Dennis Prager Show - The Happiness Show That Started It All
Aired: 2026-05-08
Duration: 39:50


=== First Happy Hour Returns (09:59) ===

[00:00:00]  On today's episode of Timeless Wisdom, we found the cassette that answers the question, When was my first happiness hour?
[00:00:09]  This is from January 1999, the first happy hour.
[00:00:15]  It's coming up on Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager, and it starts right now.
[00:00:20]  Rising interest rates, stock volatility, out of control inflation.
[00:00:24]  People are concerned about what the future holds financially.
[00:00:27]  This is Dennis Prager for Amfed Coin and Bullion.
[00:00:30]  There's no better time than the present to move a portion of your IRA into precious metals.
[00:00:34]  You should know there's a right and a wrong way to set up your precious metals IRA.
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[00:00:42]  Call Amfed, coin and bullion, 800 221 7694.
[00:00:47]  AmericanFederal.com.
[00:00:49]  That's AmericanFederal.com.
[00:00:52]  Welcome to Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.
[00:00:55]  Hear thousands of hours of Dennis's lectures, courses, and classic radio programs.
[00:01:00]  And to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles, go to Dennis Prager.com.
[00:01:04]  dot com It's the happy, happy, happy, happy hour.
[00:01:21]  Yes, it is.
[00:01:22]  Hey, everybody.
[00:01:26]  It's very special what I have on tap today.
[00:01:28]  I'll explain in a moment.
[00:01:29]  But first, but first, but first, but first.
[00:01:33]  Remember, folks, come hella high water.
[00:01:36]  Blood, frogs, lice, vermin, whatever.
[00:01:38]  We have the happiness hour on Dennis Prager's show because the happy make the world better and the unhappy make it worse.
[00:01:45]  Now, everybody.
[00:01:47]  I'm listening.
[00:01:49]  Yes, it is.
[00:01:52]  We've got video up there of families dancing to this stuff.
[00:01:56]  We've got everything.
[00:01:57]  If you sing along, video it and we'll put it up too.
[00:02:02]  But it's a very serious subject, actually, happiness is.
[00:02:05]  That's why I titled my book on it, Happiness is a Serious Problem.
[00:02:08]  It certainly is.
[00:02:10]  Life is tough for the vast majority of human beings, and it's extremely tough for a lot.
[00:02:18]  I don't know.
[00:02:19]  Well, I do know, actually.
[00:02:20]  I know.
[00:02:21]  I think I know one person for whom life has been relatively easy.
[00:02:27]  But I will keep that name anonymous at this time.
[00:02:31]  But overwhelmed.
[00:02:32]  It's not me, by the way.
[00:02:33]  It is not me.
[00:02:37]  If it were me, by the way, if I had an easy life, we wouldn't have to have a happiness hour.
[00:02:42]  I would not have written a book, certainly not a book titled Happiness is a Serious Problem.
[00:02:46]  So, what's special about today?
[00:02:49]  After a great deal of searching, I've recorded most of my shows for 29 years.
[00:03:00]  We have thousands upon thousands of cassette tapes and then digital.
[00:03:06]  And we're eventually going to digitize, thanks to another great man in Nebraska.
[00:03:12]  And one great one in California found it, Alan Breeze.
[00:03:18]  And we found the cassette that answers the question when was my first happiness hour?
[00:03:25]  And it was January what?
[00:03:29]  29th, 1999.
[00:03:32]  So here it is.
[00:03:33]  Now, obviously, you don't hear the theme song.
[00:03:38]  It wasn't chosen yet.
[00:03:40]  So here is the actual.
[00:03:42]  And by the way, this is the first time, well, it's the second time I'm hearing the first few minutes.
[00:03:47]  I have not heard this.
[00:03:49]  This is as new to me as it is to you, unless you heard it that day and remember it.
[00:03:55]  I don't.
[00:03:56]  This is from January 1999.
[00:04:01]  The first happy hour.
[00:04:06]  Well, ladies and gentlemen, the music introduces a new dimension to the Dennis Prager program.
[00:04:17]  Happy hour on the Dennis Prager Show.
[00:04:26]  That's a fun theme.
[00:04:30]  Can't knock that.
[00:04:31]  It has occurred to me.
[00:04:34]  That some of you think that all I care about is good and evil, right and wrong, truth and lies, clarity and non-clarity, and you don't know the other sides of me.
[00:04:47]  And I feel cheated and cheating you.
[00:04:53]  Now, here I spend 10 years writing a book on happiness, and I never even talk about the subject on this show, and that's crazy.
[00:04:59]  So, folks, welcome to the happy hour.
[00:05:02]  By the way, we renamed it Happiness Hour over the course of time.
[00:05:06]  Go ahead.
[00:05:06]  We won't do it again.
[00:05:07]  I love that line.
[00:05:08]  If it fails, we won't do it again.
[00:05:10]  I had no idea how this would go over.
[00:05:14]  I remember my thinking, and I really remember it vividly.
[00:05:19]  Maybe people will think this is unbelievably superficial.
[00:05:22]  People might think that what is this doing on a serious talk show?
[00:05:27]  Nobody else does anything even remotely like it.
[00:05:32]  This is not your field, Dennis.
[00:05:36]  If some psychologist wants to go on radio and talk about happiness, that's fine.
[00:05:42]  I also had this in my mind that happiness is a selfish pursuit.
[00:05:47]  So here I am, a guy who wants a more decent and moral world.
[00:05:51]  Why am I spending an hour every week on something that's just selfish?
[00:05:55]  You have no idea, you really don't, how much went on in my mind against having this to come to fruition of a, what I call then happy hour, but now happiness hour.
[00:06:10]  And when I just said, can you just possibly move back 20 seconds?
[00:06:16]  When I said, if this doesn't work out, you know, we'll just drop it.
[00:06:19]  I.
[00:06:20]  I was thinking aloud.
[00:06:22]  Here we go again.
[00:06:23]  Welcome to the happy hour.
[00:06:25]  And if this fails, we won't do it again.
[00:06:29]  It's as simple as that.
[00:06:31]  But I'd like to share with you on this hour and have you ask and comment on your own happiness issues.
[00:06:43]  The problem is being happy.
[00:06:45]  By the way, does anybody know what this music is?
[00:06:48]  Anyone know?
[00:06:50]  Well, yeah, West Soundhound, but would the talking over it deflect?
[00:06:55]  I'd be very curious to try it out.
[00:06:57]  All right, continue.
[00:06:58]  Maybe a listener knows.
[00:07:00]  So today I'm going to talk to you.
[00:07:02]  I'm going to open up with one of the ideas that I could bring to your attention.
[00:07:08]  You know one of the reasons a lot of people are unhappy?
[00:07:10]  Why?
[00:07:10]  Because they think that everybody else is happier than they are.
[00:07:13]  Good point.
[00:07:14]  Which is pretty disgusting when you think about it.
[00:07:17]  Oh, I get miserable thinking about all the happy people around.
[00:07:21]  Ladies and gentlemen.
[00:07:22]  May I tell you how we sabotage our happiness in life?
[00:07:27]  Well, we do in many ways.
[00:07:29]  But let me just tell you one right now.
[00:07:33]  We compare ourselves to people we are sure are happier than we are, and then we get miserable.
[00:07:39]  I can give you example after example of this.
[00:07:45]  Oh, you do it all the time.
[00:07:47]  Do you compare your happiness to people you think are less happy?
[00:07:52]  You compare yourself to people you think are more happy.
[00:07:57]  Now, remember, this is 1999, and I had just spent, as you heard, 10 years.
[00:08:05]  In fact, it was so long, it took so long for me to write the happiness book that I gave the money back to Random House because I didn't have it in on time.
[00:08:16]  I actually paid back the advance, and then HarperCollins picked it up.
[00:08:23]  And I've been with HarperCollins since.
[00:08:25]  And my next book is still The Last Best Hope, is my next book.
[00:08:34]  And that too will be HarperCollins.
[00:08:36]  But that was, remember, this is the culmination of massive amounts of both talking in speeches, not on radio, and writing.
[00:08:48]  So here we continue.
[00:08:49]  And this is a big one.
[00:08:50]  I'm fascinated that I picked as my first topic.
[00:08:53]  We compare ourselves to people we think are happier than us.
[00:08:57]  I think it's one of the big five.
[00:09:00]  That is so human to do.
[00:09:04]  You know, everybody does it.
[00:09:08]  The guys who are on the Forbes 400 wealthiest Americans don't compare themselves to the 300 million Americans poorer than them.
[00:09:19]  They compare themselves to the 166 ahead of them on the Forbes list.
[00:09:25]  That is the way it works, my friends.
[00:09:27]  That is the way it works.
[00:09:29]  We continue.
[00:09:30]  They're not, or very rarely are they.
[00:09:34]  Let me give you a great quote.
[00:09:35]  This quote will change your life.
[00:09:37]  It's not for me, it's a woman named Helen Tolushkin who made this up.
[00:09:40]  But if you memorize this quote, You will immediately be a happier person if comparing yourself to people you think are happier is part of your misery.
[00:09:50]  And that is this.
[00:09:53]  I will even use a reverberant sound to impact it even greater.

=== Happiness Lies With Strangers (03:14) ===

[00:09:59]  The only people I know who are happy are people I don't know well.
[00:10:05]  We need to remember.
[00:10:07]  There's a great line that she said The only people I know who are happy, the only happy people I know are people I don't know well.
[00:10:12]  By the way, folks, that is one of the great lines of world history.
[00:10:17]  And I can say it because I didn't come up with it.
[00:10:20]  The great late Helen Talushkin did, and it's worth putting over your bathroom mirror to see it every day.
[00:10:29]  The only happy people I know are people I don't know well.
[00:10:33]  She came out with that spontaneously when I was in high school, and it is amazing it stuck with me.
[00:10:40]  You know what sticks with me?
[00:10:41]  Ideas.
[00:10:42]  Dialogue doesn't.
[00:10:44]  And I paid a big price.
[00:10:45]  Events don't dialogue, but ideas stay with me.
[00:10:50]  And I was in high school when she said it.
[00:10:54]  Her son, Joseph Talushkin, today one of the preeminent Jewish thinkers and writers, had biblical literacy, Jewish literacy, I mean, a whole of like a dozen books.
[00:11:07]  Anyway, we were in her kitchen.
[00:11:09]  We were talking about kids in our class we thought were happy.
[00:11:14]  She closed the refrigerator door and said, Boys, let me tell you something the only happy people I know are people I don't know well.
[00:11:24]  And it's so true because as soon as you know anybody well, you know how much pain they have in their life.
[00:11:29]  It's if you don't know them well, you don't know.
[00:11:33]  We'll be back 1 8 Prager 776.
[00:11:39]  This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.
[00:11:45]  Precious metals dealers come and go.
[00:11:47]  This is Nick Grovich, president of Amphed Coin and Bullion.
[00:11:50]  We've stood the test of time since 1983.
[00:11:53]  With the flurry of coin and bullion dealers coming and going, how do you know who to trust?
[00:11:57]  And what to buy at Amfed Coin and Bullion.
[00:11:59]  We value educated consumers.
[00:12:01]  We want to alert you to good bullion buys in the market and help you steer clear of the tricks and bad deals.
[00:12:07]  Call Amfed Coin and Bullion for a free coin performance review 800 221 7694 or AmericanFederal.com.
[00:12:17]  Now, back to more of Dennis Craig's timeless wisdom.
[00:12:26]  When you're crying, you bring on the ring.
[00:12:32]  Stop your shine.
[00:12:39]  From the wisefoodstorage.com studios, gourmet emergency meals at the best prices, wisefoodstorage.com.
[00:12:47]  I'm Dennis Prager.
[00:12:48]  The Happiness Hour.
[00:12:50]  We unearthed my first Happiness Hour, then called Happy Hour, from, let's see, it would be 12, almost 13, no, no, 12 and a half years ago.
[00:13:03]  January 99.
[00:13:04]  99 is when my book on happiness came out.
[00:13:07]  It was a gamble, a big gamble.
[00:13:08]  What to you now is a given?
[00:13:12]  Oh, Dennison, his happiness hour.

=== The Gamble of Joy (08:17) ===

[00:13:14]  I mean, to be honest, that's the first thing most people who meet me in the street or at a speech say I love your happiness hour.
[00:13:21]  But like so much in life, you take a gamble, you flirt with failure in order to have a big success.
[00:13:32]  I had no idea that this would succeed.
[00:13:36]  None.
[00:13:37]  And you heard me say, look, if this doesn't work.
[00:13:40]  We don't do it again.
[00:13:43]  I would have been absolutely unsurprised if I didn't get a single call.
[00:13:49]  Or if the only calls I got were, Dennis, come on, you talk about serious subjects.
[00:13:53]  What is this, a happy hour?
[00:13:54]  What are you, at a bar?
[00:13:57]  Right?
[00:13:57]  That's the way people associated happy hour.
[00:13:59]  In fact, I used to say our happy hour is the only one you don't get inebriated in, and you still leave happier.
[00:14:06]  In fact, you do leave happier.
[00:14:09]  So I'd be curious when you first met the happiness hour.
[00:14:14]  1 8 Prager 776.
[00:14:16]  And what I'm listening for the first time.
[00:14:19]  I have not heard any of this.
[00:14:22]  I purposely didn't want this to be as spontaneous for me as it is for you.
[00:14:27]  And I picked a great subject for the first broadcast on happiness.
[00:14:33]  And that is that we compare ourselves to others that we think are happier than us.
[00:14:38]  All right, continue.
[00:14:40]  Everybody that you know, well, you know how much pain and unhappiness they have had in their lives, right?
[00:14:49]  It's only people you don't know well that you assume have been much freer of pain and unhappiness than you have.
[00:14:59]  But as soon as you get to know people, I'll never forget, this was really a dramatic moment for me.
[00:15:05]  I know this.
[00:15:06]  And by the way, the moment you really know this, the moment you really know this, you'll never be jealous again.
[00:15:11]  And jealousy is one of the greatest obstacles to happiness in the human condition.
[00:15:17]  People are jealous and they get unhappy.
[00:15:19]  Jealousy is totally subversive.
[00:15:22]  But there's nothing to be jealous of.
[00:15:23]  But let me tell you how we could play tricks on ourselves.
[00:15:25]  I am very brain-centered, and I know what I'm telling you to be true, and I have incorporated into my life.
[00:15:32]  But listen to this.
[00:15:34]  A few years ago, I was on a book tour for the book prior to my book, Unhappiness.
[00:15:39]  And I was in a, I won't say what city, because it's possible it could be traced to, you know, somebody listening could figure it out.
[00:15:47]  And I don't want to betray a confidence.
[00:15:51]  But I was on a major city in the South, major American city.
[00:15:56]  I was on this talk show during the day.
[00:16:00]  And this talk show host was in his 30s.
[00:16:03]  Very successful, primetime show, good-looking guy.
[00:16:09]  He has a picture in the studio of his wife and children.
[00:16:11]  She's beautiful.
[00:16:12]  The kids are beautiful.
[00:16:14]  This guy is happy.
[00:16:16]  He's telling me how much he loves living in this city.
[00:16:19]  And I think to myself.
[00:16:21]  which is the way most of us do think.
[00:16:24]  I'm thinking, my God, I think I may have met a guy who has everything.
[00:16:30]  Well, we continue the interview, and then there's, of course, a commercial break.
[00:16:36]  During the commercial break, we start talking about our mutual love of computers and how we both love the Internet.
[00:16:46]  And he says to me, Dennis, I can't tell you how valuable I find the Internet.
[00:16:51]  And I say, really, me too.
[00:16:53]  He said, well, let me tell you.
[00:16:55]  I type in multiple sclerosis and I have learned so much about that disease.
[00:17:04]  I said, well, why do you concern yourself with multiple sclerosis?
[00:17:09]  Because my wife has it.
[00:17:13]  And I tell you, I have the chills as I relate that story to you because I remember thinking, Dennis, you fool.
[00:17:22]  You violated your own knowledge, your own principles of happiness in thinking, well, here's a guy bereft of problems.
[00:17:34]  No one is.
[00:17:35]  No one, no one, no one, no one.
[00:17:37]  People, even if they don't have a wife with multiple sclerosis or a child who's ill or something, people have demons.
[00:17:45]  Every single human on earth has demons.
[00:17:48]  Every one of you listening has demons.
[00:17:51]  Something in you that is self-destructive that pushes you into arenas that will hurt you.
[00:18:01]  For this one, it's in the area of emotions.
[00:18:05]  For this one, in sex.
[00:18:06]  For this one, in booze.
[00:18:07]  For this one, in drugs.
[00:18:09]  For this one in money, for this one in power, for this one it's in security, for this one it's in the physical realm.
[00:18:15]  I mean, it's endless.
[00:18:20]  So we compare ourselves to, I'll tell you another reason people compare themselves to others and think others are happier.
[00:18:26]  All around you are images of happy people, right?
[00:18:29]  Everybody is smiling in ads.
[00:18:31]  Everybody is smiling on billboards.
[00:18:33]  Did you ever see a picture of your grandparents?
[00:18:37]  I'll bet you you don't have one picture of a smiling grandparent.
[00:18:41]  Certainly, if you're my generation.
[00:18:43]  Let me remind you, you're listening to what we finally found the first broadcast of the Happiness Hour, January 1999.
[00:18:51]  Okay, continue.
[00:18:53]  You see any pictures?
[00:18:54]  I was just watching The Civil War on PBS.
[00:18:58]  On tape.
[00:18:59]  It's not on PBS now.
[00:19:00]  I bought it on tape.
[00:19:01]  On tape.
[00:19:02]  And it's a terrific series.
[00:19:03]  By the way, let me explain for some of the younger listeners.
[00:19:07]  Prior to Netflix, people used tape to watch movies.
[00:19:13]  It would move across from one spool to another spool.
[00:19:18]  It wasn't that long ago.
[00:19:19]  You actually.
[00:19:20]  No, you can't use it with me, Sean.
[00:19:29]  It's amazing.
[00:19:30]  The president feels powerful when he enters Air Force One.
[00:19:34]  Sean feels powerful when he puts on the laugh track.
[00:19:39]  All right, we continue.
[00:19:43]  Gotten all these awards, correctly so, deservedly so.
[00:19:46]  And all the pictures from the Civil War, not one person is smiling.
[00:19:51]  And I don't mean wounded soldiers.
[00:19:52]  I mean before they became soldiers, after they got home.
[00:19:56]  Not one person in any picture, not one general, not one private, not one civilian is smiling.
[00:20:03]  Because it never occurred to them, why would I smile for a picture?
[00:20:06]  Who walks around smiling?
[00:20:08]  People who walk around smiling all the time are institutionalized.
[00:20:12]  Right?
[00:20:12]  Right.
[00:20:14]  So, we walk around thinking these other people are all happier than us, and that makes you more unhappy.
[00:20:21]  This is the happy hour, a new innovation on my show.
[00:20:25]  Maybe we'll do it third hour Fridays.
[00:20:26]  We'll see how it goes.
[00:20:27]  A lot of you are calling, which is already a semi precious stone.
[00:20:33]  And it's important stuff.
[00:20:36]  I've come to realize how critical happiness is.
[00:20:39]  It took me a long time, my friends.
[00:20:40]  It took me a long time to realize that happiness was not just a selfish psychological pursuit.
[00:20:46]  But a moral obligation.
[00:20:49]  1 8 Prager 776, the happiness hour.
[00:20:53]  This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.
[00:20:59]  Precious metals dealers come and go.
[00:21:02]  This is Nick Grovich, president of Amfed Coin and Bullion.
[00:21:05]  We've stood the test of time since 1983.
[00:21:07]  With the flurry of coin and bullion dealers coming and going, how do you know who to trust and what to buy?
[00:21:12]  At Amfed Coin and Bullion, we value educated consumers.
[00:21:16]  We want to alert you to good bullion buys in the market and help you steer clear of the tricks and bad deals.
[00:21:21]  Call Amfed Coin and Bullion for a free coin performance review.
[00:21:26]  800 221 7694 or AmericanFederal.com.

=== Trusting Precious Metals Dealers (15:29) ===

[00:21:31]  It's so important to make someone happy.
[00:21:35]  Make just one.
[00:21:37]  Now, back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.
[00:21:40]  Heart to heart, you.
[00:21:41]  You sing to one smile that cheers you.
[00:21:44]  One face that lights when it leaves you.
[00:21:57]  One girl, you're.
[00:21:58]  You're everything, too.
[00:22:00]  That's what a man wants to be.
[00:22:02]  Everything to his woman.
[00:22:06]  There was more wisdom in that song than in the entire departments of women's and gender studies at all of the universities put together.
[00:22:20]  If all you knew was what Jimmy Durante sang, you could lead a better life than getting a PhD in gender studies or women's studies in terms of interaction with the opposite sex.
[00:22:32]  I say it with no joy, but anyway, that's why we founded Prague University to undo what most universities do.
[00:22:39]  Welcome back to the Happiness Hour.
[00:22:42]  And it's a real special one today because I am playing for you the first Happiness Hour I ever did, 1999.
[00:22:53]  Let me take some calls here.
[00:22:55]  And it's fun to listen to.
[00:22:58]  That's the reason I have not heard it.
[00:23:00]  So I have no idea what I'm about to say, but I'm pretty much of the same opinion as then.
[00:23:07]  Here is someone who claims to have heard that first show, Michael, in Prescott, Arizona.
[00:23:12]  Hi, Michael.
[00:23:14]  Hi.
[00:23:14]  Well, I claim and I actually did hear it.
[00:23:17]  How do you know you heard the first?
[00:23:20]  I don't know.
[00:23:20]  You've talked about Mrs. Toleshkin and that insight more than once.
[00:23:24]  So, you know, it's possible I'm just sort of retrofitting.
[00:23:28]  But I just remember because you were the only person that I'd ever heard up until then to talk about happiness.
[00:23:36]  I went to law school with Michael Josephson, by the way, and I didn't know him, but, you know, he came on to be prominent in the ethics arena.
[00:23:45]  Yeah, but I never heard anyone before you talk about that, and I think that's probably your greatest insight.
[00:23:55]  The idea that people compare no matter what they feel like, they always think somebody else is better off emotionally.
[00:24:08]  Right.
[00:24:08]  I never heard anyone, and I just, 1999, that's not that long ago.
[00:24:12]  I've been listening to you for many more years than that, and so I do remember that program.
[00:24:17]  I was in Fullerton in those days, and so heard it on KRLA or the previous station, wherever you were.
[00:24:24]  No, I'll tell you, I'm very touched.
[00:24:25]  Thank you very much.
[00:24:28]  It is a big one, the comparing.
[00:24:29]  And it's in the book, by the way.
[00:24:31]  It's one of the chapters in the book.
[00:24:32]  Of course, I've done so many shows.
[00:24:34]  How many shows does that mean?
[00:24:35]  If I started in January 99, so.
[00:24:40]  Yeah.
[00:24:45]  Figure 40?
[00:24:46]  Why?
[00:24:46]  45 even?
[00:24:49]  Oh, okay.
[00:24:49]  Just for, yeah.
[00:24:50]  Okay.
[00:24:52]  So 440.
[00:24:54]  440.
[00:24:56]  Yeah, so even closer to 500.
[00:24:59]  Yeah, 500 shows.
[00:25:01]  And I would say that we've had about 300 topics.
[00:25:08]  So obviously, vast numbers of these are not in the book on happiness.
[00:25:13]  Let's go to another call here.
[00:25:16]  And thank you, Michael.
[00:25:17]  I appreciate that a lot.
[00:25:19]  Let's go to, let's stay in Arizona for a moment.
[00:25:21]  Phoenix and Mike.
[00:25:22]  Hello, Mike.
[00:25:23]  Dennis Prager.
[00:25:24]  Hi, Dennis.
[00:25:25]  How are you today?
[00:25:25]  Okay, thanks.
[00:25:27]  We're calling you Dr. Happiness.
[00:25:29]  That's nice.
[00:25:29]  I like that title.
[00:25:31]  I did hear your first program.
[00:25:33]  Now that I'm hearing it again, I've been listening to you for a long time, and I use some of your teachings on my children.
[00:25:39]  My 21 year old just got married, and when she was 12, she came to me and said, Daddy, I'm bored.
[00:25:45]  And I said, Well, honey, then you must be a boring person.
[00:25:48]  And she goes, That's not very nice.
[00:25:50]  And I said, Honey, you can choose to do anything you want.
[00:25:53]  You could read a book, you could call your friends, you could ride your bike, but you come to me to make you happy?
[00:25:58]  You need to decide this on your own.
[00:26:00]  So she went and she read a book.
[00:26:02]  And then two weeks later, the best part of this whole story, she comes back and says, Daddy, I'm.
[00:26:07]  Never mind.
[00:26:09]  And she walks around.
[00:26:10]  I love it.
[00:26:11]  I love it.
[00:26:13]  Well, I get credit for that, and I am very, very delighted.
[00:26:19]  My kids stopped.
[00:26:20]  I am bored.
[00:26:21]  They gave up on that so fast, just like his daughter, because that would be my line.
[00:26:26]  Then you're boring.
[00:26:28]  There is no excuse for being bored in the world in which we live.
[00:26:33]  You're in solitary confinement.
[00:26:35]  Or, I don't know, you just collect cow dung all day in medieval Europe.
[00:26:42]  Maybe you have a right to say, I'm bored.
[00:26:46]  But there's no right to say that in the world in which we live and the opportunities that are available to us.
[00:26:54]  Take more of your calls, and we'll hear who the first caller ever was to that show when we come back on the Dennis Prager Happiness Hour.
[00:27:04]  This episode of Timeless Wisdom will continue right after this.
[00:27:11]  Rising interest rates, stock volatility, out of control inflation.
[00:27:15]  People are concerned about what the future holds financially.
[00:27:17]  This is Dennis Prager for Amfed Coin and Bullion.
[00:27:20]  There's no better time in the present to move a portion of your IRA into precious metals.
[00:27:24]  You should know there's a right and a wrong way to set up your precious metals IRA.
[00:27:29]  Mistakes could cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars in IRS fines.
[00:27:32]  Call Amfed Coin and Bullion 800 221 7694.
[00:27:38]  AmericanFederal.com.
[00:27:39]  That's AmericanFederal.com.
[00:27:43]  Now, back to more of Dennis Prager's Timeless Wisdom.
[00:27:49]  You'll never hear this particular one again.
[00:27:54]  We found the recording of my first Happiness Hour.
[00:27:57]  This is the Happiness Hour on the Dennis Prager Show.
[00:28:00]  Every Friday, second hour.
[00:28:01]  I gave it a try 12 years ago, 12 and a half years ago.
[00:28:09]  And even said, if this doesn't work, well, we just won't do it again.
[00:28:12]  But it worked.
[00:28:14]  And my first subject was people comparing themselves to others, and we compare ourselves always to those we think are happier than us, who've had a less difficult life, and then makes us even more unhappy.
[00:28:30]  Continue, please.
[00:28:32]  I've come to realize how critical happiness is in people's lives.
[00:28:35]  Cindy, in your car, thanks for calling.
[00:28:38]  Hi, am I on?
[00:28:39]  You are indeed.
[00:28:40]  Okay, I think this is a great idea.
[00:28:42]  Good.
[00:28:43]  Anyway, my comment is that I am a very happy person, and I think that people get turned off.
[00:28:47]  When you're too happy.
[00:28:50]  And thinking about the story you just told, that when you're looking at someone's life, everyone has demons.
[00:28:59]  Well, that's also part of figuring out that nothing's perfect and life isn't perfect, so you have to just make the best of it.
[00:29:07]  And I think also people get turned off if you're too unhappy.
[00:29:12]  Whenever someone goes through something, I'm sure everyone has had a bad time.
[00:29:16]  Right, so people are turned off if you're very unhappy or if you're very happy.
[00:29:22]  Well, that's a very good question.
[00:29:25]  In other words, it's easy to turn people off.
[00:29:27]  All right.
[00:29:27]  I was curious to know what the first call would be.
[00:29:30]  And that was it.
[00:29:32]  Cindy, wherever Cindy is.
[00:29:34]  Cindy, if you're listening, love to hear from you.
[00:29:38]  We'll give you some sort of prize.
[00:29:41]  Wasilla, Alaska, and Curtis.
[00:29:45]  Hello, Curtis.
[00:29:46]  Dennis Prager.
[00:29:47]  Hello, Dennis.
[00:29:48]  It's very nice to talk to you.
[00:29:49]  Thank you for taking my call.
[00:29:51]  Thank you.
[00:29:54]  So, what I was telling the person I just spoke with is that I heard a Oh, several years ago, that you should be kind to everyone you meet because everyone you meet is in a great battle.
[00:30:06]  And it's similar to what you spoke a while ago about your friend who thought you had the most happy person you'd ever met.
[00:30:12]  So that's what I do.
[00:30:13]  I try to do it.
[00:30:14]  It's not always that, but be kind.
[00:30:16]  Everyone's in a great battle.
[00:30:19]  Excellent.
[00:30:19]  When did you first become acquainted with this Happiness Hour?
[00:30:24]  Well, in just the last few months, I've been listening to you for a couple of years, but maybe the happy hour didn't really connect.
[00:30:30]  But I've paid more attention to it in your recent months, yes.
[00:30:35]  Well, thank you for that.
[00:30:36]  By the way, there are a few people, and then it is few, it's overwhelmingly popular.
[00:30:42]  But I periodically will get an email, and it's always from a guy.
[00:30:45]  I've never gotten this from a woman.
[00:30:48]  And that is, that is, love your show, listen, everything except the happiness hour.
[00:30:53]  I'm a political junkie.
[00:30:56]  And I always wonder is that person introspective?
[00:31:03]  It's not, you know, I don't hold it against the person, obviously, but I just wonder if you are only interested in politics, and there are such people, right and left, then obviously I have to believe you're not terribly introspective.
[00:31:20]  What is going on inside of me?
[00:31:24]  And I can't live such a life.
[00:31:29]  The micro and the macro are both incredibly important.
[00:31:33]  All righty, let's go to Chad in Los Angeles, California.
[00:31:36]  Hello, Chad.
[00:31:36]  Dennis Prager.
[00:31:38]  Hello, Dennis.
[00:31:38]  How are you?
[00:31:39]  Okay, thanks.
[00:31:41]  Great.
[00:31:42]  I was calling the quote the only happy people I know are people I don't know well.
[00:31:52]  Right, I disagree with that.
[00:31:53]  I feel that I know quite a few people that are happy.
[00:31:58]  I myself am very happy.
[00:32:00]  I don't have a perfect life, everybody has problems.
[00:32:04]  Well, that's what she meant, though.
[00:32:06]  That's what, you see, you're fully right.
[00:32:09]  If you take her literally, then of course it's not true.
[00:32:12]  There are happy people, obviously.
[00:32:14]  But that's not what she really meant.
[00:32:17]  She really meant to say, don't be fooled.
[00:32:20]  Please know that everybody has real burdens and pains.
[00:32:26]  Okay.
[00:32:26]  Okay, so I'm glad you called, and I'm glad to make that clear.
[00:32:31]  Most of the time, when I have given that quote, when I have cited that quote, I think the.
[00:32:37]  The live audiences, I can never tell from the radio, but a live audience will laugh, and it's not because they don't think that there are any happy people on earth.
[00:32:48]  They laugh because of the deeper truth of it.
[00:32:51]  That don't get fooled by thinking this other person is happy go lucky and they have a painless life.
[00:33:00]  There's no such thing.
[00:33:02]  Okay, and let's go to Orange, California, and Diane.
[00:33:07]  Diane Dennis Prager, hi.
[00:33:09]  Hi, Dennis.
[00:33:09]  Hi.
[00:33:10]  I just wanted to tell you I remember distinctly the first happiness hour because I have multiple sclerosis.
[00:33:15]  Oh, really?
[00:33:17]  And when you gave that example, I went, you know what?
[00:33:19]  Dennis is right.
[00:33:21]  And I'm happy anyway, but something like that is just not going to make you unhappy.
[00:33:28]  It's how you react to it.
[00:33:30]  There was a quote that I cited recently.
[00:33:35]  A very popular sportscaster died, and he had, I think, some terrible cancer.
[00:33:42]  And he said, and I quoted him on the show this past week, I think.
[00:33:47]  In the obituary, they mentioned this.
[00:33:49]  He said, What is it?
[00:33:51]  Life is 80% what is given to you, and No, no.
[00:33:55]  20% is what you're dealt, and 80% is how you react to it.
[00:34:01]  You can't control the wind, but you can adjust your sails.
[00:34:04]  God, there must be so many sayings that say that same thing.
[00:34:08]  Yeah.
[00:34:09]  Well, that's very touching to me that you have multiple sclerosis and heard the first show.
[00:34:15]  Yes, and I know you've told that story since, but even then it just hit me like a ton of bricks, and I really love your show, Denny.
[00:34:22]  Well, God bless you, and I mean that.
[00:34:25]  Wow.
[00:34:30]  You know what I would like?
[00:34:32]  I would like to know how many sayings there are that make that same point.
[00:34:38]  It's not, I'll give you another one.
[00:34:41]  It's not the cards you're dealt, it's how you play them.
[00:34:45]  You know, so we now have the wind in the sails.
[00:34:48]  Any of you know more, either come on in on the phone or send me an email.
[00:34:55]  You're listening to The Dennis Prager Show.
[00:35:13]  I played for you today the first Happiness Hour.
[00:35:16]  We found it, and it's been a lot of fun.
[00:35:19]  And let me take as many calls I can before the end of this particular hour, celebrating 12 and a half years consecutively of the Happiness Hour.
[00:35:34]  And let's see here.
[00:35:36]  Hmm, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Marianne.
[00:35:39]  Dennis Prager, hi.
[00:35:41]  Dennis, good afternoon.
[00:35:42]  It's a pleasure to speak with you.
[00:35:43]  Thank you.
[00:35:44]  I've been listening to your show for about three years.
[00:35:47]  2008 got me started, and if there was one hour of radio time I have a week, it would have to be the happiness hour.
[00:35:55]  Wherever I am, I try to tune into it because it really does make a difference in my life.
[00:36:00]  And the happy people really do make the world happier.
[00:36:04]  Make the world better.
[00:36:05]  Make the world better.
[00:36:07]  They do make the world better.
[00:36:08]  That's right.
[00:36:09]  And one of my happiest friends is a woman who lost her husband quite unexpectedly 18 months ago, and yet every day she greets with a smile and the decision to choose to be happy.
[00:36:20]  And it's a great blessing to me.
[00:36:24]  One of my favorite happiness quotes is by Ray Bradbury.
[00:36:28]  I'm sure you're familiar with it.
[00:36:29]  You can make yourself happy or miserable, it's the same amount of effort.
[00:36:34]  That's terrific.
[00:36:36]  You know, I'll tell you the truth.
[00:36:37]  We ought to collect some of these because, you know, the collective wisdom of the audience is infinitely greater than mine.
[00:36:45]  And so I defer to you in that sense, and I would love to have you send me some intelligent quotes.
[00:36:53]  One of our favorite, and we have it on the happiness video at Prager University, is Lincoln's.
[00:36:59]  We decide.

=== Choosing Your Own Happiness (02:49) ===

[00:37:00]  What is it?
[00:37:03]  We decide to be as happy as.
[00:37:06]  No, we.
[00:37:08]  No, no.
[00:37:09]  My favorite quote, and I'm walling it.
[00:37:12]  Anyway, it's essentially that we decide whether to be happy or not.
[00:37:15]  It's as simple as that, and it's very.
[00:37:17]  That's obviously critical.
[00:37:19]  Carmen in Paris, California.
[00:37:21]  Hi.
[00:37:22]  Yeah, my name is Carmen, and I like to hear your show.
[00:37:25]  It's beautiful, especially I learn more from my husband because he loves your show.
[00:37:31]  So, and I learn more the language because I hear your voice and I took classes and I get more proficient in the language.
[00:37:40]  But, you know, that still has some kind of.
[00:37:42]  Well, that means a lot to me.
[00:37:44]  A lot of immigrants have told me that they have learned a lot of English through listening to the show.
[00:37:51]  And I think of that all the time, and it's one of the reasons I try to speak as clearly and not too fast as possible.
[00:37:58]  So, on this anniversary, forgive me if I didn't get to your call.
[00:38:02]  It was a once in a lifetime review of the first show.
[00:38:07]  Now, call in on anything under the sun.
[00:38:13]  Well, ladies and gentlemen, the music introduces a new dimension to the Dennis Prager program.
[00:38:22]  On tomorrow's episode of Dennis Teaches the Torah, a lot of people believe that the purpose of life is having.
[00:38:31]  children and in Jewish life, there's a particular sense of naches from children.
[00:38:39]  Many of you have heard the term naches.
[00:38:40]  It's both Yiddish and Hebrew.
[00:38:42]  It means joy and pride in some combination thereof.
[00:38:47]  And that the purpose of life is to have naches from your children.
[00:38:50]  And that's not true.
[00:38:51]  And woe unto the child whose parents feel that way.
[00:38:56]  Come back tomorrow for Dennis Prager's signature series on the first five books of the Bible.
[00:39:00]  Dennis teaches the Torah.
[00:39:03]  This has been Timeless Wisdom with Dennis Prager.
[00:39:06]  Visit Dennis Prager.com for thousands of hours of Dennis' lectures, courses, and classic radio programs, and to purchase Dennis Prager's Rational Bibles.
[00:39:20]  Rising interest rates, stock volatility, out of control inflation.
[00:39:23]  People are concerned about what the future holds financially.
[00:39:26]  This is Dennis Prager for Amfed Coin and Bullion.
[00:39:29]  There's no better time than the present to move a portion of your IRA into precious metals.
[00:39:33]  You should know there's a right and a wrong way to set up your precious metals IRA.
[00:39:37]  Mistakes could cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars in IRS fines.
[00:39:41]  Call AmFed, coin and bullion, 800-221-7694, AmericanFederal.com, that's AmericanFederal.com.