Don't Believe Everything You Think

Recently, I dreamt about a mistake I made in a college football game played over 20 years ago. Interesting... I made a lot more good plays than bad but I still wind up dreaming about the bad two decades later. Which really isn't that surprising. Any coach or ball player will tell you that the games they lost stay with them longer than the games they won. That's because the emotional sting of loss is greater than the emotional charge of gain. Negative events or "hits" affect us more strongly than the relatively positive. (For more see Bad is Stronger than Good)

I strongly believe the Scriptures teach us to monitor our thoughts (Phil 4:8,Proverbs 4:23). It's imperative that we set our minds on God's reality over against our own reality. Without understanding what God's reality and freedom is we're all predisposed toward fixating on our mistakes, problems and our past.

However, that doesn't mean that all negative events or moods are destructive. Not only can critical or cynical dispositions save us in times of danger they can make us more effective at certain tasks. For example, I've learned after reading Emotional Intelligence that balancing my checkbook or putting a budget together while in a bad mood actually orients me to be more realistic about how I'm spending my money. The trick is getting myself in a bad mood!

To take this all a step further... I don't believe the the goal of the believer is to be free from emotions. I'm not even convinced that we can be free from their influence. The best assessment I have right now is that the goal is to be from the control of emotions. 2Corinthians 10:5 exhorts us to take every thought captive, submitting it to the authority of Christ.

So be aware of what you're feeling. It is a part of how God made you. But don't be driven by every emotion you have. Don't believe everything you think.

Bank Fraud and Negativity

Someone, somewhere got a hold of my debit card number and had an early Christmas this past week. We discovered the anomalies a couple of days ago underneath the ‘pending’ section of our bank account. The bank couldn’t actually do anything until the transaction’s posted even though the account was officially closed. So, each morning this week I’ve awakened, gone to the computer in order to check to see how much money I lost the night before. After three days it totaled $948.62. It was downer.

Ever had a week where the first minutes every day were spent finding out what bad thing happened while you were sleeping? Some of you probably have even though it may have nothing to do with bank fraud. There are people that I’ve known who are convinced that something bad happened or is getting ready to happen just about every morning. It’s not a positive way of living. Now there are times when the reality is such (like in my case this week) when you know something did happen but most of the time it’s defeating to spend your life that way. I guarantee you that if you try to find bad… you will. Don’t be that kind of person. A guy named Paul said a long time ago, “Look for the best not the worst. The beautiful not the ugly. Things to praise, not things to curse.” Positive people apply that kind of scriptural thinking to their life.

Research shows that positive people have the same amount of problems as negative people. (did you get that?) Their problems aren’t any different but their response is. I heard Dr Henry Cloud speak this week and he said this, “Pessimistic people usually respond to problems in three ways: A. They personalize it (“Oh, I’m such a loser!”) B. They make it pervasive (“I’m a loser in all areas of my life.”) and C. They make it permanent. (“I’ll never be anything but a loser.”)” Positive people, on the hand, respond to problems in an opposite fashion.

Do you go looking for problems?
How do you respond to problems?
Are you positive or pessimistic?
Can you count the number of times I’ve used words that start with the letter ‘p’ in this blog?