In your Right Mind… Part 3… Training a Warrior!

Let me make this perfectly clear… For those of you under medical care to manage your mental health… I commend you! I also beg you to keep up your effort and follow your doctor’s orders. My opinions/experiences spoken on this web-site should only be taken alongside of, NOT INSTEAD OF, Health Care Professionals. You and I seek the same thing… mental health… but it is a journey not a destination, with many potential consultants/helpers along the way.

It is our Journey… Training Up our Command Center… in the way it should go.

Sounds like… Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it.

Training up is the perfect picture of your role as the Commander… and child is the perfect picture of your Command Center. Like children, our mind can go from sweet wonderful playmate to tantrum throwing bully in less than a blink of the eye. From zero to 60 and back again in a breath. From adult like reason to childish manipulation. But eventually we all have to grow up (or at least get old).

 

The first principle in training up is… KNOW YOUR KID!

Some experts estimate that the average person has 48.6 thoughts per minute (according to the Laboratory of Neuro Imaging at University of Southern California) That’s a lot of thinking…

Have you ever just spent time monitoring your thoughts? Do you recognize those that seem to have more authority than the others? Have you ever investigated their origin and do you hear the tone and recognize the author? Have you found the tapes that just keep repeating under certain conditions?  Have you spent enough time in your Command Center to assess any necessary reorganization of command &/or reprogramming of truth versus relativity training that has taken root?

In order to do your assessment you have to know the Thinker of the thoughts.

Before you can know the Thinker of the thoughts, you have to hear the  thoughts… Before you can judge the effects of the thoughts, you have to KNOW the chosen direction of the Commander. You also have to know who he/she IS NOT…

You have to have an intimate relationship with YOU!

 

The second principle of Training Up is… Taking ownership

Just like we do with our children! Oh come on, admit it… You OWN your children! You can try to disown them but…  They contribute nothing to your fiscal health and would starve and be naked without your contributions to their fiscal health. Though you don’t control their every action you assume responsibility  (ownership) for their management… their value, their profit to their world and their debts.

Similarly, you cannot control the thoughts that come into your head but you are responsible for their management… their potential value, their profit and their debts.

An excellent way to manage is by taking prisoners! 2 Corinthians 10:5 We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ

Taking every thought captive… now THIS is mental health!

Once the thought is captive…  you set its course… its value to the body, its position of impact for maximum profit to your life, and the results of any debts (scars/wounds) it may incur if left to itself and given no supervision.

Not all deserve to be given position in our lives or stored for future use. Some thoughts are just not WORTH keeping! Unlike children, we can and should disown and trash those we see as causes of current or future trouble. And don’t forget… as I was reminded TODAY… “take out the trash OFTEN!”

 

Third Principle in Training Up… The Commander (you) set the Direction.

In setting the direction of our lives, we focus our efforts (both conscious & unconscious) so that our Command Center can order our lives with the intent to produce (cause) desired results (effects). Without focus we are left to wander, never quite reaching our unnamed and unmanaged expectations. Without intentional direction we let “unauthorized voices” map out our route.

We can install new tapes… We can authorize reliable voices to speak the truth in love… the reliable voice of God’s Word…

Romans 12:9 Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil; cling to what is good.

Ephesians 4:29 Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear.

Ephesians 5:19 speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord;

Ephesians 5:19 speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord;

 

Fourth Principle of Training Up… Take the journey

One thought… one word… one song at a time… Practice may not make perfect but practicing good things makes life better!

WARNING… this journey is not for sight-seeing or purely pleasure.

in fact sometimes it is downright ugly… We have an enemy… and he uses many weapons to destroy. Don’t become a his casualty of war… instead become a warrior.

Ephesians 6:10-18 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. Stand firm therefore, having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; in addition to all, taking up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints,

We are not alone in this war… we have our God, Who does not wish for any to perish… So let’s keep on training our Command Center up in the way we should go, with God’s help as our Creator and Abba, even if it takes forever!

James 1:3-4 knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

It may not always be a pretty journey, but it is ALWAYS a worthwhile journey!

 

**All Scripture quoted comes from the “Bible Gateway” app and is the NASB  version of the Bible