While most welcome this year with open arms, there are some who dread to say hello to another day. Perhaps, the loss of a loved one, a disease or disability, unmet expectations, exhaustion from work, the distance from people you care about or the pile of goals you want to achieve are weighing you down.
All these negative emotions are NORMAL. If you are feeling this way, you dont have to deny or pretend you dont have these emotions. However, our experiences may be beyond our control but what we do with our negative emotion is our responsibility. Most of us focus on our behavior and pressure ourselves to act differently. But behavior is just the tip of the iceberg. We have to go to the root of the problem- the battle is in the mind. Our experience affects our thinking and our thinking affects our feelings and our feelings affect our behavior. We need to process the circumstances we find ourselves in. The key word is PROCESS.
Here are some steps I have adapted to help process a negative emotion:
1- Ask yourself Why
2- Align with God
3- Surrender your expectations
The Bible shows us in Psalm 43:5 how the psalmist David did this:
Why am I discouraged?
Why is my heart so sad?
I will put my hope in God!
I will praise him again—
my Savior and my God!
The mind is indeed powerful, which is why God commands us to take EVERY though captive into obedience to Him. Its not enough to know what to do. If you want change, you have to follow what God says. What is God calling you to do? God says in Jeremiah 29:11 that His plans for us is to have a hope and a future. We can most certainly trust God even when the task may be painful- such as to forgive, to accept Gods sovereignty over a loss, or to give up a career for a higher calling.
Start this year right, make a positive impact on your family by changing your negative emotion into a blessing through Gods power.
Let us know how we can help you on your journey of trusting in God.
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