These Thoughts Are Not You

mark dejesus here bringing you insights to empower your thought life and today i want to get into an aspect of your thinking that has been very very helpful for me and i believe it'll be very helpful for your life your healing and freedom journey as i've learned to heal work through areas of my life and grow and mature i've found that i've had to deal with my thought life in many different ways in many different facets but i remember in the early stages it was fear-based thoughts all these thoughts it was just fear anxiety it was like felt like it was all day long and just had all these fearful emotions and thoughts and then there were lots of dark thoughts that i struggled with you could say depressive thoughts oppressive thoughts just heaviness negativity anxiety-ridden thoughts anxiety that would lead into panic and there were those obsessive thoughts those subjects that would just narrow into and just spin over and spin over and spin over and spin over you know what to do with them battle them struggle with them you feel guilt you feel anxiousness you feel you struggle with feeling a sense of peace in your life in your day then there were those well i'll just call them crazy thoughts right do you have crazy thoughts are you crazy am i crazy i have crazy thoughts am i crazy am i crazy for saying i'm crazy and asking you if you're crazy about the crazy are we all crazy are we just crazy many people write to me mark am i crazy i gotta write this thing out let me write it out for you am i crazy am i crazy but here's what i'm thinking am i crazy are you crazy how many times can i say crazy but i stumbled in at the at the early stages of this i didn't realize this was an obsessive compulsive kind of battleground i was just like these are crazy thoughts what do i do with them am i crazy does this mean something about me and i learned something that has been very very helpful for me and as i began to apply it it helped me to have a much better relationship with my thought world and that was this just because you have a thought that arrives in your thinking this does not mean this is who you are that you are that thought or that this is your identity and i think what this did is it helped me to separate out who i am in christ and what's not in the identity that god has given me so that i can continue to focus on and learn and grow and feed that which is of god and realizing thoughts that god's not sending my way i mean many people say well that's easier said than done well it took me on a journey of learning fear chronic fear and anxiety is not of god so god's not trying to use anxiety to get my attention that was very very helpful also realizing god is not a guilt trip god god doesn't use confusion he's not the author of confusion he's not shaming me he's not he's not performance evaluating me every five seconds he actually wants to relate with me and me learn to relate to him that these thoughts would get me all wound up and just beginning to establish these thoughts are not me i remember i feel waves of anxiety flood through me and it was helpful to go this might be flowing through me but it's not me it's not who i am and i'm going to learn how to work my way through now at first i was like get away get away get awake and get these thoughts away get this anxiety away get these disturbing thoughts we get this stuff away right i reacted in panic for a variety of reasons but then i learned this isn't me but i can ride through this and god's gonna help me in a journey because many times people can recognize this thought isn't me but then they get so stirred up so worked up it makes the thought worse because they haven't invited a compassionate response and i had to learn that nurturing compassionate response to my thinking patterns now in christianity and even in in in the modern world today we can emphasize thoughts a lot right concepts like as a man thinks so is he you know guard your heart guards your thoughts all these things right it's great we can we can emphasize the power of thoughts and that's good that's important but do we also pressurize the subject so much that any thought that appears we're now analyzing it figuring it out is this me did i do this am i capable of doing this where'd this come from where'd this thought and we're analyzing things we don't need to analyze and the truth is the overwhelming majority of people surveyed have said that they struggle with intrusive thoughts or they or they have intrusive thoughts i should say not that they struggle but they have them so we all basically have intrusive thoughts or or weird thoughts or strange thoughts or we have thoughts of heaviness depression or and it was so helpful for me to to realize you know i put a lot of pressure i put so much pressure on my thoughts it's not helping me so these verses and passages of scripture that talk about our thoughts create more pressure than freedom because i'm putting a microscope to stuff i don't need to put a microscope to but it was helpful to say in a compassionate way towards myself this thought isn't me so i can just let it float on by i don't need to give it further attention further analysis but we get locked into a thought that comes through it means something about me i have to pay attention to this and i have to discover why this thought where did it come from why is it there and now we're introspecting and what we lose in a distortion is we we see a thought that's coming through if the thought appears it means we're one with this thought so then we even go to how dare i even think this way and we start judging ourselves condemning ourselves and shaming ourselves and it's terrible for mental health terrible and it's not good for relational emotional health and it really will seek to hinder your walk with god because you're always trying to navigate these speed bumps of your thoughts and then you're led to constantly fix them and so what helped me in realizing okay these thoughts they're not me this isn't me they might be going through my system but they're not me what helped me in that was the first round of establishing that thought and that value is teaching me not to be so afraid of my thoughts not very afraid of my thought world i was very afraid of what i was what was circulating through my thinking i was afraid of a thought coming in so even if i had moments of freedom i was still apprehensive of like what thoughts are gonna come my way and i'm gonna feel goofy and uncomfortable and i'm gonna excuse myself from a conversation because i'm spinning in something can't pay attention right or maybe you you know whatever kind of thought pattern you're struggling with that it leads you to where you're now anxious in your own thought world when you're afraid of your thoughts they gain leverage that which you fear it increases because you focus on it you give it attention you react to it they lose power when you are no longer afraid of them how do you not become afraid of your thoughts mark through practice you practice hey there's that thought doesn't mean anything i don't have to serve it i don't have to feed it i don't have to give it more attention i can gently redirect myself to a new subject and you learn to compassionately build a stronger reservoir within you of how to handle what comes in how to handle what gets passed on through right i had to learn how to stop being afraid of my thoughts through practice it's not a magical thing there's no magic formula there is no instant quick fix anxiety especially is often something now i teach a lot of anxiety i teach a lot on that but in our emotional world when anxiety rises up it is often something we have to go through versus something we're always trying to go away go away go away get away get away how do i feel better how do i feel better how do i feel better that just makes it worse i had to learn hey this isn't me and this is something i'm going through isn't it different to go through something versus saying this is who you are isn't it better see i'm going through some anxiety versus well i'm just i am anxiety and i always will be anxiety and i'm always going to have it in this kind of way don't limit yourself but don't pressurize yourself now god in christ jesus doesn't look at our identity and say you are a fearful person this is who you are nah that's not in his dna for us we have a new identity we have a whole new world of thinking and living that god offers us in christ jesus and it takes a journey it takes a lifetime to learn what that looks like how that applies day by day learning to let god renew our thinking and to put away anxiety to put away fear to put away guilt to put away shame to put away bitterness to put away rejection and to move ourselves into a new direction of thinking and so i had to learn how to ride the roller coaster i've used this illustration before i don't like roller coasters do you like roller coasters are you a roller coaster person i don't like and the main reason i don't like it is because me tummy gets a little bit upset like the the the spinning up and down i just get a little like and it kind of just ruins ruins it for a bit but like my kids or if i'm with friends or something and they really love it i go you know what i'll give it a go and what helps me and every single person on a roller coaster is knowing what it's going to end it's going to end oh it's crazy we're upside down it is we know it's going to end and that helps to get through and even for many to enjoy it and for others who are like i'm just doing this to just be a good sport they know it's going to end another illustration is thoughts are like waves and the waves come and they go sometimes the waves are stormy but the storm doesn't last forever we think it will and these emotions are like waves they're meant to just flow through not meant to stay there forever this can apply to a lot of thoughts it even applies to grief when we're grieving something we feel like we're going to be stuck in this forever we go through depression we think i'm going to be depressed forever we have dark thoughts i'm going to be this way forever but we have to realize these are things to go through this may be something i'm feeling this may be something i'm working through but it's not who i am i don't have to lock this into my identity i don't have to lock this into an eternal state of this is who i am see how we get so black and white and so harsh with ourselves so the key of this is in learning to practice not being afraid of your thoughts and learning to realize this isn't me is being kind to yourself it's a nurturing practice being compassionate not so judgy and so condemning learning to be gracious are you gracious towards yourself in your thought life and so in looking at how to stop fearing these thoughts so much was this thought isn't me it's not who i am and i had to learn how to develop and i had to learn who i really was in christ i had to learn who i really am all this stuff is this who i am in christ no well who am i in christ i don't know i could quote stuff but i don't really have it here in my heart so i'm gonna learn i'm gonna learn who i really am in christ and what that looks like in a given moment and i'm going to give myself room to practice i'm going to give myself room that while that thought's there while that struggle's there it's flowing through my system but i'm still practicing reminding myself that's not who i am it gave me tremendous freedom in my study of romans 7 and 8 to read paul in his struggle in his journey where he said when i have sin operating it's not me it's sin that dwells within me and i think we can look at that from a lot of different angles a lot of different ways but from a simple standpoint paul was bringing out this isn't who i am there's something at work flowing through but it's not who i am that was very helpful and very empowering for me that when stuff flows through it's like no that's not me and i'm gonna gently because i'm loved by god and grace is available to me inviting me to be empowered in relationship with god i'm gonna redirect myself back to a new subject how about power love and a sound mind how about faith hope and love how about i am loved and i'm safe right now in god and i'm okay my journey of overcoming mental health battles and healing has taught me to be so much more compassionate towards myself and my thoughts than i ever ever had it's been one of the biggest revolutions in my life it also makes me kinder to others it makes me more compassionate makes me less pressurized less intense less angry more light in my inner world i think part of the fruit of the spirit is there's just a flow in our lives a lightness you know ability to laugh ability to have joy we're so serious oh my thoughts if you only knew the thoughts mark if you knew the thought i just had or i'm currently having that seriousness that heavy weight that burden that yoke jesus would say take my yoke upon you and learn from me what i'm doing is going to lead you into the easier way my burden's easy my burden is light i want to encourage the lightness so doggone serious so doggone fearful so heavy it was helpful for me to know this isn't me furthermore paul said to timothy god's not giving you a spirit of fear so that anxiety panic worry all those dread projections hyper vigilance god's not giving that to me now my journey of healing is going to be a process but i can realize this isn't me and this isn't god and i can get free it's gonna take a journey so buckle up take a deep breath and get ready to ride the journey of over no mark i need i need to i need to get rid of this thought right now right now i need your help i need your help i need y'all right now right now if you feel that if you're that 911 my thought you haven't plugged into the journey yeah but mark i have but it's been a month however old you are and it's taken you know let's say you're 35 years old you have 35 years of thinking and there's areas that are really disturbing and you want them fixed overnight after 35 years of bill how about you let patients have its work and say i'm going to take the journey yeah but what mark what about you have a mark what about no there is no what about many people watch my videos and then they ask more questions and then i i answer them and they ask more and it's this constant whack-a-mole of asking questions and they've they've not said it's a journey it's a journey i'm not going to figure out all my what about it's a journey and so where do you need to apply this understanding of this isn't me you are not the thoughts you are not that's not who you are you want to the thoughts that arrive in your thinking you know the disturbing thoughts that's not who you are and doesn't say anything about who you are you're going to have all kinds of crazy thoughts flow by in your lifetime the more you practice not being afraid the stronger you get the more firm you get in your identity if you get fearful of them they just grow now we struggle with these thoughts because of the feelings they create if there was if we were emotionless we'd first of all be robots but we wouldn't even be having these discussions the reason that we struggle with our thoughts is because of the emotions they create and when the emotion is so it's so strong how it floods your body you feel i got to pay attention to this this must mean something no you can have a 10 on a scale of 0 to 10 a 10 emotional reaction doesn't mean anything didn't mean anything now why is the emotion so so charged well the feelings we have over a thought usually come down to the interpretation of a thought the meaning that we attach to them how we interpret our thoughts gets us tripped up and we get into what ifs what if what if this means something what if this means something about me what if this is something god wants me to pay attention to what if this is something i could do we have this problem called thought action fusion that's a psychological technical term which means if a thought passes through and you feel the emotion of it it's the same thing as doing it so now you're condemning yourself or maybe you're thinking maybe i have done it or maybe i want to do it do i want to do it now you're in this introspective incessant checking maybe i want to do it mark this thought is so strong maybe i want to do it it's just a sign of insecurity that needs love it's a lack of nurture and nurture is the way by which we calm ourselves and for many of you you don't know how to nurture yourself i didn't so therefore you could run around and ask people to nurture you please tell me tell me tell me i understand how about today you make a decision to learn to nurture yourself if you want to go into a deeper dive my wife and i had a series of discussions we have as an online course restoring the power of nurture and maybe that's a great place for you to start for you to begin to learn and grow or maybe you want to move into the heart healing journey there's a there's a section right in the middle of it that i just love is is practicing the accepting power of god his patience and his kindness over your life to experience love over the thoughts that you have the struggles that you have or you say you know what i need to get a stronger grid on what it looks like for fear anxiety and all this stuff i will not fear is a great place to go but if you're like me and you're like man i need to learn how to be more loving and compassionate to myself a game changer in my life was god loves me and i love myself and so where do you need to recognize ah these thoughts are not me i can redirect myself somewhere else because otherwise you're gonna try to fix all these thoughts you're gonna go on these tangents and you're gonna try to fix something that doesn't need to be fixed argue with something that doesn't need to be argued i see because of our lack of love and our lack of nurture we don't know who we are so we're so vulnerable to so much stuff aren't we let's get back and rooted mark how do i learn who i am how do i get firm in it right i got to learn these scriptures and quote these things and do these practices well that stuff is great it's about learning to be loved because god loves you as a father and we learn who we are through the love of our father because only a dad can tell a son or a daughter who they are is the father's role and god as your father is relaying who you are in christ and all these thoughts are floating through because we're insecure we're going through struggles we're just feeling so unloved and we don't know who god is in our thoughts we don't know who the enemy is we don't know where we're like is this me where did i go it's all going back to what does it look like to be loved and to be gracious to myself it's not so much about what thoughts come your way because you're going to have a bunch of them some crazy some super crazy it's all right it's about learning our response and learning to be loved love ourselves and let the love of the father in christ jesus flow through our lives so i pray there's been a blessing to your life and your journey who can you share this with that could bless their life and what they're going through maybe it could help spur some great discussions there's many courses books articles materials there's a resource library you can click on topics and there's plenty of other stuff you can look at too you can also go to the donate section where you can give a one-time donation or support on a regular basis and it would mean a whole lot to us as we have put a full-time work and effort into developing materials that can help people be equipped to live healed and live free so that's all i have for today i pray that this will empower your thought life your healing and freedom journey look forward to seeing you next time this is your brother from another mother saying i'm out [Music]

Channel: Mark DeJesus

Views: 23,167

Keywords: Thoughts

Id: zJb5CfmiEZU

Length: 22min 19sec (1339 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 17 2021