Permission to Be Happy: Why Your Joy Matters More Than You Think

Your suffering doesn't serve anyone—but your radiance might.

Hi friend,

During the month of June, I have two exciting, free community offerings for you! 🎁

1. 📚 “Conscious Creators: A 5-Day Substack Gathering”: This is mostly of interest for Substack writers and starts June 16. You can find the full details here.

2. 🌻 “Permission to Thrive: A Guided Journey to Reclaim Your Spark”: This is probably something we all could use—over the last few days, I certainly realized that I needed to follow my own advice. 😅 You can sign up for this here, or read my article for a more complete introduction.

How can we be happy in a world that’s full of suffering?

Life on Earth can be excruciatingly hard.

Scarcity, wars, cruelty… the list goes on. And that's just the worst of it.

Even if we dodge the darkest tragedies, no one gets a pass on grief. Everyone who lives long enough will taste loss.

Everyone.

And maybe—just maybe—that's by design.

🤔 I love the idea of Earth as a soul's boot camp: We grow through limitation and constraint. But must growth require grinding struggle? What if we could evolve through joy instead of despite suffering?

The weight of others’ pain

When our life isn’t hard, we can always point to someone else who’s going through a hard time.

In a world of 8.1 billion people—and countless suffering animals—happiness can feel like a betrayal.

Our conditioning reinforces this:

• Religious frameworks teaching us about original sin or that "life is suffering",

• Cultural stories about starving artists and "no pain, no gain",

• The weight of history, where most of our ancestors endured unimaginable hardship.

When life does flow easily, we often react with:

• Disbelief ("This can't last")

• Dis-ease ("Why isn't this harder?")

• Guilt ("Who am I to thrive?")

Let's name that last one for what it is: a lie.

A lesson in sharing our joy from my late godfather ❤️

I once spoke with my beloved godfather when he was near death (thinking about this still makes me cry). During our call, I carefully avoided mentioning anything positive in my life or future plans. I thought I was being kind.

But my godfather stopped me. He wanted to hear about the good things. My joy wasn't hurting him—it was reminding him of life's sweetness.

Most people are like my godfather. Those who genuinely want others to be miserable are either deeply hurt or cruel. And dimming our light serves neither.

In math, minus times minus equals plus.

Math:  (-)*(-)= +

That’s just not how it works with energy. When it comes to energy and emotions, minus times minus equals… more minus. Suffering multiplied by suffering creates more suffering. It’s a downward spiral.

Energy/emotion:  (-)*(-)= downward spiral

Your thriving, on the other hand, creates positive ripples in the world:

• Your genuine smile might brighten someone's day,

• Your peaceful presence can calm a tense room,

• Your courage to live fully might others to do the same.

An invitation to thrive

If you're feeling the weight of "shoulds" and the whisper that says it's not okay to flourish—I created this for you.

Permission to Thrive is a gentle, 6-day journey beginning on June 16th and culminating on the Solstice. 🌞

You'll receive daily permission slips to:

• Begin (yes, even messily, even imperfectly),

• Change direction when your soul calls for a new path,

• Rest without earning it first,

• Be multi-passionate instead of fitting in a box,

• Succeed your way (not someone else's blueprint).

Each permission slip arrives with a small practice, a journaling prompt, and a dose of encouragement. Because thriving isn't about pushing harder—it's about coming home to yourself.

This experience includes:

• 🌱 Daily permission slips (10 minutes of soul-nourishing reflection),

• 💫 An optional live Solstice Ritual to release old stories and start writing new ones,

• 🤍 A caring community of fellow permission-seekers.

Begins June 16th - and it's my gift to you.

👉 Say yes to thriving: save your seat here

The revolution of joy

Go ahead and give yourself permission to be happy.
To live a good life.
To enjoy all the good things this world has to offer.

It's not just okay—it's necessary. Your joy is a light in this world. And we need more light, not less.

📖 Further reading: For those called to alleviate suffering while thriving: I share about effective ways to donate in this article. 

Warmly,
Louise

P.S.: Here’s the link again for “Permission to Thrive: A Guided Journey to Reclaim Your Spark”. We start June 16!

P.P.S.: You can find the details for “Conscious Creators: A 5-Day Substack Gathering)” in my note below. We start June 9 (yep, this is turning into a busy month for me...).