So, once again, even when the basic idea (“accept yourself!”) is a good one, she obliterates it in a wave of vitriol.īut most of what she argues will guarantees happiness is– do I even have to say it?– horrifying. Enjoying and appreciating nice things is the opposite of enjoying and appreciating “simple” things, and enjoying the luxuries renders you incapable of enjoying the “simple” things. While there’s something to be said for the cost of “keeping up with the Joneses,” that’s not what Helen is saying here. That’s not permissible in Helen’s world, though. That doesn’t mean I also don’t appreciate snuggling up in my polyester blanket in my sweatpants with a cup of tea I microwaved in the $1 glass mug I bought at Wal-Mart, but I think it’s totally fine if you appreciate both. the enthralling moments of a Puccini opera threatening to burst through the ceiling of the Kennedy Center.
I think London blue topaz stones are some of the most gorgeous things I’ve ever seen. I’m one of those women that jewelers like to say have “exceptional taste.” I like the sound of a silver fork tapping the side of a crystal water goblet. She also tells us to “accept ourselves” (although she limits that to “don’t rip yourself to pieces for burning dinner or breaking something” which doesn’t really fall into the typical understanding of self-acceptance), and to “appreciate simple pleasures.” I’m all for appreciating the simple things however, even while telling us to be rose-smellers, she takes the time to demonize many women. Some of these things are pretty solid ideas– she encourages charitable volunteering, which some researchers have connected to happiness. Since happiness is “earned,” there are specific things we can do to make ourselves happy. Then comes the bulk of the chapter: what you need to do in order to be happy. It’s the same sort of statement that she made on the first page– “You may think you are happy, but in reality you are not.” They can find pleasure, and they are so ignorant they mistake that for happiness. I don’t think I’ve ever heard an argument for conflating these two, but she makes the argument that good little rule-followers are happy, and people who don’t care about “eternal laws” can’t possibly be happy. She then moves on to setting up a false dichotomy between happiness and pleasure. Even if we thought we were happy, if we weren’t following the rules, we were mistaken. I grew up in fundamentalism, and the appeal of fundamentalism could probably be wrapped up in the promise “follow all our our rules and you’ll be happy!” Which made the converse true: “not following all of our rules makes you miserable!” Happiness became totally defined by whether or not we were following the rules, period. We are unhappy when we are doing something wrong.” Unhappiness “arises from a failure within–weakness of character, sin. First of all, unhappiness is totally our fault.
She has a hard time explaining what happiness is, so she talks mostly about what unhappiness is and what happiness isn’t. Whether it’s a Mormon woman writing in the 1960s, or an evangelical woman writing in 2005, we’re still hearing the same things.įirst off, she tells us what happiness is, taking an approach of defining by negation. The principles and the message haven’t really changed that much.
well, you might not even be a Christian, so there. They ignore the same types of people that Helen does, they dismiss the realities of many women’s lived experiences like Helen does, and it all results in a set of teachings that condemn at least 40% of the American population– and that’s just America! Forget about the global church– if you’re not at least an upper-middle-class white evangelical stay-at-home mother.
Helen might say it much more directly than Mary Kassian or Dannah Gresh or Stasi Eldredge probably would, but all these conservative women are advocating for the same principles and in very much the same way that Helen does.
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