Being a good old-fashioned pessimist, apparently since birth, I tend to believe that happiness as a constant state of mind is a lie/marketing scam used to sell me things and make me think that what I have is not enough. I think that emotionally life shakes out to the classic bell-shaped curved with normal/neutral feelings being the majority of the bell-shape and the really excellent and really horrendous being the two extreme ends. And ever since I came to this realization I have to say that the time I spend genuinely content is a lot more than it was before. I am even less pessimistic than I used to be (This shocks me personally).

Now that I have gotten my Oprah moment over with, I will get back on topic.

I think that the pentecostal church is especially skilled in using the American endemic belief that happiness should be our default state. If we were unhappy it was because we were living too much in the flesh, not tithing enough, not praying enough, etc, etc. And the tragedy of this in the general culture, and in the culture of the pentecostal church, is that instead of being allowed to be human and full of problems, flawed, and different (just being allowed to be) we get fake. We create false versions of ourselves that pretend everything is great, instead of just admitting that it is crap and that we need our friends and family to know, love, and support us for us (with all the good and bad that encompasses).