Change Your Thoughts. Change Your Life. — Pt. 1
All of us want to be happy—we do. Augustine, our African church father and perhaps the most influential theologian in history wrote almost 1600 years ago, "Every man, whatsoever his condition, desires to be happy." There is little argument here; we want to get happy and stay happy.
We have a complicated relationship with happiness; some of us may even feel guilty or selfish, even having the thought of wanting to be happy. But that guilt is not getting the life for you that God desires.
Believe it or not, God wants us to be happy. God cares about our happiness, and he has gone to great lengths to prove it.
Do you know of a devoted, earthly father who does not desire his children's happiness? Of course not! God is described as the ultimate loving and devoted Father, and as such, our happiness is a concern of His.
He does not want us to be happy at the expense of our integrity or morality, but He also knows that immoral and ill things will not make us happy in the end.
So here is what we know…
You want to be happy.
God wants you to be happy.
God, Himself is a happy God.
God designed us to be happy! He delights when we delight. He rejoices over us with singing, according to Zephaniah 3:17, which means He created us in His image to rejoice and sing, as well!
How, then, do we find happiness? It seems so elusive. How we find happiness is quite clear, the scriptures have no shortage of promises.
The Psalmists' words tell us, "Happy are the people whose God is the LORD!" And, "Happy are the people whose strength is in you."
But to experience this happiness and hang tight to it, we need to find freedom from some things that keep us captive in unhappy places. In this seven-part Blog Series, I will explore with you what I believe are the four things—minimum—that we need for us to have lasting happiness.
We need:
New Script
New Voices
New Story
New Focus
Today I am going to explore the idea of a New Script. If we are going to be happy, we have to corral our negative thoughts and write a new mental script by which we operate.
If you are unfamiliar with the Enneagram, it is an ancient tool used to describe nine personality profiles in a reasonably complex but very understandable way—once you get into it.
What is fascinating about the Enneagram and pertinent to our series is that it helps you see how the various wounds you have suffered over your life have helped to shape who you are and who you thought you needed to be to navigate your world.
My top two Enneagram numbers are Four and Eight, and if you know anything about the Enneagram, you know that those two numbers are almost diametrically opposed in expression. The Four is Original Person—artistic, sensitive, melancholic. The Eight is called the Powerful Person—strong, decisive, challenging.
Why am I sharing this with you? Because over the last couple of years, specifically through the lockdown, I have slowly realised that I am more Four than Eight, but throughout my adult life—particularly in pastoral ministry—every time I have allowed myself to live and lead and love out of that artistic and sensitive place, something injurious happened.
So I began to think things like, "I have to protect this part of myself." And "if they—whoever they were at the time—see me as weak or sensitive, then they will take advantage of me." And "I have to keep all of this sensitivity inside because people only respond to strength."
Eventually, the thoughts became unconscious ways of being; in other words, I ultimately did not have to think and then act on those thoughts; my powerful person—the Eight in me—took the reins, guarding the most sensitive side of me at all times, and keeping my Four "safe" from the world, but also unseen.
It messed me up because for almost fifteen years, an entire part of me—what seems to be the primary part of me—was suffocated, and slowly I became the thoughts I was thinking. I have been less of myself for years—up until the end of 2020, really—because of the thoughts I have been thinking, and perhaps you can be honest enough and vulnerable enough to admit the same—
We become the thoughts we think.
In her book, Switch on Your Brain: The Key to Peak Happiness, Thinking, and Health, Dr Caroline Leaf writes:
"Your mind is the most powerful thing in the universe after God."
So powerful, in fact, that how we think affects our own spirit, soul, and body and how we think also affects the people around us.
Science and Scripture both confirm how the results of our decisions pass through the sperm and ova to the following four generations, profoundly affecting their choices and lifestyles. It is called the science of epigenetics. If this is a new concept for you, do not fret, we will provide some resources at the close of our time.
The Scriptures often speak about the power of the mind and our thoughts. I think it's easy to glaze over this and overlook the connection between thoughts and transformation. Maybe it's too "self-help ish," and cheap self-help books have turned us off.
Science connected the mind with transformation years ago.
Our minds are powerful, and our thoughts shape who we are and will become.
In my case, I thought powerful, not sensitive, was what I needed to be to function in my role and this world. I thought that if anyone ever saw what was underneath, I would not be safe in my own skin. I thought many things, and eventually, those thoughts began to shape who I was and the world around me.
But we do not have to be captive to our thoughts; we have the power to change our thinking and therefore change our relationship with ourselves and the world around us.
Dr Caroline Leaf says again in her book Switch On Your Brain:
"As we think, we change the physical nature of our brain. As we consciously direct our thinking, we can wire out toxic thinking patterns and replace them with healthy thoughts."
Here is the bottom line: you need a new script if you want to be happy and stay happy. You need a new mental script that guides and directs how you navigate yourself, others, and this world. It would be best if you rewired your brain with a new script. Your old script of "I can't" or "they won't" or "if they" or "what if" has to be cast out, and a new one written. You have to consciously direct your thinking to wire out toxic thinking patterns and wire in healthy thoughts.
Thankfully Scripture and Science agree—you can rewire your brain. God has given you His power to have power over your mind. You do not have to be bound by toxic thoughts and debilitating beliefs. In part two of this series, I will share the three steps you need to take to rewire your brain for peak happiness. Tune in!