]  It is a major, major fallacy.
[00:59:15]  Success doesn't make people happy.
[00:59:19]  Work can.
[00:59:21]  Work can contribute to happiness.
[00:59:24]  I say that categorically, but not success.
[00:59:28]  And there is a very simple way to find out if I'm right.
[00:59:33]  If you think that success would make you considerably happier, I ask you to go to someone who has the level of success that you think would bring you happiness and ask the person if it has brought them happiness.
[00:59:46]  Ask them.
[00:59:47]  If you think if you were made partner in a law firm, go to one of the partners.
[00:59:52]  Say, you know, you're a partner.
[00:59:53]  I'm just curious.
[00:59:55]  Are you happy?
[00:59:56]  Are you a happy person because you're a partner in this firm?
[00:59:59]  The odds are that the partner is thinking about a much higher level of success that would make him or her happy.
[01:00:06]  Everybody has a higher level of success.
[01:00:09]  If you think success makes you happy, you will never be happy, because there is always a higher level of success to which you can aspire.
[01:00:18]  It's one of the most important things I could say to help anybody here.
[01:00:22]  What then does bring happiness in work?
[01:00:25]  Something does.
[01:00:26]  Two things.
[01:00:28]  Do you enjoy your work?
[01:00:30]  And do you feel that it is meaningful?
[01:00:34]  Those are the things that make you happy in work, not success.
[01:00:40]  I will give you a personal example again.
[01:00:43]  I write and publish a journal.
[01:00:47]  It is the thing that takes the most time out of my life, more than radio, more than lecturing, more than anything else, in my work.
[01:00:56]  It is very hard to write your own journal of thought every three months and publish it.
[01:01:02]  Now, I do it, and it does bring me a lot of happiness.
[01:01:07]  Is it successful?
[01:01:09]  Okay.
[01:01:09]  You tell me.
[01:01:11]  There are two totally correct ways of answering that question.
[01:01:15]  The journal is seven years old.
[01:01:18]  It is being published seven years, and it has 9,000 subscribers.
[01:01:24]  To which you can say one of two things Wow.
[01:01:27]  Guy writes his own journal, his own thoughts, 9,000 people.
[01:01:32]  Pay to receive it?
[01:01:34]  That is really something.
[01:01:37]  Or you can say as follows Guy's been publishing a journal for seven years.
[01:01:43]  There are 250 million Americans.
[01:01:48]  And he has 9,000 subscribers.
[01:01:52]  Which is correct.
[01:01:54]  Both.
[01:01:55]  Here's a question.
[01:01:57]  Am I twice as happy than I was when I had 4,500 subscribers?
[01:02:01]  Isn't that absurd?
[01:02:02]  One day, God willing, I'll have 18,000 subscribers.
[01:02:05]  I'll be twice as happy as now.
[01:02:06]  Is that not absurd?
[01:02:09]  What brings me happiness from Ultimate Issues is I love to write.
[01:02:14]  I love the fact that people read what I write.
[01:02:16]  I love to put out my own journal because nobody will edit it.
[01:02:19]  And I love the mechanics of working with desktop publishing.
[01:02:24]  Okay?
[01:02:25]  I enjoy it.
[01:02:26]  So it's meaningful and enjoyable.
[01:02:28]  That's why it brings me happiness, not because of the numbers.
[01:02:32]  Of course I want bigger numbers.
[01:02:34]  I write it.
[01:02:34]  I might as well have more people read it.
[01:02:36]  That's the reason I write it.
[01:02:38]  But I started with 724 and I liked it.
[01:02:43]  And there are people who are partners in major law firms who are miserable because they are immensely successful but don't enjoy it and don't find it meaningful.
[01:02:54]  You've got to get up in the morning and be happy you're going to work, and I submit to you that there are as many bus drivers as happy to go to work as there are lawyers.
[01:03:04]  We do a very great disservice in Jewish middle class life when we tell our kids that they have very few options.
[01:03:13]  Doctor, lawyer, businessman, and that's basically where it's at.
[01:03:18]  It's not a good idea to do that.
[01:03:21]  Some people aren't meant to be doctors.
[01:03:23]  Some of our kids are meant to be carpenters.
[01:03:26]  Not working with livers and pancreases, but with lumber.
[01:03:30]  But we don't think in that way, because if your kid said, I want to be a carpenter, some Jewish parents would die.
[01:03:37]  For that, I sent you to college?
[01:03:40]  I paid all that money, so you should be a carpenter?
[01:03:42]  A Jewish boy?
[01:03:43]  Last Jewish boy was a carpenter, got a very terrible fate.
[01:03:49]  Maybe that's the reason I never thought of it, it says, correlation.
[01:03:59]  It is not success that brings people happiness.
[01:04:03]  It is rather the joy and the meaning that they find in their work.
[01:04:08]  And that is important, and that is why, by the way, I am very opposed to the poo-pooing of volunteer work.
[01:04:15]  Many volunteers, if not most, enjoy their work and have more meaning in it than paid people do in their paid work.
[01:04:23]  But because some people have equated worth with salary checks, men and women, People have done a very self destructive thing in thinking that getting paid X will make me happier than not getting paid and doing something I actually like.
[01:04:39]  If you are capable financially of volunteering in work that is meaningful, you are lucky.
[01:04:45]  Because it will bring you a lot more joy in life than another job just in order to say, I get a check.
[01:04:53]  These are some of the obstacles.
[01:04:56]  There are many.
[01:04:57]  And you know what?
[01:04:58]  I want to end with one final one.
[01:05:02]  The Norman Rockwell obstacle to happiness.
[01:05:06]  Images.
[01:05:08]  I have found, my friends, that a major source of unhappiness in people's lives is that they have an image of how their life ought to be, an image of how their husband or wife ought to be, an image of how their kids ought to be, how their family life ought to be, how their whole life ought to be.
[01:05:25]  And they compare their reality to the image and then get unhappy.
[01:05:30]  Get rid of your image.
[01:05:31]  And you might find that your reality is far more wonderful than you ever imagined.
[01:05:38]  This is something I must tell you, honestly, this was one of the most important for me to learn.
[01:05:44]  A lot of us grow up with certain images.
[01:05:47]  And if your life doesn't evolve according to that image, you're unhappy.
[01:05:52]  But there's nothing wrong with your life.
[01:05:53]  Your life is fine.
[01:05:55]  It's only in comparison to that image.
[01:05:59]  People have family ideas of, that's why I call it the Norman Rockwell thing.
[01:06:03]  of, you know, the family seated around the table.
[01:06:06]  And I remember before I was ever married where I had an image of kids around the table and basically, daddy, what does it say in Genesis 3?
[01:06:19]  I was a jerk.
[01:06:22]  I had bachelor images of children.
[01:06:25]  That's what I had.
[01:06:27]  Children are much better than sitting around the table.
[01:06:30]  They're better, but they're certainly not like that.
[01:06:33]  That's not what goes around.
[01:06:34]  And if you form your child into an image, You guarantee the livelihood of quite a number of psychiatrists later.
[01:06:43]  That's what a lot of people do with their children.
[01:06:45]  They don't let them grow, they mold them into the parental image.
[01:06:50]  And I have fought that.
[01:06:51]  I have learned not to do that.
[01:06:55]  Give you a personal statement.
[01:06:56]  It's the most personal speech I give.
[01:06:57]  My nine year old son wants to be a movie director.
[01:07:01]  I want him to be a movie director like you want to sit on pins for the rest of the evening.
[01:07:06]  Okay?
[01:07:08]  Yet, I tell him, he says to me, and he knows my feelings, but he says, Daddy, what do you think?
[01:07:14]  And I say, David, you know my answer.
[01:07:17]  I want you to enjoy whatever you do, and I want you to use whatever you do for a living to make the world a little bit better.
[01:07:23]  And if that's what you will do as a movie director, then enjoy yourself.
[01:07:27]  That's not my first choice, but I'm not him.
[01:07:30]  I'm me.
[01:07:32]  Dennis' first choice for Dennis shouldn't be Dennis' first choice for David.
[01:07:37]  David's an autonomous human being.
[01:07:39]  If he said, Daddy, I'd like to go into the rackets, that's different.
[01:07:42]  Hey?
[01:07:45]  But that's not what he has said.
[01:07:47]  You can be an honorable movie director.
[01:07:51]  And that's a very important thing.
[01:07:53]  It doesn't conform to my image.

=== Challenging Your Life's Blueprint (01:20) ===

[01:07:57]  But I don't live by that any longer.
[01:07:59]  And I have made much more peace through the reality that I have.
[01:08:02]  Things are good.
[01:08:04]  I'd like to challenge you with one today, which may be upsetting to some of you.
[01:08:07]  I don't mean to upset you.
[01:08:09]  But I don't want people walking around with ideas that are so contrary to what I think is obviously the truth that it will ultimately hurt their religion and hurt religion.
[01:08:21]  See, when religious people come out with ideas that an irrational, non religious person hears and says, but that's just not so.
[01:08:28]  Thanks very much.
[01:08:29]  It doesn't help religion.
[01:08:30]  So I'm going to challenge you with one that I have been told by many of you both on air and, of course, by here privately.
[01:08:39]  God never gives us more than we can handle.
[01:08:42]  Join us tomorrow to hear more on timeless wisdom with Dennis Prager.
[01:08:48]  Is losing weight getting harder as you get older?
[01:08:50]  It's not your fault.
[01:08:50]  You're eating better, you're moving more, but your body isn't responding anymore.
[01:08:54]  At PhD Weight Loss, they help people identify what's actually blocking fat loss and help increase your lifespan.
[01:08:59]  If you want to understand why your body isn't cooperating, call PhD Weight Loss Now and book your consultation at 864 644 1900.
[01:09:07]  Mention Dennis Prager and you get two weeks free in the program, and they'll pay for your food.
[01:09:12]  That's a $1,500 value absolutely free.
[01:09:14]  Call 864 644 1900.