On Happiness

When the month of Av enters, we reduce in joy. Rav Yehuda, son of Rav Shmuel bar Shilat, said in the name of Rav: Just as when the month of Av enters, we reduce in happiness, so too, when the month of Adar enters, we increase in happiness.

(13) After the ingathering from your threshing floor and your vat, you shall hold the Feast of Booths for seven days. (14) You shall be happy in your festival, with your son and daughter, your male and female slave, the Levite, the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow in your communities. (15) You shall hold a festival for the Eternal your God seven days, in the place that the Eternal will choose; for the Eternal your God will bless all your crops and all your undertakings, and you shall be nothing but happy.

It is a great mitzvah to be happy always, and to strengthen oneself to push away the sadness and the black bitterness with all of one’s might.

(1) On the topic of happiness:

(2) By way of analogy: Sometimes, when people are happy and dancing, they grab someone standing outside [the circle] who is in sadness and black bitterness. Against his will they bring him into the circle of dancers; against his will, they force him to be happy along with them.

(3) It is the same with happiness. When a person is happy, then the black bitterness and suffering are pulled out to the side.

(4) But a higher level, is to gather the courage to actually pursue the black bitterness, and to bring it, too, into the happiness, such that the black bitterness itself is transformed into happiness. So a person should transform the black bitterness and all of the suffering into happiness.

It is like a person who comes to a celebration. For then, from the abundant happiness and joy there, she transforms all of her worries, sadness, and black bitterness into happiness. We then find that she has grabbed the black bitterness and brought it, against its will, into the happiness - just like in the dance we mentioned above.