A few months ago, my life officially was uprooted, torn apart and I was stripped of everything that I had worked so hard to build. It wasn't much but I was on my way to doing some big things, so I thought. Anyway, a few years back, God revealed to me that I was an employer and not an employee and that I need to trust Him in building businesses that create opportunities for other people. I felt like Moses or a deer in headlights and immediately thought to myself, "Me?" I had no business experience and had no clue how to run one. I'd gone to school for Architecture, not for business so obviously, my first reaction was fear and doubt. However, over the years, God would place me in positions within companies and allow me to build relationships with high-ranking people in those companies that would force me to exercise my business muscles that I didn't know I had. My little business muscles would start flexing and I would start speaking and executing things successfully that I didn't even know that I knew how to do. Eventually, those opportunities ended and God told me that I was ready to step out on my own. I was so scared but I had taken a leap of faith and did what God had told me to do. Although it was scary and uncomfortable for me, in 2021 I began putting myself in situations where I was around successful people that were doing what I was trying to do. I started building my business website, I signed up for business mentoring and I attended several business conferences where I would network in order to build a support community. I felt like I was on my way! Then suddenly, seriously immediately things began to dry up starting with my finances, then business opportunities, business relationships, then my health, and ultimately my housing was all taken away. My daughter and I were abruptly relocated a few days before Christmas 2021, with all that we could fit in a car and I am now starting all over from scratch. I felt betrayed by God because I had been obedient and done what He'd told me to do, only for everything to be taken away from me once again. My mind interpreted my outcome as my punishment for obedience.
"How dare you step out and try to change the trajectory of your life? You knew that you were not qualified to do this. Now look at you, you screwed everything up because you thought you were special enough and had what it took to do and become something different than what you always were." The voices in my mind immediately started to reprimand and scold me into a deep dark depression. I've dealt with depression my whole life but the level of depression that I was now facing was so bad that not only did it manifest emotionally and spiritually, it took over my health both mentally and physically. I was in a silent fight for my life that no one around me could ever begin to comprehend! A fight for my sanity and my person. I had allowed the opinion of my thoughts as well as the assumed thoughts of others to win and become true, and not the thoughts and opinions of God.
This may not be a literal reference to running, but discouragement and depression can manifest anywhere in your life and keep you from ever getting started. It will make you run away from everything that matters to you instead of running towards your calling. Running in a sense of taking control of your life in a way that you have never done before and letting God change it into something that you never dreamed it could be. Running as your power, running as your sense of freedom, running as your sense of control and stability, running as your weapon and the catalyst that changes the rest of your life! Japanese writer and runner, Haruki Murakami said, "Most runners run not because they want to live longer, but because they want to live life to the fullest...Exerting yourself to the fullest within your individual limits: that's the essence of running, and a metaphor for life."
During this dark period, I felt the most freest and at my strongest when I ran. Because I paired it with my time with God, it became my sanity and my strength. When I don't run, I feel incomplete and not prepared to face my day if I miss this time with God. It quiets those voices in my mind that try to tell me what I can't do, what I shouldn't do, and how it all should be done. It is a daily battle, and the run equips me with weapons that allow me to be in control of my thought life for that day. The amazing Bishop TD Jakes said, "When the enemy tries to fight you with words, you have to fight him back with THE WORD." Combat the enemy with declarations and scriptures such as, "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength (Phillipians 4:13)," or "No weapon formed against me shall prosper (Isaiah 54:17)." Declare these things over your life daily with power and conviction and the enemy has no choice but to flee your mind and your circumstances.
There is a saying about money, "if you don't tell your money where to go, it will tell you where to go." That can also be said about your mind. If YOU don't tell your mind what to do and what to focus on, your mind will tell YOU what to do and what to focus on. Those voices stop you from believing in yourself and keep you from buying into the future God has planned for you. Bishop TD Jakes says when speaking about his book, The Crushing, "You are what you eat and the voices are what will feed your faith or fear. If you change your diet, you can change your outcome. If you continue to talk to yourself the way that you do, you will always be where you have always been." It is what you say to yourself that validates you, empowers you, and ultimately delivers you!
I am still a work in progress, my success story is still in the process of being written. You are the spectators to this great revelation that I believe will soon come to pass. I write these things to you not because I have it all together. I write these things to motivate you and encourage you because, in the process, I am encouraging and motivating myself. I know everything happens for a reason and because of that, I am starting to live intentionally on the brighter side of my circumstances. The bible says, in Romans 8:28 NLT, "And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them." I am trusting and believing in that every day, and even if it seems like it never will, I know that I have the power to make it so. “
"Remember, you become what you think. Think discouraging thoughts, and you'll get discouraged." - Joyce Meyer
What battles have you faced in your mind that have had negative effects on your life? What steps will you take to be more intentional in your thought life? I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
No comments:
Post a Comment