If we read many self-help books or listen to the self-described gurus or, indeed, believe the dominant paradigm guiding the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we are taught that life is only valuable if it's hard. The difficult, steep path is the better path. If something is easy, it has no value.

In a word: BULLSHIT.

In my experience I have always preferred the easy path, and hope to do so until I'm dead, after which it won't matter.

TSCC, meanwhile, uses this (Calvinist?) guilt trip to make us believe we have to suffer to have a good life (in this life or the fairy-tale next one).

Again: BULLSHIT.

That we only learn value life-lessons when life is difficult.

All together now: BULLSHIT!

Here's my alternative:

Have a beer or a cup of coffee. Kick off your shoes. Stare out the window.

Instead of hurrying to get to church on Sunday, sit around scratching your crotch.

Call in sick to work when you're feeling just fine.

Tell your boss, hey, thanks for the offer of the promotion but, frankly, sounds like a lot of extra work so, no thanks.

Tell the husband, I don't feel like cooking. I'm gonna order a pizza.

Tell the parents, I think I've studied enough. I'm going to the movies.

Go to the park. Hell, go to three goddamn parks. Sit on a bench until your ass falls asleep.

Any questions?

You sound like my kind of guy.

I’ve always admired quitters. It's not the quitters who cause the problems of the world. Just think how much better off the world would have been had Adolph Hitler been a quitter.

As a youth, it was my ambition to become a quitter. But I gave it up.

Football coach told me, boy don’t be a quitter. I hate quitters. Quitters are the lowest of the low. Quitters are weaklings. What’s that in your pocket, boy? Cigarettes! You need to quit. I compromised. I quit football and kept smoking.

Well you got one thing right, the Mormons telling you that suffering is the way to joy or a better life when I don't see a single one of them living a suffering life so yea they are full of shit on that one. They don't suffer worth a shit.

Pizza for dinner it is. I hate cooking for just me.

Because the church promotes value or idealized duress and suffering rather than promoting avoiding suffering.

For example idealized handcart rather than wagons or train rides by pioneers... primary songs ;remember the primary song with refrain : "walking walking walking" etc. Seem to devalue avoiding suffering, or supporting others in avoiding obstacles and suffering when possible.


More difficult ? Easy? Same outcome? Why were we taught to be stupid.

Fairly routinEly. But is it deliberate or just a cultural artifact resulting from poorly marketed lifestyle pulled forward fairly frequently from earlier eras - applied to latter day saints now- generating a life fUll of enhanced artificial obstacles . Oh that poor church. Oh those poor people. My poor brother.

Lucifer is the one that wants you to believe you have to suffer to know happiness:

LUCIFER: You must eat of this fruit so as to comprehend that everything has its opposite: good and evil, virtue and vice, light and darkness, health and sickness, pleasure and pain. Thus your eyes will be opened, and you will have knowledge.

EVE: Is there no other way?

LUCIFER: There is no other way.

Hmmm...the BoM teaches the same thing...so, Satan must have written the BoM!

My TBM friend married a man with many problems. She is enabler to husband and son. She says the Lord wants her to be tested. No, its her bad decisions that are testing her.

It's interesting that you should bring this up. I can distinctly remember a conference talk from my youth where a general Authority went on and on about how a life of hard work, service, and pious prayer and humility before the Lord is the only satisfying and correct way to live, and the only way of living that will ultimately make you happy.

As he was speaking, all I could think was how much nonsense that it sounded like, and how completely contrary it sounded to Human Nature. There is so much that humans do, even at the most instinctual level, to avoid suffering. And there's a reason for that- avoiding suffering is one of the ways we ensure our survival, because potential suffering could lead to potential death, which would make us unavailable to propagate our species, which would result in our Extinction, depending on the kind of suffering or injury or whatever specifically happens. To dive headlong into a lifestyle of suffering and hard work, leaving absolutely no time for leisure pursuits, which seems like the attitude that the church is very much in favor of, seems counterintuitive. Contrary to what the church says, it seems like a lifestyle that will ultimately leave you miserable, on your deathbed asking: 'Why did I spend so much time at the office? Or in the bishopric? Or doing asinine and ultimately meaningless Church work? Why didn't I spend more time with my family, going to picnics, or the beach, or playing football or baseball with my kids? Was my devotion to God as a so-called insurance policy to assure my spot in the Celestial Kingdom really a worthwhile exchange for the happiness I could have had with my family?'


As I have so often thought and talked about here, as have many other posters, the church has no concept of balance. There's nothing wrong with serving others, and if you have to suffer for an ultimately worthwhile gain, that's fine. But that's not what your life should be about, and the church should not be preaching such filth. There is nothing wrong with people who want to work hard in the short-term, or in their careers in general, or make a lot of money so they can ultimately relax and do the things that are really meaningful to them, and will ultimately make them happy.

I have an... Older male role model who I wonder how exactly he approaches this exact topic. He works a lot, is in his late fifties, and his health isn't the best. He is over a hundred pounds overweight. He has spent a lot of his life in school, and the past couple of decades in a demanding profession where he is in charge of a lot of people and responsible for instituting complex policies for a huge company. I have often wondered if he prefers work to spending time with his family. Over the past few years, as he has been able to do parts of his job from home, I have noticed that he spends more time at home, but it is not necessarily productive time with his family. It seems like he is either mostly taking phone calls, doing work on the computer, or doing his church work. so even though it seems like he has gotten something he wanted -maybe-, which is not spending so much time at work or away from his home, his mind is still where his body is no longer.

The thing is, I don't know if doing work is what makes him happy. I think it does in some sense, but I think it's more a value system for him. I think that he thinks that a life is not well lived unless you are working as hard as you can, as much as you can. I think it's the only thing he knows how to do, so I don't really know if it's happiness necessarily or not. I just think it's the only thing he knows how to do. And I blame the influence of the church for this, and for the perceptions I have about him, which for all I know could be completely wrong. It just seems like he loves work more than he loves being with his family, or at least prefers work.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/23/2017 03:06PM by midwestanon.

Sure like your theory get busy..and its exactly the reason tscc encourages early quick marriage and a brood of kiddies quick...before you have time to reflect on lifes meaning your up to your ass in alligators...head down ass up and youve made your commitment...the only hole i see in your theory is the one ive always butted into...the lack of money makes fools of us all...money is the only gawd of this world...dont worship it for a few days and see how that park bench feels then...in winter...with newspapers for a blanket...fear of this gawd will keep you running the yellow brick road...slavery is real...but the slaves now provide their own food shelter and donkey...how clever is that...and we cant sign on the dotted line quick enough...your a rebel get busy...i salute you...you live what most will only dream of...i concur...the hardway is bs...it doesnt build character...just ask anyone who knows me...haha

You, sir, are a wanker, and I fucking love you for this! The only thing I would add is to add vulgar language into one's lexicon as it is free, liberating, and fun. Charlie's Boner.