Authors: Joyce Meyer
Tags: #Religion / Christian Life / Personal Growth, #Religion / Christian Life / Inspirational, #RELIGION / Christian Life / Spiritual Growth
The Mind Connection: How the Thoughts You Choose Affect Your Mood, Behavior, and Decisions (16 page)
Christy Henrich was a talented American teenager who was one of the country’s best gymnasts. When she tried out for the Olympic team in 1988, a judge told her she was too fat—Christy was four feet eleven inches and weighed only ninety-five pounds.
Upon hearing the critique of the judge, Christy began starving herself. Some days she ate only a slice of an apple. And if she ate more than that, she would force herself to vomit so as not to gain any weight.
Though she missed out on qualifying for the Olympic team that year, Christy placed fourth in the uneven parallel bars in the World Championships just a year later. However, Christy’s story doesn’t have a happy ending. Tragically, Christy Henrich died at the young age of twenty-two in a Kansas City hospital. Her organs failed—she weighed only fifty-two pounds.
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One of the things that people, and women in particular, worry about is how much they weigh, and how they look. Although we do want to maintain a normal weight and present ourselves in a pleasing way, we cannot all be stick-thin and look as if we are the one person on the planet that is free from the aging process. Do the best you can, but don’t worry about weight and appearance. Make peace with the parts of your body that you don’t care for and learn to downplay them while making the most of your strong points.
For example, if you don’t like the shape of your nose, then make sure you have a stunning hairstyle. If you don’t like the way your legs look, then don’t wear shorts. Worrying won’t change a thing
about the way we look! Most of us would not go to the extremes that Christy Henrich did and actually suffer an untimely death, but we may be shortening our life span by worrying excessively about many things, including our weight and appearance.
I am recommending that you stop worrying and thinking excessively about weight if that is a problem for you. If you eat right, you will eventually weigh what you are supposed to weigh. It may not be what your skinny friend weighs, but whatever it is, learn to embrace it and stop worrying. Worry never made anyone skinny, but there are lots of people who eat when they are stressed, so it may be adding to your problem instead of solving it.
Make a list of things you worry about and pray over it daily, asking God to help you cast your care on Him in each of the areas. As situations come up in your life that would normally cause you to worry, choose to think differently than you have in the past.
Stress can be a positive force that helps us perform well in a sport or at a job interview. Faced with challenges or even danger, the body kicks into gear: Hormones flood in that elevate our heart rate, increase blood pressure, boost energy, and prepare us for action. The experts call it the “fight or flight” response, but when we get stuck in that mode, it can have serious consequences on our health. The longer the stress lasts, the worse it is for both your mind and body. God has created us to be able to handle normal amounts of stress, but when we begin to feel tension from it, especially when it is chronic, it is time to take action. God has given us the amazing gift of life, and we should value it enough to protect it.
Learn to recognize tension and let that be a trigger, or a signal to purposely relax. I spend a lot of time writing, and the stress
of deep thought while simultaneously putting those thoughts on the computer, combined with sitting in the same position for hours at a time can definitely cause tension. My neck and shoulders will begin to mildly ache, and if I ignore that signal, they eventually move into pain, and I start to feel exhausted. If I will get up at the first sign of tension, take a short break of even two to five minutes, and stretch a little, it relieves the stress, and I can go back to work.
When I am discussing something with someone, and we are getting into a heated disagreement, I can feel the tension as every muscle in my body starts to stiffen. I have learned to let that be a trigger or a signal to either stop talking or take the conversation in another direction. If I am rushing from thing to thing, I may start to feel tense or overwhelmed, and that is a trigger for me to slow down.
We all have these little signs that show up in our body, letting us know that we are on overload, but we have to learn to respect them. Sometimes I call them “warnings.” They are like storm sirens that go off, letting us know that a storm is coming. For some, it may be shortness of breath, a headache, an upset stomach, or sweating, but whatever it is, learn to recognize your warning signs and respect them enough to make appropriate changes.
One of the things we lack in our society is solitude. We live in a noisy, high-pressure, busy world, where more is expected of most of us than we can possibly do. The world more than likely won’t change, but we can. One of the main things that combats and offsets stress is solitude. I absolutely love quiet times!!!! But there was a time when I became restless if things got quiet, because I
was addicted to noise and activity. I have discovered that even five minutes of quiet and solitude can restore my soul to a restful place and relieve stress. It gives me time to actually breathe deeply and do nothing.
If we scheduled more solitude and quiet time for ourselves, we would probably be able to schedule fewer doctor appointments. If you are like I was, you may have to build up an ability to be quiet. If it is difficult for you, then start with a few minutes three or four times a day and gradually increase your tolerance level. My favorite times of the day, and the ones that strengthen me most, are in the morning before anyone else wakes up, and at night after everyone else has gone to bed. It isn’t that I don’t enjoy people, because I enjoy them very much, but some quiet time in the morning helps me get ready to be with them, and quiet time in the evening helps me recover from being with them. As we all know, not all people are easy to get along with, and since we never know what a day may bring, it is best to be spiritually ready!
I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude.
Henry David Thoreau,
Walden
We tend to think that our existence is only justified when we are
doing
something, but that is not true. We are human
beings
, not human
doings
! God doesn’t love us more when we are doing something than He does when are enjoying quiet. Our busyness makes us feel important, but it doesn’t make us more important to God.
I finally had to face the truth that I felt more acceptable when I was working than at any other time. Some of that came from my abusive childhood, some of it from my strong, work-oriented
temperament, but neither could be an excuse to not change. Whatever the reason was, the result was the same. Too much activity without any solitude was damaging my future and preventing me from enjoying the present. Let me stop and say “Thank You” to my Heavenly Father for revealing to me that He had not created me merely to “do,” but also to “be.”
• Your thoughts and your stress levels are closely related.
• Worry just makes a problem worse. Believe the best, and trust God to take care of every situation.
• To avoid stress and worry, choose to think positive thoughts on purpose.
• The first thing to do when you are ready for help is come to Jesus. He will guide and direct you into a healthy lifestyle.
• Make a list of the things that worry you and pray over that list daily. Cast your care upon the Lord.
The Mind-Body Connection
There is no question that the things we think have a tremendous effect upon our bodies. If we can change our thinking, the body frequently heals itself.
C. Everett Coop, MD
Our bodies are like automobiles that God provides for us to drive around earth in. If we want them to perform to their maximum ability and be around for a long time, then we need to choose to think in ways that will help them. All of our thoughts, good or bad, have an effect on our physical being. The mind and body are definitely connected.
Today I am spending the day with a close friend whom I don’t get to see very often, and I am really looking forward to it. All of my thoughts are happy ones, and I have noticed that I feel better physically than I have in a few days. I didn’t necessarily feel bad previously, but today I feel great! My energy level is up, and I feel strong. I have also been dealing with a minor health problem that has been lingering for eight weeks, but nobody has been able to provide an accurate diagnosis or prescribe anything to make it better. Last night, I encountered a new symptom that shed light on what the problem is, and I now know what to do to get well. That has replaced reasoning and concern with hope, and it has also increased my energy.
Positive, hopeful thoughts increase energy, whereas negative, hopeless ones drain energy. Physical tiredness is not always the result of wrong thinking. We certainly can have a sickness or disease that leads to loss of energy, or we may even wake up tired for no known reason. I had the stomach flu for three days last week and I felt terrible. I was tired and weak, and it wasn’t caused from wrong thinking. Things don’t always happen for the same reason, but I do know, and science and medical technology verify, that the mind and body have a close connection and that our thinking does have a direct effect on our body.
Positive, hopeful thoughts increase energy, whereas negative, hopeless ones drain energy.
Dr. Caroline Leaf has written extensively on this topic. In her book
Switch On Your Brain
, she states:
Research shows that 75 to 98 percent of mental, physical, and behavioral illness comes from one’s thought life. This staggering and eye-opening statistic means only 2 to 25 percent of mental and physical illnesses come from the environment and genes.…
We may have a fixed set of genes in our chromosomes, but which of those genes are active and
how
they are active has a great deal to do with how we think and process our experiences. Our thoughts produce words and behaviors, which in turn stimulate more thinking and choices that build more thoughts in an endless cycle.
We are constantly reacting to circumstances and events, and as this cycle goes on, our brains become shaped by the process in either a positive, good-quality-of-life direction or a negative, toxic, poor-quality-of-life direction.
So it is the quality of our thinking and choices (consciousness) and our reactions that determine our “brain architecture”—the shape or design of the brain and
resultant
quality of the health of our minds and bodies.
Science and Scripture both show that we are wired for love and optimism and so when we react by thinking negatively and making negative choices, the quality of our thinking suffers, which means the quality of our brain architecture suffers. It is comforting—and challenging—to know that negative thinking is not the norm.…
Toxic thinking wears down the brain.
The Institute of HeartMath, an internationally recognized, nonprofit research organization that helps people reduce stress, discusses an experiment titled “Local and Nonlocal Effects of Coherent Heart Frequencies on Conformational Changes of DNA.” This study showed that thinking and feeling anger, fear, and frustration caused DNA to change shape according to thoughts and feelings. The DNA responded by tightening up and becoming shorter, switching off many DNA codes, which reduced quality expression. So we feel shut down by negative emotions, and our body feels this too. But here’s the great part: the negative shutdown or poor quality of the DNA codes was
reversed
by feelings of love, joy, appreciation, and gratitude! The researchers also found that HIV positive patients who had positive thoughts and feelings had 300,000 times more resistance to the disease than those without positive feelings. So the takeaway here is that when we operate in our normal love design—which is being made in God’s image (Gen. 1:26)—we are able to change the shape of our DNA for the better.
So when we make a poor-quality decision—when we choose to engage toxic thoughts (for example, unforgiveness,
bitterness, irritation, or feelings of not coping)—we change the DNA and subsequent genetic expression, which then changes the shape of our brain wiring in a negative direction. This immediately puts the brain into protection mode, and the brain translates these poor-quality, toxic thoughts as negative stress. This stress then manifests in our bodies. But the most exciting part of this study was the hope it demonstrated because the positive attitude, the good choice, rewired everything back to the original healthy positive state. These scientists basically proved we can renew our minds.…
[Here are two powerful statistics confirming that much] of mental and physical illness comes from one’s thought life:
• A study by the American Medical Association found that stress is a factor in 75 percent of all illnesses and diseases that people suffer from today.
• The association between stress and disease is a colossal 85 percent.
The main point of this [information] is that mind controls matter. If we get this right, we have enormous potential to reach peak health. If we get it wrong, we will be our own worst enemies.
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Many years ago a woman shared with me her experience of receiving healing from arthritis, and it is quite amazing. She had been suffering greatly for several years with painful arthritis in several joints of her body. Medicine helped some, but nothing
brought any true healing until she heard teaching on the devastating effects of bitterness and unresolved anger. She had been hurt deeply by her mother and literally hated her. The thoughts she meditated on frequently about her mother were negatively affecting her in ways she was totally unaware of.
Through the teaching of Jesus on the need to forgive our enemies, she found the grace to do so, and over the next few months she noticed that her pain from arthritis was gradually disappearing. The swelling and stiffness in her joints was diminishing and continued to do so until she was completely healed. I am not suggesting that everyone with arthritis is filled with bitterness, but in this case she was, and the healing she sought could not come until she was free from it.
More and more studies are proving that the physical body responds negatively to negative thinking and it responds positively to positive thinking. Every part of the human body has a critical role to play, and if one part is functioning in any unhealthy way, then the entire body can often suffer the consequences; it is the same when a part of the body is functioning in a healthy manner.
Recently, I read a story about a man named Ed: Ed remembers having an upset stomach when he was a child and his grandmother asking him if he was having a problem at school. What she knew instinctively we are at last beginning to prove scientifically: that there is an intimate and dynamic relationship between what is going on with our feelings and thoughts and what happens in the body.
A
TIME
magazine special showed that happiness, hopefulness, optimism, and contentment “appear to reduce the risk or limit the severity of cardiovascular disease, pulmonary disease, diabetes, hypertension, colds and upper-respiratory infections,” while
“depression—the extreme opposite of happiness—can worsen heart disease, diabetes and a host of other illnesses.”
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