Happiness in Sacrament Meeting

[Linked]

A talk in sacrament meeting today suggested that the congregation is unhappy because they selfishly think too much about what will make them happy. "If you keep opening the oven to check the meal it will never get done". So stop thinking about all the things in your life that make you unhappy. Instead, do what the church tells you to and it will work out.

It couldn't be that the life the church has led you into is FILLED with things that don't bring you happiness. Nope, that could never be it.

The talk wasn't given by leadership, but rather a young mother in the ward. I'm not sure if that's better or not.

[RubinHighlander]

I think the keywords in her talk are "stop thinking". Also, TSCC wants TBMs preoccupied with thinking about all the things to keep them running on the gerbil wheel, then telling them they can never do enough or have not done enough. Guilt, fear, true happiness as long as you don't bitch about it!

[Mormorrisey]

I think the keywords in her talk are "stop thinking."

Yep. No question that's what is required for happiness in the TBM mindset. Forget your own troubles, turn it off, and concentrate on what you need to do to make it to the CK. A prescription for a great deal of unresolved anxiety instead of happiness, but what do I know? I've clearly lost the spirit.

[Linked]

I think the keywords in her talk are "stop thinking". Also, TSCC wants TBMs preoccupied with thinking about all the things to keep them running on the gerbil wheel, then telling them they can never do enough or have not done enough. Guilt, fear, true happiness as long as you don't bitch about it!

Yep.

There is some truth to her words, getting stuck in analysis paralysis about your happiness can make it harder to be happy. But avoiding evaluating your happiness altogether and letting the mormon church tell you how to get there is not much of a plan of happiness.

[Corsair]

There is a real irony in the changes that the LDS church has made in the past year. It is objectively more comfortable to skip church third hour, neglect home teaching, and not worry about the civil marriage penalty. More adjustments will likely be made and it is continually amusing to see believers relax a bit with their unintentional acknowledgement that the old system was actually not very fun. We weren't supposed to openly admit this, of course.

Happiness is supposed to come from service in the church. Finding joy in non-church activities is supposed to be balanced out with extra temple service or something like that. This culminates in the approved LDS retirement plan of senior missionary service.

[Just This Guy]

I think to some degree people are pressured to be happy, or at least make everyone think they are. This isn't a church thing, it's a social media thing.

How many people do you know on Facebook that only talk about how great their life is. How good the kids are, how great their vacation was, how pretty the yard is. They never mention that they kids have been sick, how many year it will take to pay off the credit card bill from that trip, or how many hours they spend weeding. We see that all time.

We look at these people and they show that they put on and feel bad about ourselves that we can't have the perfect life that we see other people have.

To be fair, the opposite also exists. The person who is always the Debbie Downer. Their life sucks. Husband is a jerk, dog is a mess, car's broken again. Nothing ever goes their way, at least not that they post on Facebook.

We all want to fit into the community, but we don't realize that sometimes it is a all a show.

[nibbler]

"If you keep opening the oven to check the meal it will never get done".

If you intend to wait until after you die before you open the oven you'll also never eat.

There's a balance. Living your life only to make others (church) happy isn't balance.

[nibbler]

We look at these people and they show that they put on and feel bad about ourselves that we can't have the perfect life that we see other people have.

I mentioned this in some other thread. This is pretty much what church leaders did with the history of the church and with their own self image. Then members spend their lives beating themselves silly to be as righteous as the mythologized church pioneers/leaders in hopes that they can have similar experiences.

It's human nature. A lot of people put up that facade at church on Sunday.

[Hagoth]

Happiness is an invention of Satan, just like Fun, self-acceptance, and Heavy Metal. People who do not follow The Prophet are experiencing a form of counterfeit joy that we call "happiness;" also known as "the World's happiness." Everybody knows it's just a vain and desperate attempt to fill that cold, nagging hole in the middle of their soul where unquestioning love for The Church isn't.

At least, that's pretty much what I was taught.

[Advocate]

A talk in sacrament meeting today suggested that the congregation is unhappy because they selfishly think too much about what will make them happy. "If you keep opening the oven to check the meal it will never get done". So stop thinking about all the things in your life that make you unhappy. Instead, do what the church tells you to and it will work out.

It couldn't be that the life the church has led you into is FILLED with things that don't bring you happiness. Nope, that could never be it.

The talk wasn't given by leadership, but rather a young mother in the ward. I'm not sure if that's better or not.

Even by church standards this seems off. Whatever happened to men are that they might have joy?

Sounds like a young mother that doesn't have many friends, stays at home with little kids, has little adult interaction, and doesn't get taken out on a weekly date by her husband. So instead of waking up and admitting that she is unhappy with her life, she has to convince herself that she will have long term happiness with all the sacrifices she is making for her family because church members can never admit that the ideal life described in general conference isn't ideal for everyone. Too bad for her. Hopefully someone in the audience recognized her talk as a cry for friendship and responds.