How’s Your Thoughts

How’s Your Thoughts?

Leonard Sweet has a great quote, “Either we subjugate our thoughts to Christ, or we are subjugated by them.” Simply put, if our minds are not submitted to Christ, we are controlled by our thoughts. In this blog, I want to briefly identify some toxic thinking patterns and ways to detox them from your life.

Toxic Thinking…
Toxic thinking are negative thought patterns. See if you can relate to any of these thought patterns that are listed by Demmitt & Demmitt as “toxic thinking patterns”: Mind Reading (assuming what someone else is thinking); All-or-Nothing thinking (if it doesn’t turn out completely the way you wanted, it is a total failure); Overgeneralization (something bad happens and it “always” happens); Magnification (exaggerating the problems); Should statements (things should be the way you want them); Labeling (I am just “fill in the blank”); & Blame (blaming other for her problems).

Detoxifying Thoughts…
Step 1 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 says, 4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5 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.

In order to begin to take your thoughts captive, you first must become aware of what you hear in your head about yourself. Do your thoughts gravitate towards fear, anger, sadness, shame, and conflict? These thoughts have a huge impact on your behaviors. And if you want to rid yourself of them, you have to take some action.

Step 2 We transform our minds when we feast on the Word of God. The best way to counter negative thoughts, is with the truth found in scriptures.

The Bible says in Romans 12:1, Be transformed by the renewing of your mind. We renew our minds by filling it with God’s truths. Romans 8:1 says there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Christ is our judge, no one else (and that includes ourselves).

Additional Scriptures…
Look up these scriptures and start them with the phrase “In Christ, I am…” Matthew 5:14; 2 Cor. 5:17-18; Eph. 1:1; Eph. 6:2 & Phil 3:20.

We all suffer from toxic thinking from time to time and I hope you found these steps helpful.