1.2.8 What is joy?

Joy is often confused with fun or happiness. My pocket explanation is as follows: Fun is pleasure, physical and light hearted. Happiness is the external expression of pleasure. Joy is internal, spiritual, deep, and consuming. From the dictionary:

Fun:

1. A source of enjoyment, amusement, or pleasure.
2. Enjoyment; amusement: have fun at the beach.
3. Playful, often noisy, activity.

Happiness:

1. Characterized by good luck; fortunate.
2. Enjoying, showing, or marked by pleasure, satisfaction, or joy.
3. Being especially well-adapted; felicitous: a happy turn of phrase.
4. Cheerful; willing: happy to help.
5. Characterized by a spontaneous or obsessive inclination to use something. Often used in combination: trigger-happy.
6. Enthusiastic about or involved with to a disproportionate degree. Often used in combination: money-happy; clothes-happy.

Joy:

1. Intense and especially ecstatic or exultant happiness.
2. The expression or manifestation of such feeling.
3. A source or an object of pleasure or satisfaction: their only child, their pride and joy.