Power Thoughts: 12 Strategies to Win the Battle of the Mind (30 page)

This morning I was discussing discipline with my son. We talked about prayer, Bible reading, silence, and solitude, and then my son said, “Discipline is a discipline.” I never thought of it quite like that, but it is very true.

I have taught about the benefits of discipline many times and still, no one seems to be excited when I mention the word. I believe, if we really understood the power, the liberty, the joy, and the victory discipline brings to our lives, we would embrace it eagerly. In many areas, especially in our thinking, it makes the difference between a happy life and a miserable life, a life of bondage to the enemy or a life of freedom in God. Always remember that discipline is your friend, something to be embraced and used daily. Discipline is a tool given by God to help you reach your goals. Start thinking and saying, “I am a disciplined person and I use self-control.” Then apply that discipline and self-control to all of your thought patterns.

One reason disciplining our mind is so important is that the condition of it can change quickly. One day, you may be calm, peaceful, sure of yourself, and confident in God. Another day, you may be anxious, worried, insecure, and full of doubt. I have certainly experienced these kinds of ups and downs at times in my life and they are always rooted in how I think. Our thinking directly affects our emotions.

I can remember times when I was able to make a decision quickly and stick with it easily. I can also recall times I couldn’t seem to arrive at a decision at all, no matter how I tried, or even worse, I made a decision but kept changing my mind. Doubt, fear, and uncertainty haunted me mercilessly as I second-guessed myself and simply could not make up my mind in a situation. When we allow ourselves to entertain self-doubt and double-mindedness, we are inviting confusion and misery. Many people struggle with this lack of ability to concentrate and make decisions. When a decision is called for, especially an important one, they lack confidence. Fear seeps into their thinking and controls all of their actions.

You can renew your mind with thinking like,
I hear from God and I am led by the Holy Spirit. I refuse to live in fear and be double-minded.
We can easily feel overwhelmed by all the decisions we need to make daily unless we have the confidence to believe that we have the ability to make right ones. Don’t ever say again, “I have a hard time making decisions,” because when you think and speak like that, you are setting yourself up to be confused. Instead, you can believe that when you need to make a decision, you will know what to do. Even if you have had difficulty doing so in the past, this is a new day for you and you are in charge of your thinking; it is no longer in charge of you! Remember: you are a disciplined and self-controlled person according to God’s Word.

I have learned that when Satan has successfully built a stronghold in our minds, he does not give up his ground easily. We must be willing to not only start thinking right, but we must also keep it up until we have victory. If you have spent years allowing your mind to wander in all sorts of directions, it will take time to retrain it, but the effort you invest will give you amazing dividends. Lots of people struggle with indecision and similar challenges in their minds because they have not disciplined themselves concerning their thoughts. People who can’t seem to concentrate long enough to make a decision often wonder if something is wrong with their mind. However, the inability to concentrate and make a decision can be the result of years of letting the mind do whatever it wants to do rather than disciplining it. As I said, this is often the sign and the result of a stronghold the enemy has constructed in a person’s mind. For me, tearing down those mental strongholds took some time, but it did happen, and it can happen for you. It wasn’t easy for me, so don’t be discouraged if it takes time and effort for you. I feel that this is so important that I wrote a book,
Never Give Up!
, which is solely devoted to perseverance. Perseverance is what the apostle Paul called “pressing on.” You can press on far beyond wherever you think your abilities end. When we run out of our own strength, God is ready to give us His if we ask for it.

Sometimes, I still have relapses in this area of concentration and while trying to complete a project, I’ll suddenly realize my mind has just wandered on to something else that has absolutely nothing to do with the issue at hand. I have not yet arrived at a place of perfect concentration, but at least I understand how important it is not to allow my mind to go wherever it wishes, whenever it wants to. I have already decided that I will never give up on learning how to think properly and I strongly urge you to do the same thing. I am not where I want to be, but I am making progress!

Think about It

Does your mind wander and, if so, are you ready to discipline it?

Have you made a decision that you will never give up until you experience complete victory?

It Takes Practice

Training our minds to be disciplined takes practice. One way I learned to do it was to stop allowing my mind to wander during conversations. There are times when Dave is talking to me and I listen for a while; then all of a sudden, I realize I haven’t heard one word he has spoken because I allowed my mind to wander on to something else. My body is standing there near him and many times my face is even turned toward him, but in my mind I don’t hear anything he says. For many years, when this sort of thing happened, I pretended to know exactly what Dave was saying. Now I simply stop and ask, “Would you back up and repeat that? I let my mind wander, and I didn’t hear a thing you said.” In this way, I’m dealing with the problem. I’m disciplining my mind to stay on track. Confronting these issues is the only way to get on the victorious side of them.

I’ve also discovered that we all have a lot of what I call “mental roaming time”—time when we are not occupied with anything specific and our minds are free to roam around and select something to meditate on. This might be drive time, shower time, the time before falling asleep, or other similar occasions. We need to be careful to use this time in productive ways and make sure we think about things that build character and help us grow spiritually. These can be some of the best times to meditate on the power thoughts you are learning in this book. As you fall asleep at night, do so rolling these thoughts over and over in your mind:

• I can do whatever I need to do in life through Christ.

• God loves me unconditionally.

• I will not live in fear.

• I am difficult to offend.

• I love people and I enjoy helping them.

• I trust God completely; there is no need to worry!

• I am content and emotionally stable.

• God meets all my needs abundantly.

• I pursue peace with God, myself, and others.

• I live in the present and enjoy each moment.

• I am disciplined and self-controlled.

• I put God first in all things.

Remember, the mind is the battlefield. It is the place we win or lose our battles in life. Indecision, uncertainty, fear, and random “roaming” thoughts are simply results of not disciplining the mind. This lack of discipline can be frustrating and make you think,
What is wrong with me? Why can’t I keep my mind on what I am doing?
But the truth is, the mind needs to be disciplined and trained to focus. You have a spirit of discipline and self-control and it is time to start developing it.

Ask God to help you, and then refuse to allow your mind to think about whatever it pleases. Begin today to control your thoughts and keep your mind on what you’re doing, saying, or hearing. You’ll need to practice for a while; breaking old habits and forming new ones always takes time. Developing discipline is never easy, but it’s always worth it in the end. When you win the battle for your mind, you’ll be much more decisive, more confident, and focused. Then, you’ll also be a more effective and productive person.

Think about It

Are you able to keep your mind focused on what you are doing?

When You Can’t Get It Out of Your Mind

Not being able to keep our minds on what we want to keep them on is one problem, but being unable to get something off of our minds is another. We might worry about a situation, or continually roll it over and over in our minds trying to find a solution. We want to get it off our minds and enjoy peace, but it appears to have taken up residence.

Does this sound familiar to you? Do you ever experience times when you know a particular line of thinking is making you miserable and doing absolutely no good, but you just cannot seem to stop? We all do, but we can learn to discipline our minds to allow other thoughts in and not focus so completely on one issue or situation. The way to stop thinking about something you don’t want to think about is to simply think about something else. Even getting in a different atmosphere helps. If you are worried, don’t just sit home and worry—get out of the house and go do something! Get your mind on something that will produce good fruit because worry does absolutely no good. I have discovered that even when I feel bad physically, doing something that gets my mind off how I feel makes me feel better.

I recently spent a good deal of time with a friend who was experiencing a tremendous mental battle that was rooted in a fear of displeasing an authority figure in her life. She thought about the situation—and thought about it and thought about it and thought about it. At one point, she asked, “Why can’t I get this off my mind?” Her one-track thinking caused her to be stuck in the fear she felt in the situation with her authority figure.

However, I soon noticed that when we became involved in some ministry activity together, she got her spark back and no longer mentioned her mental battle. When I asked her later that day how she was doing, she said, “I’m fine when I get involved in what God has called me to do.”

What we learn from this story about my friend is the answer to the question, “What do I do when I cannot get something off my mind and I know it is making me miserable and probably displeasing God?” The answer is to get involved in something that gives you joy, something that forces you to get your mind off the troubling circumstances and onto something positive and worthwhile.

Satan was attacking my friend at a weak point. She had been abandoned by her birth mother and abused as a child, which caused her to battle with an excessive need to be accepted by authority figures. Likewise, I have struggled with insecurities and a need to be accepted by authority figures in my life. These areas were “open doors” for the enemy in my life (places where he could easily take advantage of me and gain influence over me). As God continually works in me, these doors are shrinking in size and getting more and more difficult for the enemy to get through. What was once a wide door of opportunity for the devil has been almost completely closed.

Satan often works through or takes advantage of our weaknesses at the precise time God is trying to promote us or lead us to take a step of faith that will advance His kingdom or move us closer to fulfilling our destinies. I believe this was the case with my friend, and I know it has been the case in my life and the lives of many others.

I well remember times when God was trying to get me to make a decision that would enable me to do more in His kingdom, but fear of what people would think held me captive and immobilized me. When you find yourself stuck in a thought pattern that is detrimental to you—one that plays out over and over again like a broken record in your mind—get busy doing something God has called you to do or something that will bless someone. Don’t be passive and merely wish you could get it off of your mind. Be aggressive and refuse to lend your mind to the devil for his activity. Remember that bad thoughts lead to bad moods and bad decisions, so don’t waste your time on anything that doesn’t add to the quality of your life.

Think about It

What do you consider your weak point(s), where Satan could take advantage of you?

Make a Choice

In Deuteronomy 30:19, God says, “I have set before you life and death, the blessings and the curses; therefore choose life.” He gives us options, but He wants us to do the choosing. A choice often means we can go the easy way or the hard way. We can go the way we feel like going or we can go the way we know is right. To make a right and a wise choice means we will probably have to discipline ourselves to do something we don’t feel like doing, but know is best.

As the Bible states, discipline doesn’t bring immediate joy, but it does bring lasting joy later on. The enemy is always out to destroy us and he often tries to do that by influencing us to make bad choices—to choose to do what feels good or is easy now, instead of what will be beneficial in the long run. These choices may temporarily satisfy the flesh, but they don’t please God or satisfy us permanently. We should discipline ourselves to make good choices that honor God and His Word. God encourages His children to walk in the Spirit and the way we do that is by choosing to do what we know is right even if it doesn’t feel good. If we know to do right and don’t do it, it is sin (see James 4:17). When Dave and I have a disagreement and the air is filled with tension, I can choose to apologize and do what will restore peace or I can choose to stay angry and wait for him to apologize to me. Is it more important for me to be right or peaceful? I know that it is right for me to make peace and if I don’t, then I am sinning. God is our Vindicator and if I need to be shown to be in the right, He will take care of that, but my part is to honor Him by doing what I know is right according to His Word. God can work out all the details but we need to be makers and maintainers of peace (see Matthew 5:9).