Counselor's Corner: Whatever You Focus on Most Will Grow

I came to the realization this morning that over the last several months, I have been focused way too much on all the things wrong in my life. After a series of disappointments, let downs, and frustrating circumstances I began to see life through a “distorted filter.” My focus became on what was wrong in my life, and I had difficulty seeing the good from the most difficult of my circumstances.

I have always tried to see the good or positive in situations, but when I allowed myself to focus primarily on the negative, my entire outlook on life changed. Life became difficult and discouraging, which eventually lead to feeling hopeless that things would get better.

►Ways you can change your focus to the good, the lovely and what is praiseworthy (Philippians 4:8):

1.     Forgive yourself. If you have struggled with focusing on the wrong things, forgive yourself and change your perspective.

2.     Forgive others. Yes, people may have hurt you, used you, and rejected you but forgive, release and bless them.

3.     Take responsibility for how you feel. You are in control of your life. People and circumstances can affect you but ultimately you can exert self-control over allowing them to spiral into a negative focus. You cannot control people or circumstances, but you can choose how you will respond.

4.     Take every thought captive into the obedience of Jesus Christ. Become aware of your thoughts, and choose to replace the negative thoughts with truth.

5.     Retrain your thoughts to intentionally see the positives in yourself and in others. If you are constantly picking out the negative qualities in yourself and in others you will see yourself and others the way the enemy wants you to.

6.     Wherever you focus your attention and energy will become your reality. How do you want to shape your reality? The enemy will certainly help you to magnify the negatives in life.

While God guards our hearts (Philippians 4:7), we are also commanded to focus our lives on things that please God (Philippians 4:8). Focusing on the positive in any situation can increase your faith. This is not to say to ignore reality, but to truly believe that God does work out all things for good who love Him and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28). When we focus on the negative it weakens our faith and increases stress, anxiety and fear in our lives.

Counselor's Corner: 23 Strategies to De-Stress God's Way

Would you say that your life is relatively stress-free, and that you know how to de-stress? Many people are living stressed-out lives, and don’t know why they are getting sick frequently, feel tired and have hormonal imbalances. Stress is one of the biggest contributors to many of the ailments our bodies can endure.

►Stress is mainly caused by how you perceive things. Your perception about people, circumstances and yourself largely impacts the level of stress that you have.

Listed below are 23 strategies to de-stress God’s way:

1.      Be at peace with ALL men. I know it is not always easy to be at peace with that difficult or annoying person in your life, but every time you lose your cool with them your stress level goes up. Peace with ALL men DOES NOT mean be a doormat or allow others to abuse or harm you, but not to allow anger and resentment to fester inside you for people who are the most difficult to love. Peace says, “I will choose to pray for them instead of lashing out at them.”

2.      Recognize that everyone has struggles and many people are trying to find their way to God, or what they think is God. Have Mercy on the ones who are totally lost in finding the true way to Jesus, there is much confusion in the world. Pray instead for the lost that they would find their way to the only path to God.

3.      Enjoy ALL things and ALL people. Focus on the good in people not what their doing wrong or even their lack of relationship with God. Enjoy everything that you do, including work, going to the grocery store, and chores. Enjoyment in these things and people is all about perception. CHANGE YOUR PERCEPTION and you will enjoy the not-so fun aspects of your life.

4.      Stop allowing people and circumstances to control you and your emotions. Take charge of your own emotions and life.

5.      Forgive others from your heart. Let go and release all resentment, bitterness, unforgiveness, offense, anger and revenge. Most people do not even realize how they have hurt you. For the ones who intentionally hurt you, release them to God and forgive them, not for them but for you.

6.      Let go of all stubbornness, pride and haughtiness. You don’t know everything and you don’t know always know why people do what they do.

7.      Let go of all unrealistic expectations for yourself and for others.

8.      Live in the moment, the present. Don’t live in the regrets of the past or fear of the future. Be present-focused.

9.      Laugh, play and be silly and do things you enjoyed as a child. If you enjoyed swinging or coloring as a child, incorporate those activities into your life.

10.  Have an unshakeable trust in God and believe that He will protect you and will work out ALL things for your good.

11.  Cultivate a heart of gratitude daily. Focus on your blessings not your lack. As you focus on your blessings, your lack will shrink. What you focus on most will grow. CHANGE YOUR PERSPECTIVE.

12.  Focus on what you can do, and not on what you can’t do. FOCUS on your strengths, not your weaknesses.

13.  Don’t allow others stress, heavy burdens, and unrelenting problems become yours. Let others take ownership for their lives as you are doing with yours. Emotionally and mentally detach from others problems, and instead cast their cares upon Jesus and allow Him to carry their heavy loads-NOT YOU!

14.  Let go of ALL that you cannot control. Basically, you have control over your life and your emotions, and that’s about it.

15.  Don’t take what others do to you personally. Most of the time people are not aware of what they are doing to you. CHOOSE to believe others are not intentionally trying to hurt you.

16.  Think the best, not the worst about others. This one goes along with #15.

17.  Do not judge others who are not walking with God, those that are “supposedly” walking with God, and those that are living a destructive lifestyle.

18.  Don’t be in a hurry or a rush. Walk slower, listen more than you talk, breathe slower, and drive slower. If you have 20 items on your to-do-list, that’s way too many. Having too many things to do each day will make you feel rushed and stressed! Cut back all the non-essentials.

19.  Take time everyday to enjoy God’s beauty whether through nature such as sunsets, sun rises, beautiful flowers in bloom or the many different arrays of stunning birds.

20.  Don’t blame others for how you feel. Take ownership for how you feel.

21.  Stop dreading whatever you do. Dread creates stress. Even if you have to do something that is less than pleasant, look for the good or the positive in the situation before allowing yourself to dread.

22.  Forgive yourself! As important as it is to forgive others, it is most important that you forgive yourself. Let go that you are not perfect and that you have and will make mistakes.

23.  Love yourself and be good to yourself. Self-hate and self-loathing are major contributors to stress. Stop comparing yourself to others. Accept that you are unique and you were created that way. Stop trying to fit into the world’s standards and be who you were created to be.

Your overall health, energy, relationships, peace, and level of contentment will significantly improve if you begin implementing the above strategies to de-stress God’s way.

Counselor’s Corner:Resilience: Getting Back Up Again After You Have Been Knocked Down

There are a few of us in life who have been knocked down repeatedly. Some of us have had to learn very early on in life how to fight, and some never have learned to get back up from the punches in life. For someone who has been under tremendous stress, trauma, and different crisis’ in their lives, developing resilience is key for maintaining and keeping good mental, physical and spiritual health. Without resilience, one breaks under pressure instead of just gently bending.

What is resilience? The capacity to recover quickly from difficulties. You bounce back swiftly after stress or difficulty in your life.

Research shows that the amount of resilience a person possess is a greater factor for determining success in life rather than your IQ. Some people have a natural tendency towards resilience, while others are bent more towards emotional reactions including being overwhelmed by difficulties in life. I believe some resilience is part of our DNA, but I also believe some resilience is learned by our environment or by the people who raised us. Take for instance, if you were raised with an overly emotional mother whose first reaction to problems was to show negative emotions and you never saw how she overcame her difficulties; chances are a part of what you perceived became ingrained in you. The good news is you can learn how to become resilient. Learning to become resilient starts with your thoughts, and renewing your mind to believe what God says in His word about you. If your thoughts are negative, it is probable you are not a resilient person.

Reflect and ponder: Would you consider yourself a resilient person? Why or why not? What traits did your caretakers show you that helped or hindered your resiliency?

Counselor’s Corner:

→Resilient people are able to cope with problems and setbacks. Those that lack resilience become overwhelmed when distressing situations occur, tend to focus on the problem, use unhealthy coping mechanisms to deal with life’s challenges, and are slower to recover from setbacks

→Resilient people don’t live life in denial, but they understand that setbacks occur and that life can be painful sometimes.

→Resilient people do not remain focused on the negative, and disengage rapidly from problems that appear unsolvable. A key to resilience is to know when to “cut your losses,” and move on to problems that are solvable.

→Resilient people still mourn losses and experience grief, but they can find redeeming potential in most situations. When non-resilient people face difficulties all of their emotions turn negative. If things are good, the non-resilient person is good, but if things are bad, they feel bad.

→Resilient people can find the silver lining in almost any adverse circumstance. Resilient people will find, seek, and search for the good in their challenges.

→Resilient people are grateful people and are always counting their blessings. They might say, “I am sad that this happened but I am blessed about this.”

→Resilient people are not victims and don’t wallow in self-pity.

→Resilient people are overcomers, whether it is their childhood wounds or current painful situations.

→Resilient people are hopeful. They are hopeful brighter days are ahead and they trust God will use their pain for His purposes.

→Resilient people take good care of themselves such as with exercise, eating healthy, and maintaining a healthy support system.

→Resilient people do not focus on their problems, but focus on what is right in their lives.

→Resilient people are not whiners and complainers. They don’t tell their problems repeatedly to others to gain pity.

→Resilient people are fighters, they don’t back down and they never give up! When they get temporarily knocked down, they come back up stronger.

→Resilient people move forward, they don’t keep looking back in the past in regret and they don’t project what may happen in the future.

MEDIATE ON THESE SCRIPTURES:

I repeat, be strong and brave! Don’t panic, for I, The Lord your God, am with you in all you do.

Joshua 1:9

The righteous keep moving forward, and those with clean hearts become stronger and stronger.

Job 17:9

Freedom in Christ

Take some time and sit with Jesus and ask Him how your life would be if:

How would you feel if you did not carry false guilt (what if, should be, or could be doing)?

How would you feel if you did not worry about your family and other nagging issues?

What if you did not need a substance or chemical to feel alive and to have pleasure?

What would your life be like if you did not compare your life to anyone else’s life? Simply content with your lot in life.

What would your life be like if you no longer cared so much what people thought of you? It’s great if others like you, but if they do not-you are okay!

How would you feel if you no longer condemned yourself or beat yourself up for your shortcomings, mistakes, and weaknesses? What if you accepted yourself completely, shortcomings and all?

What if you began to see yourself as worthy and with value? What if you believed you have purpose and your life does matter?

What would your life be like if you did not try and figure out the outcomes and instead rested and trusted God for the outcomes?

How would your life be if you totally and radically trusted Jesus? Even if your prayers “seemingly” go unanswered and you stand by and watch other people get the very blessings that you want.

What would your life be like if you loved people the way Christ wants you to, not how other people want you to love them?

How would your life be if you did not get easily offended and did not speak judgmentally and critically of other people?

What would your life be like if you focused on the good and not the negative, and your words magnified the good instead of all your problems?

What would your life be like if you did not live in a constant state of panic and stress? What if you adopted the mindset, “Take life as it comes?”

What if you are okay with being misunderstood by people because you choose to follow and serve Christ?

What if you could truly enjoy life without feeling guilty that others don’t have what you have?

What if you could be led by the Holy Spirit and not what man wants from you?

What if you lived knowing that you are a child of God, adopted into His family and are no longer an orphan? What if you knew that Jesus does love you even if you don’t get everything that you want?

What if you loved God with all your heart, soul, and strength and placed no “idols” before Him (including family, work or ministry)?

What if you truly let go of all the expectations that you have of people, if they choose to be a benefit and blessing to you-that’s great, but if they choose to do things that cause you pain, you can release and forgive them.

What if you did not let anyone disappoint you with their actions?

What if you did not live bitter because of your life’s circumstances and was truly happy when others got exactly what you have been praying for.

What if you could experience FREEDOM? Jesus wants us FREE in ALL these areas so that we can experience life in abundance and enjoy life to the fullest (John 10:10).

Having this type of FREEDOM will require some basic steps for you:

1)      Love God FIRST-He must get first place in every area of your life. Place nothing before Him. Focus on things above, not on things on Earth-become eternity focused.

2)      Push away the distractions that will come to steal your time with God and to steal your peace and joy. Distractions can come through people, phone calls and texts, the internet, and nuisances.

3)      Care more about what God thinks about you than what others think about you. People will have an opinion about you but if you know whose you are and what He has called you to do you can rise above people’s opinions.

4)      Live in the present, the moment-not projecting the future. Don’t plan too far ahead and hold your plans loosely in case Jesus wants to interrupt your plans.

5)      Never compare yourself to anyone. Jesus has a unique plan for each of us. If you try and conform to the world and what the world is doing, you will feel very lost.

FREEDOM in Christ means More joy, More peace, More love, More contentment, and More enjoyment of your life. You can have FREEDOM in Christ by following Jesus not the ways of the world. Jesus said He came to Earth to “proclaim freedom,” and He said “if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:36). Jesus was not saying free to do whatever we wanted, but free to be the kind of people He created us to be. We are all under the power of the natural tendency to sin, and sin has brought a penalty. But we have the freedom to choose life over sin and death, and that comes from accepting Jesus Christ’s sacrifice for our sins on the cross and accepting and believing that. We are no longer under sin’s grasp-we have been freed. Like a prisoner, the cell doors have been unlocked for all of us to get out by Jesus Christ. As we submit to Christ and His ways, sin loses its grip on us. When we choose to trust and follow Christ our sin habits and bad attitudes lose their control over our lives. True freedom is not doing whatever pleases your flesh, because that will lead you back into the prison without a way out.

The way out of your prison (sin) and to freedom is: obeying and trusting Jesus.