When I first started running, to motivate myself, I would try to prepare my mind the day before to avoid procrastination. In my mind, I would plan the time that I would wake up, what I would wear, my jogging route, and even what I would listen to all before the day came. When the morning would come, I would allow my motivated and excited mind to be subdued with doubt and negativity until I ultimately would go back to bed. Why not? It was better in the bed, way more comfortable and I didn’t have to do any work. I could just lay there in the arms of my bed and feel bad about it tomorrow and let the cycle continue. Because I was focused on how terrible and uncomfortable the run was going to be, I would easily get discouraged before I even got started. I had already concluded in my mind the end result of a situation that I didn’t give a chance to exist by allowing myself to be sweet-talked by Mr. Self Sabotage and his faithful acquaintance, The Procrastinator.
As human beings, we are ALL very creative creatures. If you don’t think you are a creative person, think about how many times you’ve come up with a creative way to get out of something that you don’t want to do? Or created a brilliant detailed plan that took more work to create than it would have taken you if you actually just did the thing you were trying to avoid. More times than none, we end up just doing the thing we didn’t want to do anyway 🤷🏽♀️. I’ve done it multiple times, we all have done it in some shape, form, or fashion. In the beginning, to keep from doing the work and feeling bad about being overweight, I would try to make peace with it. I would say and think to myself, “Maybe God wants me bigger. If He wanted me to exercise, He wouldn’t make it so difficult. What is size anyway? What is weight, just gravity right? If I was in outer space I wouldn't even weigh that much plus thick and full-figure women are in these days so just embrace the curves! ” God wasn’t making things difficult, I was. I also wasn’t my best self with my habits and health either. My mind would go over the details about how long it would take to get in shape and lose the weight, and before long, I had a whole mental dissertation on my reasons NOT TO, when I could have just exercised and gotten it over with.
We can be our best cheerleader and our worst opponent all at the same time. Mentally, we jump between both the offensive and defensive team, with ultimately the strongest winning the top slot and making the decision. As our own opponent, if our focus isn’t strong enough, it becomes difficult to win the battle in our mind because we always want the easier and most comfortable outcome. We become the middle-man who stands in the way of our own greatness; the catalyst that creates the mental confusion that will never allow us to see the better versions of ourselves until we get out of our own heads. We talk ourselves out of a lot of things in life because we are either too afraid, too uncomfortable, or too discouraged to start. We allow our minds and how we feel to navigate our day and determine the outcome of our lives. In his book, Outwitting the Devil, Napoleon Hill states, "People are not born with wisdom but they are born with the capacity to think. And they may, through the lapse of time, think their way into wisdom." Just as we inherit fear and discouragement from our thoughts, can we also gain wisdom through our thinking as well? In 1 Peter 1:13 NLT, the bible says, “...prepare your mind for action and exercise self-control.” Notice the keyword is “mind,” once prepared and set, it is a weapon all on its own. There is nothing more dangerous than a made-up mind, because, from it, anything is possible.
The way we think can either destroy a dream or make a dream come true; depending on how we position it in our minds. In the bible, Romans 12:2 says to "...let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect." James Allen writes in his book, As a Man Thinketh, “Every thought- seed sown or allowed to fall into the mind and to take root there, produces its own...and bearing its own fruitage of opportunity and circumstance." Basically, good thoughts bear good fruit while bad thoughts bear bad fruit. He goes on to explain, “...when we realize that we are a creative power and that we can command the hidden soil and seeds of our being out of which circumstances grow, we become the rightful master of ourselves.”
Did you know that you have the ability and the authority to not only master your mind but your whole self? Once you master your mind, your whole being is called to attention! Napoleon Hill goes on to say in his book titled Outwitting the Devil, “Whatever man believes to be true has a way of becoming true.” Because we allow discouraging and defeating beliefs to enter into our minds before we begin to do anything, we have already failed before we’ve even started. From those thoughts, we have created the outcome of our fate, our doomed reality of what will be. James Allen tells us, “We are anxious to improve our circumstances, but are unwilling to improve ourselves; we, therefore, remain bound.” I know many of you may have so many brilliant ideas that could change your life and financial situation, and it can be so exciting in the beginning to get started! Just remember, no matter what you do or where you decide to focus your attention, success is inevitable: either you will successfully fail or you will successfully succeed. It is what you do with that success that will matter. If you succeed, take that momentum and keep going, and if you fail, take what you have learned and begin again; either way, you were successful.
Don’t renege on your future when things get difficult and the real work begins. The worst thing than being a prisoner to the state is being a prisoner to the mind. It is so important to do the work initially on your mind so that you can withstand and maintain the momentum during difficult and discouraging times. Our minds are so powerful that God tells us in Romans 12:2 that we can only transform ourselves if we renew our minds; change the way we think. Our minds can be an anchor or a sail: an anchor to keep us stagnant or a sail to push us forward. Remember, “For as a man thinks within himself, so he is," Proverbs 23:7 NASV"
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