Have you ever stopped to take note of the thoughts running through your head and the words you are speaking to yourself?<\/p>\n
It is said that we have approximately 50,000 – 70,000 thoughts per day, so it’s obviously impossible to keep track of them all. \u00a0But if the majority of your thoughts are negative, how do you expect you will feel? \u00a0Defeated? \u00a0Depressed? \u00a0Stressed? \u00a0All of the above?<\/p>\n
Our thoughts and emotions follow a very simple pattern:<\/p>\n
THOUGHT —> EMOTION —> BELIEF\/ACTION<\/b><\/p>\n
Simply put, the thoughts we think cause us to feel a certain way – happy, sad, angry, afraid, etc. \u00a0The more we think these same trains of thought, the more we will start to believe them as truths. \u00a0And the more we will start to act accordingly.<\/p>\n
For example, if I think “I am always running late” over and over again, I will most likely start to feel bad. \u00a0I might feel guilty, ashamed or even angry at myself. \u00a0Then these emotions may lead me to believe that I am an unreliable person and cause me to start getting down on myself in the future before I’m even actually running late!<\/p>\n
That is the power of our words.<\/p>\n
We’ve all heard that before –\u00a0words have power<\/em> – but even when we hear this warning, we probably think of it in terms of other people. \u00a0That we need to be careful how we speak to others because our words have power over them. \u00a0But that is not only true with others. \u00a0Our words also have power over\u00a0ourselves.<\/em><\/p>\n The things we repeatedly say to ourselves can cause us to not only feel a certain way, but to believe certain things about ourselves too. \u00a0Many of which aren’t even true!<\/p>\n I have actually caught myself feeling badly before – with a sense of sadness or even “doom” without any idea of why I was feeling that way. \u00a0I would have to stop and think to myself, “What was I just thinking about that made me feel this way?” \u00a0If that’s not proof of your thoughts leading to emotions, I don’t know what is!<\/p>\n So what do we do about it?<\/p>\n We need to be more aware of the words we are speaking to ourselves. \u00a0And if they are mostly negative, we need to change them. \u00a0God does not want us to live a life of misery, full of self-doubt and condemnation. \u00a0He wants us to see ourselves as He does – fearfully and wonderfully made.<\/p>\n No matter what we have been through or what we may struggle with – it doesn’t change the fact that God loves us. \u00a0Because who we are and what we struggle with are not<\/strong> the same thing (thank you for this, Jennifer Rothschild!).<\/p>\n We\u00a0are<\/em>\u00a0made in His image.<\/p>\n We\u00a0are<\/em> forgiven.<\/p>\n We\u00a0are\u00a0<\/em>loved.<\/p>\n And those are the things we\u00a0should\u00a0<\/em>be saying to ourselves. \u00a0Over and over again!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Have you ever stopped to take note of the thoughts running through your head and the words you are speaking to yourself? It is said that we have approximately 50,000 – 70,000 thoughts per day, so it’s obviously impossible to keep track of them all. \u00a0But if the majority of your thoughts are negative, how…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":589,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[32,31,125,118,121,126,129,123,131,124,127,122,128,120,130,117,116,132,119],"class_list":["post-53","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-emotional-health","tag-emotions","tag-encouragement","tag-feelings","tag-identity","tag-inspiration","tag-lies","tag-negativity","tag-personality","tag-positive-thinking","tag-self-esteem","tag-self-talk","tag-self-worth","tag-spiritual-health","tag-struggles","tag-thought-life","tag-thoughts","tag-true-self","tag-truth"],"yoast_head":"\n