Holy Unhappiness: God, Goodness, and the Myth of the Blessed Life by Amanda Held Opelt Book Review

 

In Holy Unhappiness, Amanda Held Opelt explored all the different areas in which we are expected to be happy in life. But life doesn’t always go our way and what we think will make us truly happy often fall short. We tend to believe that getting a good job, getting married, having kids, following God’s will for your life, community, going to church, just to name a few areas will make us happy and complete. She referred to it as the belief in the emotional prosperity gospel and we have been tainted views. 

 

 

In the chapter dedicated to the belief that having children will make us fulfilled and happy. She revealed how she has a miscarried at 9 weeks. There was no heartbeat detected – just an empty stillness. She shared how she felt crushed that she couldn’t accomplish what a woman’s purpose and she felt betrayed by her body. She also had two more miscarriages. She did end up having two daughters. She explored the history about how God stated that children are a heritage from the Lord and how blessed a man is if his quiver is full of them. She looked at the history of woman staying home to raise the children and how that has changed over the years. She went into detail about God has sustained her through her infertility. She explained how we can still have delight and be present and finding joy in the ordinary. 

 

 

She also looked at the topic of our bodies and her different areas in which she had health scares. She explained her incredible story with getting healed from a disease that looked like Crohn disease. She recalled her father praying daily for a miracle until one day she was healed. She did share how she has experienced a bad shoulder injury, bruise that left her pain in her leg, and a few other things. She looked at how if we believe in the emotional prosperity gospel, then we should be able to do whatever good thing we think God wants us to do. She shared how scriptures state that our bodies are a temple to God and how we are created wonderfully by Him. But we are also dust and will one day return to dust. She also was very real about how her dad prayed for her sister when she was sick from the flu and she still died. It’s one of the mysteries of the body and limits that we will never know why. She strongly encouraged readers to know their limits and the boundaries of our own bodies and to see the blessing in the limit. We can learn to give our bodies humility. 

 

 

I would recommend this awesome book on the myth of what truly makes a happy life and what makes us satisfied. This book breaks down everything that we fall for and believe will make us feel complete and whole. This book will seriously assist readers into breaking down the idol of happiness and we can crack it with a full force. I loved how she teaches readers to walk the narrow road with Christ and to take time to enjoy the ride even if it takes time. She revealed that real happiness is focusing on being a child of God and to remember that He is always with us and this is gift. I really connected with the way she described holy and how unhappiness can be in fact holy. This book will help readers to release some of our expectations that we are believing will make us happy.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

"I received this book free from the publisher, Hachette Book Group/Faithwords for my honest review.”

 

 

 

 

 

If you would like to purchase a copy, check it out on Amazon.com:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

https://www.amazon.com/Holy-Unhappiness-Goodness-Myth-Blessed/dp/1546001921

A Hole in the World: Finding Hope in Rituals of Grief and Healing by Amanda Held Opelt Book Review

In A Hole in the World, Amanda Held Opelt opened up about how she had to learn to survive in our trying season of her life. In the book, she shared how she experienced three miscarriages. She lost her sister, Rachel Held Evans (blogger and New York Times best-selling author) unexpectedly passed away due to the flu at age 37. She had a few brain seizures. She shared how her last post was right before lent and she promised to post some more post and never got the chance to. She left behind her husband, her 11-month year old daughter, and three-year-old son. She also had a miscarriage shortly after her sister’s death. In the book, she explored the twelve rituals of bereavement. Mostly she looked at the Western culture and Abrahamic.

 

 

 

 

One of my favorites that she looked at was the one on casseroles and how this relates to the body and grief. We may feel fatigue, experience headaches, joint pain, changes in our sleeping cycles, eating habits, and much more. Grief can cause us to have higher levels of cortisol and experience stress. We could be more prone to cardiac risks and reduced immune systems. We also have a 40% chance of death when we lose a spouse. She opened up about her pregnancy and how she had a miscarriage and everything she felt. She explained how when someone dies there is a typically a big meal provided by family and friends. The Jewish include rolls to portray the staff of life, hard boiled eggs to symbolize nature of life. In Switzerland, men carry lemons to place on graves to symbolize sharpness and bitterness of death. She looked at many more examples in other countries. Eating at a funeral helps to remind us that we’re still alive. She shared how when Jesus raised Jairus daughter from the death the first thing he told them was to feed her. 

 

 

 

I would recommend this amazing book on handling grief to anyone who is currently experiencing grief or will in the future. I liked how the book explored 12 different rituals of bereavement and they can all assist us in getting through our pain and hurt. I was touched by reading about her life story throughout the book and how she had to experience grief in different times in her life and how she was able to heal, manage, and still live her life. I loved how she came up with the idea of looking at different counties and cultures and how they process grief. It was very interesting and I learned a lot of knowledge I didn’t realize what other countries did. 

 

 

"I received this book free from the publisher, Hachette Book Group/Faithwords for my honest review.”

 

 

If you would like to purchase a copy, check it out on Amazon.com:

 

 

https://www.amazon.com/Hole-World-Finding-Rituals-Healing/dp/1546001891/