Episode 135
Making Happiness a Conscious Choice and Lifelong Practice with Karen Guggenheim
The happiness we used to know was like a reward, something that shows up once life finally goes our way. But what if that moment never comes? What if life hands you unimaginable loss instead, and you're left trying to piece together who you are and what comes next? The truth is, happiness isn’t a finish line. It’s a conscious choice, and a lifelong practice. And no one embodies that truth more powerfully than Karen Guggenheim.
Karen Guggenheim is the founder and CEO of WOHASU®, the organization behind the World Happiness Summit. A leading voice in global well-being, she is recognized for turning personal adversity into a powerful mission: helping individuals and organizations thrive through science-based strategies for happiness.
Most recently, Karen led the expansion of WOHASU to the United Nations and global cities, advancing the conversation on mental health and well-being at the highest levels. Karen is the author of Cultivating Happiness: Overcome trauma and positively transform your life.
In this episode of the Happiness Squad Podcast, Ashish Kothari and Karen Guggenheim, explore what it means to treat happiness not as a fleeting emotion, but as a conscious, lifelong practice.
Things you will also learn in this episode:
• Defining happiness as a framework, not a feeling
• The misunderstood nature of happiness
• The urgent need for systemic change in how we lead, work, and educate
• Why forgiveness is the most challenging but transformational pillar of personal growth
• What every leader, parent, and teacher needs to hear about happiness
This episode will remind you that happiness is not something you wait for, but something you build, even in the aftermath of heartbreak. Give it a listen, and you’ll never think about happiness the same way again.
Resources:
• Karen Guggenheim: http://karenguggenheim.com/
• World Happiness Summit: https://worldhappinesssummit.com/
• Wellbeing Leadership Certification by World Happiness Summit: https://worldhappinesssummit.com/wellbeing-leadership-certification/
• World Wellbeing Policy Forum: https://wohasu.com/portfolio/world-wellbeing-policy-forum/
• Conscious Entrepreneur Summit: https://events.humanitix.com/2025-conscious-entrepreneur-summit
• The Bridge to Happiness by Karen Guggenheim at TEDxMiami: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcgJo9IGxxk
• World Happiness Summit on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-mbWbPUjzHCVQ0iU3rmCsQ
• Dr. Fred Luskin - Forgiveness and Happiness from WOHASU: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaklxaKGWNU&pp=0gcJCdgAo7VqN5tD
• Truth and Reconciliation Commission with Desmond Tutu: https://www.theforgivenessproject.com/stories-library/desmond-tutu/
Books:
• Cultivating Happiness by Karen Guggenheim: https://amzn.eu/d/hla8Eey
• The Book of Forgiving: The Fourfold Path for Healing Ourselves and Our World by Desmond Tutu and Mpho Tutu: https://a.co/d/0GYRdSx
• Hardwired for Happiness by Ashish Kothari:https://amzn.eu/d/1ZdsT4g
Transcript
Ashish Kothari:
Karen, it is so lovely to have you on our Happiness Squad podcast. Thank you for joining us today.
Karen Guggenheim:
Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. It's my pleasure to be here with you.
Ashish Kothari:
Karen, you have such an amazing and inspiring story. You and I had a chance to meet for the first time two and a half years ago. I was still at McKinsey, and I think we got connected through Jacqueline Brassey. I heard about WOHASU, and I mean, it's just an amazing movement you've started.
Tell us a little bit about your own personal journey and what got you into the field of happiness. You talk a lot about it in your book, you've talked about it in your speech, but I would love to share your origin story into this massive movement that you've created.
Karen Guggenheim:
Pain. Pain. Pain is a great catalyst for change. I made a radical choice for happiness about 12 years ago. My husband caught a flu that developed into pneumonia, and in a short period of time, he passed away.
At first, I didn’t really want to live because I had been married half my life and he was my best friend. My first inclination was to shut down from life. Then I remembered I had children, and I couldn’t have that luxury—at least I felt it would be a luxury not to feel.
So I decided to live for my kids. In that choice, I thought: okay, big pain—it's gotta be something magical, great. And I called it happiness. I didn’t know about the science or the frameworks, but I just knew intuitively that was going to be my choice. So I chose happiness.
The very next step was: how to do that? Two things. One was, I have to feel my feelings—and those were going to be painful, and I didn’t know how long that would last. The other was: what do I control from this uncontrollable situation? I could control making meaning and having a purpose.
That’s what I did. Four months after he died, I was getting an MBA at Georgetown University and moving forward. But the very first thing was walking into the pain. It’s still painful today. It’s not as painful as it was, but my goodness, it's still disappointing. I wish he were here today. He’d get a kick out of all this.
He was a physician and an executive in the medical industry. He was very much about helping people—an incredibly kind person. He was a scientist. The work I do is my homage to him—to who he was as a person. He was incredibly pro-social and kind and also valued science and evidence very, very much. What I do with my work is really try to keep him alive in a sense, in my work and in my every day.
Ashish Kothari:
Karen, thank you for sharing that. The way you started—pain—there is so much of it in the world right now. So much loss. And what you followed with is key: choice. You chose not to ignore the pain, not to numb the pain, not to pretend it was going to go away, but actually chose happiness.
The decision to move on—for your kids, for others in your life—is a really important central message. It’s in your book. It’s in what I write about so much: that happiness is a choice. And happiness is so much more than an emotion.
Karen Guggenheim:
Exactly. That’s what I want to preface. I want to really stress that—even then—I understood it wasn’t "haha happiness" or just joy. I knew I had to architect my life under the framework of happiness.
Knowing that life has ups and downs—for example, I think the first time we spoke I was in Nicaragua. I was born in Nicaragua. I had a complex childhood and situations. I know life is really challenging. I’ve seen that.
So I just want everybody listening to understand: I didn’t choose to just experience positive emotions for the rest of my life, which would be amazing. But I knew that wasn’t true. I had to find a framework. One that was hopeful, optimistic—understanding that this was a big trauma in our lives that most likely would have an impact forever. And it will have an impact forever. But that’s just the way it is.
Ashish Kothari:
I always equate life to trees. Like the inner rings to the outer rings—life has rings. That ring, that tragic moment, never really goes away. We can grow around it, but it’s not something that just leaves you. It’s our choice to make something of it. And you made such a beautiful choice—not just for yourself, but for the millions you’re actually touching through the movement you sparked.
Karen Guggenheim:
Thank you for that. What happened is that I became happy again—accidentally. When I found out there was a science, a framework, methods to teach this—because it's teachable and learnable—you just have to do it all the time. It’s not a one-off.
That’s the thing people miss. There’s no five quick tips or tools to happiness. It’s a whole cocktail that you have to put together—that the individual has to put together.
Now, there are some general components that apply to everyone: like relationships, your physical body, a sense of spirituality, a sense of community, having a purpose. It’s very difficult to be happy if you don’t have purpose and meaning in your life. Very hard.
Engaging in prosocial behaviors. All these different things make up a life. It was very basic—almost like a child—the way I saw it. What kind of life do you want to have? How do you want to feel in your life? That’s something we don’t talk about: how do you want your life to feel to you?
Do you want to be a victim in your life? An aggressor? A victimizer? Do you want to feel angry all the time? Again, anger—when appropriate—is super helpful and important. But I’m talking about being in a state of anger as your default. That didn’t feel good to me.
I started to really look at this life—the only life I have—and ask: how do I want to feel in it? The way we’re brought up, particularly in the Western world, is: "What are you going to do in your life?" Not: "How are you going to feel in your life?"
Ashish Kothari:
Or how you're going to be.
Karen Guggenheim:
Exactly. One of the things I say is: we all have to-do lists, but what’s your "to be" list? How do you want to be today? Do you want to be kind? Grateful? Empathetic? Forgiving? Those things are really important in building the kind of life you want—for your family, community, workplaces, etc.
Ashish Kothari:
Yeah. And we have such similar minds. It is about practices. It’s what we practice. And it’s not one and done. It’s not like: I took a course, or I had an event, or I bought a car, or I got married. It’s a practice. It’s a practice to really rewire our brains away from fear, negativity, and scarcity.
Karen Guggenheim:
Yes, and also, we’re living in a world where we want instant gratification and quick results. We communicate quickly. We travel quickly. But being human requires a kind of chiseling from the marble—like a Michelangelo. It takes that level of fine-tuning of who you want to be as a person. It doesn’t happen overnight, but it’s worth cultivating.
When I found out this was a science, I dedicated my life to WOHASU and the World Happiness Summit. We’ve been very honored since then to impact so many different organizations, foundations, services, training, master's programs, and all these other things people are doing around the world—this beautiful community.
And it’s just amazing. Because it was built on authenticity and the reality of life. It wasn’t built on rose-colored glasses or toxic positivity. It was built on very real-life circumstances.
Ashish Kothari:
Yeah. So let's go there for a moment. Share a little bit about, for those who don't know, what WOHASU is and how the idea came to life, and the journey you've been on. I think you had the seventh one this year, right?
Karen Guggenheim:
So WOHASU is an acronym for the World Happiness Summit. Like you said, we've had seven of them—five in Miami, one in Lake Como, and one in London. Last year was London. It was great. The theme was purpose, and we had the Surgeon General of the United States come to that. I had a lovely fireside chat with him.
Dr. Vivek Murthy has done so much work on the impact of loneliness and the mental health crisis among our youth. It’s something that's really present in my mind—how we need to do more for the youth in our world, especially in the United States and the UK, where kids are suffering so much.
We talk a lot about employee well-being, which is very important—12 billion workdays are lost around the world every year because of depression and anxiety. When I reflect on that number, I wonder: how many education days are lost for kids? How many playdates are lost?
I'm very hyper-aware of that. We say that children are our future, but they're also here now. It's not only when they become "utilities" to us as leaders—whether that’s civic, government, or business leaders. Our youth deserve to be happy, healthy, and well. I feel like we're not calling enough attention to that.
Some of the ways we’re addressing this is through our Wellbeing Leadership Certification Training. We just launched it in Miami-Dade County Public Schools, the third-largest school district in the U.S., with over 400,000 students and 34,000 employees. We're in the process of certifying all 350 school principals in well-being leadership for a happier and more resilient school community.
We've trained the cabinet and the superintendent as well. It's an amazing initiative, and the superintendent in Miami said yes to such an innovative and long-overdue program for our kids.
We also host the World Wellbeing Policy Forum. We’re going to have it again in London this October. We're looking at how to place well-being first in decision-making—for governments, businesses, society, and education. Because we know cognitively and from evidence that it’s the right thing to do, but there’s a disconnect in why we’re not doing it. These are the things really present in my mind as we drive this forward.
Ashish Kothari:
Isn’t it crazy, Karen? I love that. Isn’t it crazy, in particular when it comes to our younger population? I always reflect on this.
When children are born until a certain age—unlike adults—they don’t need something to be happy. They are just happy. They're giggling, they're smiling. Something needs to happen to make them cry or unhappy: they’re hungry, thirsty, they fell down, they heard a loud noise and got startled.
Children don’t need to be present in what they're doing—they just are. I think about my son when he was two or three, playing with his train tracks. He would play with Thomas for an hour, completely immersed.
Karen Guggenheim:
I think that's because they are present.
Ashish Kothari:
Exactly, that’s because they are present. And somewhere along the way, as we grow up, we lose that. We stop being happy and start pursuing happiness. If this happens, then I’ll be happy. We get into that game.
I always highlight this in my talks—what happened? You were the same. Why is the most common answer to “How are you?” now: “I’m busy”? At McKinsey, that was the standard. Not “I’m happy,” or “I’m awesome”—just “I’m busy.” And now that’s happening younger and younger.
If you look at the last five to seven years, the mental health of young kids is worse than the mental health of adults. That curve has gotten inverted.
Karen Guggenheim:
In this country, definitely. Yes. In the United States, yes.
Ashish Kothari:
And so much of it is driven by the environment. I love that you're starting with schools. Somewhere along the way—at homes, schools, and through devices—our kids are falling into a state not of flourishing, but of depression, sadness, anxiety. All these emotions.
Karen Guggenheim:
And I think, as a society, we're accepting that.
Ashish Kothari:
Yeah.
Karen Guggenheim:
And I think that's a big, big problem. A collective problem.
Ashish Kothari:
I love what you said—collectively, it's a massive problem. And I love what you said: we talk about children as the future, but what kind of future are we creating if the present is already telling us what's happening to them?
Karen Guggenheim:
Totally. I agree with that. But also—what they’re living now matters. It’s not only about what the future will be like for us, but it’s also: how does it feel to be a child or adolescent right now? And apparently, it’s not feeling very well.
Ashish Kothari:
Yeah. You know what, this is triggering for me. It's kind of an idea. While I was at McKinsey—and I think you're familiar with this work that Jackie, Barbara, and others led—I’ve done a lot of work around transforming workplaces from human suffering to human flourishing.
If we want people to live happier, healthier lives, individual happiness is important. All the positive psychology work accounts for about 27% of well-being and may result in 3% fewer people burning out.
But 72% of well-being comes from how work is done. And what I get curious about—what your focus on education sparked for me—is: what is the equivalent of that research for the teenage years and even for elementary to middle school? Both in schools and outside? What are the factors, and how are they contributing?
Because I think there’s richness there. If we can start to affect those factors, we might actually make real progress.
Karen Guggenheim:
I agree with you totally. Looking at the workplace, I don’t think we’re doing much there either. We're not making much of a dent. Everyone pays lip service to it. The data is already there—we don’t need more of it. We don’t need another case study. We’re case-studied out.
I had an earlier call today, and I was thinking: what we’re asking of well-being—from an external client’s perspective—is, “If you're going to bring this to schools or workplaces, show me that it works.” More than the data, they want results.
It's almost like telling someone, “Okay, you want your body to look a certain way? You need to eat low-fat, low-carb, exercise 30 minutes a day, etc.” But the client says, “Yeah, I want the body now, and then I’ll go to the gym.”
They want the results today. And guess what? It doesn’t work that way.
This training—whichever person or entity brings it into an organization—will only work if you work it. If you don’t implement and change the culture, it won’t work.
Ashish Kothari:
Yeah. And what you didn’t mention, Karen—what you didn’t mention is, “Oh, by the way, not only do I want it now, I only have five minutes to spend on it.”
So it’s like, “I don’t have a lot of time. What’s the one quick thing? Make it simple. If it’s too complex, I’m not doing it.” And we get into these traps.
Karen Guggenheim:
Well, you're going to do other things. As we know with burnout, there will be a time when that lemon will not give you more juice.
It doesn’t matter what you want to do. It doesn’t matter if you say, “This is the most important thing,” or “We’re going to lose the client,” or “The business is going under.” You can threaten, you can push—but we’re human beings. And at some point, that humanity and biology is going to give out.
That’s where I think it gets really interesting. For some reason, we think we’re creating tough people, but we’re really creating fragile people because we’re constantly overburdening. Add to that the overwhelming amount of information we process because of technology—your brain doesn’t like that much information. Even if it’s all good, it’s just too much to process.
It’s like giving someone chocolate cake all day—it’s still too much. I think we’re in a dangerous moment, especially with the current tech explosion, because we’re forgetting our humanity.
Our competitive advantage in the future is to be more human. Technology will take care of itself—whether now, next month, or next year. The Pandora’s box is open. Technology will be great. But we need to be more human.
What are we going to do to make good decisions with technology? To build stronger social connections?
As a side note, you hear all this talk about technology and longevity. Great—but guess what’s missing? One element that is super impactful to longevity and anti-aging: people.
If you don’t invest in relationships, I don’t care what ultra-light device you use, what colon cleansing you do, or what wellness practices you follow. If you don’t focus on people and build relationships—which are the greatest buffer to problems and the greatest enhancer to life’s sparkles—you’re not going to live very long, most likely.
Ashish Kothari:
Not only that—frankly, you lose the journey.
I was at the Conscious Entrepreneur Summit here in Boulder yesterday. There were 250 people, mostly startup founders and CEOs. I told them: the mortality rate of startups over a seven-to-eight-year horizon is 5%. Only 5% survive.
And here we are, committing to these crazy seven years—sacrificing relationships, mental health, sleep, nutrition—running constantly on adrenaline and cortisol for a 5% chance that you might make it and then have the life you want?
It’s the worst way to live.
Instead, live with more joy, more connection, and more meaning behind why you started in the first place. Enjoy the journey. Invest in relationships. Spend more time being, rather than just doing.
Karen Guggenheim:
The other thing is—even if you're in that 5% of successful startups—the person you become during that time might be someone very different. If you’re highly stressed, not sleeping, eating poorly, not exercising, not taking care of relationships—it shows up.
Even from an investor perspective, it’s costly. How many stories do we hear where founders make mistakes—ethically or otherwise—because they’ve lost their way?
It’s overwhelming right now. I know you talk about this too.
We need to change the way we work. I don’t mean just work-from-home versus in-office—I mean how work is structured.
Work was defined 60 or 70 years ago, and that workforce and society were totally different from what we have today. Similarly, we need to redefine leadership.
Because the way we currently define leaders—and what we expect them to sacrifice to get those roles—is self-selecting for people with low empathy.
People who say, “I don’t care if I’m home. I don’t care if I miss the week. I’ll miss birthdays, graduations, dinner with my spouse or partner.” Not once or twice—but consistently.
So who are the people willing to do that for decades? People with low empathy.
If we change how we define leadership and realize that being a CEO doesn’t mean being 24/7, that life needs rhythm and downtime, then we’ll get better leaders. We’ll attract a more diverse set of applicants—including neurodivergent individuals—and people with more empathy and compassion.
For some reason, we’ve come to think that empathy and compassion are weak. I have no idea why—but it’s not true.
We should use our creativity not only to build machines and technology, but to build better systems. We need to apply systems thinking and design thinking to redefine how we educate kids, how we work, and how we lead. We need to invest time in that.
Ashish Kothari:
And if we do that—I can speak from my personal experience. In my last 10 years at McKinsey, especially the last seven, I integrated some of these practices into my life and redesigned how I got work done and how my teams worked.
Karen, I was getting more done between 9 to 6 than I used to get done working 6 to 9. Literally.
I increased my productivity, creativity, relationships, and client impact by 40–50%.
I was working three and a half days a week. I went part-time because I was writing a book. I wanted to create more space, and I did.
Three and a half days wasn’t far off from four days, which a recent Wall Street Journal article mentioned—companies that tried the four-day week want to stick with it. Because we’re letting people figure out how to get things done in the context of four days.
Karen Guggenheim:
Exactly. And also, the way you lead shifts. Then you have a workforce that’s happier and healthier.
Guess what? They're not just going to do more—but they're going to do better with clients. And you mentioned McKinsey—it’s a service business. It's people.
Soon, machines might be able to do some things better than we can—but what they can’t replicate is relationships. The nuance. The empathy.
Client servicing improves when you have an employee who isn’t short with you, isn’t overwhelmed, has time to think creatively, and brings solutions outside the box, and having that better engagement with the client. And those are all human skills that we are at risk of losing.
Ashish Kothari:
Absolutely. And look, you talk about so many of these. I want to pivot a little bit and dig into cultivating happiness.
I read your book—it is so beautiful.
Karen Guggenheim:
Thank you.
Ashish Kothari:
You lay out six key pillars in that book, Karen. Talk to us a little bit about those pillars—and which of those was actually the hardest for you?
Karen Guggenheim:
So I talk about gratitude, kindness, the narratives and stories we tell about ourselves, and also growth, because I modeled it actually around post-traumatic growth.
But in my time studying and working on happiness, the hardest thing is forgiveness.
The hardest thing is forgiveness. Some people don’t understand that forgiveness doesn’t mean that what another person did is okay. Some things will never be okay—ever.
For example, I had to forgive the doctors who made the mistakes that caused my husband’s death. It wasn’t immediate. It took me about three or four years. But when I was finally able to do that—and to forgive others for different things—it created such fertile ground for planting the things I wanted to grow in my life.
Instead of holding on to negative rumination—“Why, why, why?”—sometimes you’ll never know why people do the things that hurt you. Sometimes it’s unintentional. Sometimes that’s just how they are. And sometimes, it’s intentional.
But to let that live inside you—it’s damaging. If you carry it too far, it can make you bitter and toxic.
When you let that go—and many times you don’t even need to see the person—it frees up so much energy. Energy you can invest in your family, in yourself, in exercise, in seeing problems through a new lens.
That’s been the hardest thing: forgiveness. Especially when someone has hurt you deeply. But the work of Dr. Fred Luskin out of Stanford University—he speaks at every summit, by the way—is game-changing. His talks are on our YouTube channel for the World Happiness Summit.
Ashish Kothari:
I'd love to take a look at his work.
Karen Guggenheim:
Incredible. Incredible work.
Ashish Kothari:
We talk about forgiveness in Hardwired for Happiness too. There are three quotes I always go back to. I agree, this is one of the hardest practices for many people.
The first quote is from Julio Olalla, who I studied with during my Newfield coaching training. He said: “Forgiveness is not forgetfulness.” Forgiveness doesn’t mean I forget or accept what was done—it goes beyond that.
The second: “I forgive for myself.” Forgiveness is really something we do for ourselves. Of course, it can benefit the other person too, but it’s about choosing to move on.
And the third is a Buddhist quote, often attributed to the Dalai Lama: “Resentment is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.” They’re not even aware, but it’s corroding us inside.
Karen Guggenheim:
I also want to highlight that forgiveness can happen in your heart or in a letter you burn. You don’t need to tell the person you’re forgiving them.
Some people, I never did. I just forgave them in my heart. That’s important, because sometimes it’s not safe—or not possible—to be with someone who did something deeply wrong. But letting that go is incredibly powerful.
Ashish Kothari:
Yeah. And it shows up everywhere. I love that you chose this one.
If I go all the way into spiritual texts, I think about Jesus and his last words: “God, forgive those who sin against me, for they do not know what they’re doing.” They were taking his life, and yet, that’s what he said.
Meanwhile, we leave church and if someone cuts us off in traffic, we’re raising our middle fingers.
This idea of living the practice is so present.
And another example of forgiveness for me is the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, led by Desmond Tutu. He brought together those who were wronged and those who had wronged them—to collectively liberate and choose a new future together.
If they could do that, why are we still holding on?
We carry so much baggage over small things—someone went behind our back, raised their voice, excluded us—and we let those moments define us.
Karen Guggenheim:
Yeah. But we can let it go. We can let it go.
Ashish Kothari:
So, we can let it go. What are some practices, Karen, that you talk about in your book around forgiveness? If someone asked, “How do I forgive?”—what would you suggest?
Karen Guggenheim:
The very first thing—if it's something that is very hard—is just to have a willingness. Once you have the willingness, or even ask the question, you've already kind of made the decision. When you're saying, “I want to, but I don’t know how,” that reframe means you’re almost there. You're virtually there. Because it's a shift. You've decided that you want to stop directing your energy toward the pain and start channeling it somewhere else.
There’s also acceptance. The situation occurred. There's nothing I can do about it. It was horrible. The impact is horrible and will always be horrible. But I want to live.
For me, that’s tied very closely with purpose. Since I had a purpose—and that purpose was happiness—I analyzed that if I wanted to have more happiness in my life, then forgiveness had to be one of the tools.
You don’t have to forgive, but if you've decided that you want a happier life, it's a big tool to help you get there. It's hard, but it's a huge one, like jet fuel for happiness, to feel well, to feel okay in your world. Because it gives you something important—it gives you a sense of agency. It's incredibly empowering. It doesn’t seem so, but it really is.
Ashish Kothari:
Yeah. I love both of those. Number one is choosing to make the shift—even before taking any action, just choosing. And second, anchoring what you're highlighting: know your why. Why are you choosing this? What do you want instead?
Karen Guggenheim:
Exactly.
Ashish Kothari:
Right. I always feel..
Karen Guggenheim:
And commit. If you're committing to having a certain kind of life, then build it.
Ashish Kothari:
I think the gravitational pull of a clear “why” is so important in escaping the gravitational pull of staying stuck. Because we feel what we feel, and we’re justified. “They did wrong,” we say. But unless there’s something else pulling us forward, we just stay stuck.
Karen Guggenheim:
It’s true. They did do wrong. And now what? It will always be wrong. But now what?
Maybe you got an apology. Maybe you didn’t. Maybe something changed. Maybe it didn’t. Whatever it is, you get to the point where it’s like—what about you? What about your life? What about what you want to create with the rest of your life—your relationships, your work, your meaning, your art, your impact?
When you're stuck, remember—nothing in nature likes to be stuck. We are meant for movement. In the book, I also talk about movement. Not just physical movement, but movement of thought. You have to move to process, to grow. Because attaching to a thought, a state, or non-movement is not natural. It’s not good.
Ashish Kothari:
Yeah. Have you read this book? It's actually sitting right here on the table—The Book of Forgiveness by Desmond Tutu and his daughter Mpho. It’s so beautiful, Karen.
Karen Guggenheim:
I think I have to read it.
Ashish Kothari:
Yeah, you’ll love it. It’s an absolutely beautiful book. We’ll put it in the show notes—your book, that book, and a few other resources.
I want to go into one more area that I find so inspiring—one of my favorite parts of your message. Even small changes in mindsets and behaviors can create massive ripples. There's this butterfly effect.
So, I’d love for you to share a story—either from a WOHASU attendee or a reader—where you saw this in action. Someone who showed up one way, did something different, and their life changed.
Karen Guggenheim:
as the World Happiness Summit:Inside I was thinking, “I have no time.” But then I thought, of course I have time.
ell you how grateful I am. In:It wasn’t like she came to a conference and was instantly cured. But she took in different things. That experience resonated with her. And she told me, “I haven’t been depressed since then.”
That was incredible in itself. But then she went on to start teaching happiness to students. That’s a full-circle moment. For me, for my work, that story was just so gratifying.
Ashish Kothari:
That’s beautiful. Yeah, because not only did she change—but now all her students are impacted. It goes back to the education system we talked about earlier. It’s a beautiful story. When we help someone change, they change their whole group, their community, the world around them. It’s so important.
So, Karen, just to keep an eye on the clock—I’d love to ask: if there’s one message you could whisper into the ear of every leader, parent, teacher—especially with the overwhelm, anxiety, and stress we’re all feeling in life—what would your message be?
Karen Guggenheim:
It’s different. To a leader, my message would be a challenge: take the evidence we already have and put it into practice. Make well-being a strategic pillar—whether in education, business, or government. It’s an imperative right now to place well-being at the center of decision-making.
And to anyone else who’s interested in hearing what I’d whisper: don’t wait to be happy to be happy.
What I mean is—it’s not going to come in a neat package. It’s not going to arrive because you got a promotion. Sure, you’ll have moments of joy—but what we’re talking about here is a more mature and nuanced sense of happiness.
It’s something you can construct. It’s not something you wait to receive. Because it’s already inside you. You already have the tools right now to construct your happiness.
So instead of watching your life happen, become an active participant in your life.
Ashish Kothari:
Karen, thank you. Thank you for the work that you’re doing. As I said earlier, your story is unbelievably inspiring.
Karen Guggenheim:
Thank you.
Ashish Kothari:
It’s inspiring not only because you made the changes in your life after something so traumatic and devastating—something that happened to you, not something you caused—but because you took that suffering, that pain we started our conversation with, and used it to grow into a bigger version of yourself. One who is now serving and bringing these tools to so many others to help them.
So thank you for the work you do. I know how hard it is.
Karen Guggenheim:
Thank you.
Ashish Kothari:
And I appreciate you for being a leader in this space.
Karen Guggenheim:
Thank you so much. And thank you for your leadership and for inviting me to this conversation. I hope your community enjoys it. I'm very happy to have spent this time with you and everyone listening.
Ashish Kothari:
Thank you, my friend. Have a wonderful weekend.
Karen Guggenheim:
Thank you. You too.