Whatever season you are in in your life, there are thoughts and feelings that drive you daily.
Perhaps you are climbing the corporate ladder and stress is pounding at your door, perhaps you are a mother to 3 small children under the age of 6 and chaos seems to be the order of the day. Or maybe you are sadly going through a very difficult time in your life, you’ve lost your spouse through a divorce or your children don’t seem to be making the choices you hoped they would.
No matter what stage or season we go through in life our day begins and ends with thoughts. Thoughts have power. Those thoughts lead to feelings. Feelings lead to actions, and actions lead to consequences. as you can see everything in your life begins with a thought.
many people are under the misconception that they have no control over their thoughts and while there is some merit to that, we do have control over what we do with the thoughts once they enter in.
Here are some choices as to what to do with thoughts:
- Entertain them. Let them swirl around in your mind and let them determine how long they linger- give them your power
- Give heed to them. This is when you give the thought tremendous power and you let it determine how you feel and behave- again, give them your power
- Cast them out – this is where you take control of the thoughts that you know are either not appropriate or will change the course of your life- keep your power!
You may be saying “change the course of my life” ??? From one simple thought? I say yes. That’s how much power is behind just one thought.
Listen to this story:
Mary woke up suddenly this morning with the frantic barking of her dogs. This immediately raised her anxiety levels to a 10. In this state of anxiety Mary thinks to herself, I am so sick of this dog. Her husband asked for these dogs and promised to take care of them and train them. Where is he now? Doesn’t he know that I am trying to sleep? I get so tired of him making promises just to get what he wants. I’m sick of being the one who has to be the bad guy all the time. He’s the immature one. I’m tired of being taken advantage of. I can’t talk to him anymore, he just yeses me. I don’t even feel like looking at him this morning. All he thinks about is himself. He doesn’t care about what I want or need.
Mary heads downstairs to the kitchen and greets her husband with a half hearted “gmornin”. He asks her “what’s wrong” “nothing” Mary says and he proceeds with caring for the dogs and heading out to work. “See, he doesn’t care about how I feel”, she slams the door, gets ready for work and speeds off in her car almost hitting the neighbors cat.
This story can continue but I think you get my point. All of Mary’s feelings (and actions) came from the few thoughts that entered her mind as soon as she awoke. Had Mary taken control of those thoughts, she could have rewritten her story but instead Mary gave her power away. She opened the door to actions that have consequences.
What are you giving your power away to?
Are you thinking thoughts of anger or resentment? I say to you, You are not trusting in an Almighty God to avenge you of whatever or whoever has wronged you.
Or perhaps you dwell in sadness and depression because you can’t see the hope that lies before you. The hope that only comes knowing that God will never leave you or forsake you.
Maybe you struggle with forgiveness and can’t stop thinking about what this person did to you – I challenge you to read Romans 8:28 – we may not always understand right away why something happened in our lives but if we place our trust in the Lord, watch the wonderful things that will happen.
I challenge you with this final thought given to us by the apostle Paul: “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” 2 Corinthians 10:5
Capture your thoughts – keep your power!
