The Mind Connection: How the Thoughts You Choose Affect Your Mood, Behavior, and Decisions (6 page)

In her blog article “The Psychology of Happiness,” Kim Gaines Eckert, a Christian counselor, talks about how people think they will be happy “if”:

I mentioned earlier that Satan offers the “if lies” to our minds, hoping we will always wait to be happy some other time. He knows the value of true joy, and it is dangerous to him.

Eckert also said that when we get those things we thought would make us happy, we are happy, until we’re not. I love that statement. She shares that psychologists call this the “hedonic treadmill,” in which the efficacy of a new pleasure wears off over time. The more feel-good stuff we do or have, the more we need in order to achieve the same level of happiness.
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It’s like the tolerance that develops over time in addictions, so we need three of something now instead of the two that once satisfied us.

If you have a long-standing habit of thinking thoughts that poison or kill your joy, then you may need a brain detox. Detoxing is
fairly popular these days. Doctors and nutritionists have discovered that a lot of illness results from toxins that are lodged in our bodies and need to come out. This is accomplished in various ways, but all in all, the results are amazing for many people. Detoxing the brain by replacing toxic thoughts with healthy ones also has an amazingly good effect in every area of our lives. Dr. Caroline Leaf shares it this way:

I find it interesting that medical and scientific research have taken centuries to discover what God told people from the beginning of time. We have been given the mind of Christ and that means that with His help we can think as He would think (1 Corinthians 2:16). Dr. Leaf goes on to say:

That means you need to start replacing wrong thoughts with right ones, or another way I like to say it: “Start replacing your old thoughts with God’s thoughts found in His Word.” This, of course, is a process that in reality goes on throughout our lifetime, but each toxic thought that is replaced with a healthy one releases more joy into our life, as well as health into our body.

In my book
The Secret to True Happiness
I share some key points, and I would like to mention three of them in this book.

I don’t know how anyone can be consistently happy if they don’t believe in God. Oddly enough, some people who don’t believe make it their mission in life to try to diminish the faith of others. They are unhappy and they want to make others unhappy too.

A story is told of a lady who had to travel extensively for her business, and most of her travel involved flying. But flying made her very nervous, so she always took her Bible to read on long flights, because it helped her relax.

On one trip, she was sitting next to a man. When he saw her pull out her Bible, he gave a little chuckle and a smirk, and went back to what he was doing. After a while, he turned to her and asked, “You don’t really believe all that stuff in that book, do you?” The lady replied, “Of course I do. It’s in the Bible.”

He said, “Well, what about that guy who was swallowed by the whale?” She replied, “Oh, Jonah. Yes, I believe that story. It is in the Bible.” He asked, “Well, how do you suppose he survived all that time inside a whale?” The lady said, “Well, I don’t really know. I guess I will ask him when I get to Heaven.”

“What if he isn’t in Heaven?” the man asked sarcastically.

“Then
you
can ask him!” replied the lady.

I can safely say that the man in this story was not a happy man. I can sense the bitterness in his comments and questions. It is a terrible tragedy when one finds it difficult to believe.

Believe like a little child and put God first in your life, and happiness will be more easily attained. God is the source of all good things, and that includes joy. Jesus said He came that we might have and enjoy our lives in full measure (John 10:10). I recommend starting each day talking with God about your day and asking for His help in all that you need to do.

It was quite life-changing for me when I realized that God wants each of us to be thoroughly happy and to fully enjoy life. I had grown up without enjoying much of anything, and I never really had the opportunity to be a carefree child. Thankfully, God has given me the opportunity to be one as an adult. Believe that God loves you, He is for you, He is with you, and He delights in helping you. Feel free to talk to Him about anything, because He is interested in everything about you. He wants to hear you laugh and see you enjoying your life.

As a child of God, it is important to understand that you become a new creature in Christ when you receive Him as your Savior and Lord.

I love new beginnings, and that is what Jesus offers us. No matter what you may have done wrong in your past, you are now a new creation. Old things have passed away and all things are made new. That truth alone should make us very happy!

Jesus took all of our sin upon Himself and gave us His very own righteousness. Through Him we have right standing with God. God now sees us as being right with Him. We no longer need to feel “wrong” about ourselves.

Reading this Scripture should make us laugh out loud. What good news! We are made right with God, approved by and acceptable to Him. Amazing! If you have felt bad about yourself, wished you were someone else more acceptable, or compared yourself with other people, those days are over if you know who you are in Christ. He gives us a new identity, and all we need to do is believe it and receive it by faith!

Feeling incapable, unable, and overwhelmed hinders our happiness, but God has solved that problem for us if we will only believe it. The apostle Paul prayed for the church asking that they might know the power available to them as believers (see Ephesians 1:19). If we think we are incapable, then we will be, and if we think we cannot handle our challenges in life, then we won’t. Our thoughts affect us in astounding ways. They are a key in regulating our energy levels. Think weak and be weak… think strong and be strong! We are strong in Christ, not in ourselves. When you need to do anything, don’t look to yourself and ask if you are able—look to Jesus and know that in Him you are able. Here is God’s promise to you:

Anyone can be happy if they believe right and think right! Let us make a commitment to think like God thinks so we can be the people He wants us to be and live the joy-filled life He purchased for us with the life of His Son Jesus Christ.

• If we value joy, then we cannot just passively sit and wish to be happy; we must aggressively pursue it and be willing to make adjustments where they are needed.

• You cannot give someone else the responsibility for your joy. It is a choice you have to make.

• Simplifying your life is a great way to increase your joy.

• Believe like a child and put God first in your life, and happiness will be more easily attained.

If you want to do one thing, but you have your mind on something else, you limit your power and ability. Learning to focus is perhaps one of our greatest challenges in the world today.

In order for me to do a good job writing this book, I have to shut out everything else and focus. I need to be alone and without distractions. At times I have to make difficult choices in order to be able to fulfill the call on my life. I recently got a new puppy, because my dog I had for twelve years died. Not having had a puppy for a long time, I had forgotten how much work they are. Not only that, but the puppy I got was as feisty as she could be.
Actually, she had a mind of her own and wasn’t too keen on obedience, even though I had sent her for three rounds of extensive training. By the time she was eight months old, I finally had to face facts. She was not the right dog for me because I could not focus properly on the work God has called me to and still take care of her. I made the difficult choice not to keep her.

A few months went by and I decided to try another puppy, and the one I got that time was sweet, cuddly, and obedient; she learned quickly and was very cute! (Cute is important!) But even taking care of her was challenging due to my travel and schedule. However, my daughter offered to share the duties of “dog parenting” with me, and it is now a perfect situation. I have the dog anytime I want her, and I take her home when I don’t. Perhaps God blessed me with an absolutely perfect situation because I was willing to sacrifice my desire in order to stay focused on His will for my life. Always remember that God promises to give us the desires of our heart if we will delight ourselves in Him (see Psalm 37:4). Even if you have to let go of something you would like to have or do, God is able to replace it with something better than you could imagine.

Focus requires understanding that you can have too many top priorities, or nothing becomes a top priority. When we do too many things at once, we end up doing nothing well.

If you have a goal, something you truly want to accomplish, you will need to focus your thoughts, energies, and time toward that thing. It is useless to “wish” you could do something; if you truly desire to do something, you must focus and do it! I have written over a hundred books throughout the past thirty-five years, because I feel that God wants me to leave
a legacy to the body of Christ. Naturally, I have had to sacrifice other things in order to accomplish this, but I don’t feel deprived. I actually feel fulfilled, because I believe I have done what I was intended to do.

The world is filled with dissatisfied, unfulfilled people, and I suspect it is due to them not giving themselves to what they were meant to do. God has given each of us gifts and abilities, and we should nourish and develop them. Paul wrote to the Romans telling them to give themselves to whatever their gift was (see Romans 12:6–8). I am gifted as a public speaker, but I am not gifted as a musician. I tried in the earlier years of my life to learn to play guitar, but it was a waste of time. We cannot accomplish a thing merely because we want to do so. God only helps us do what He wants us to do. Find out what that is and give yourself to it.

The writer of Ecclesiastes said we are to give our mind to what we are doing (see Ecclesiastes 5:1). I don’t know about you, but I often find that difficult. My mind has a tendency to wander, and I have to keep calling it back to what is at hand. The more we allow our minds to run wild, the wilder they will become, but they can be trained to focus with some diligent effort. You will never control your thoughts if you don’t believe that you can. At any moment you can stop thinking about something you don’t want to think about and start thinking about something you want to think about. I tell people, “If you don’t want to think about something, then think about something else.”

It is also possible to keep your mind on one thing at a time, but it does take practice.

Richard Carlson said in
Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff… and It’s All Small Stuff
, “When you do too many things at once, it’s impossible to be present-moment oriented. Thus, you not only lose out
on much of the potential enjoyment of what you are doing, but you also become far less focused and effective.”