Disciplining Your Mind: 30 Days to a Better You!

By Stephanie R. Reck

STRUGGLING WITH NEGATIVE MINDSETS?
ARE YOU TIRED OF LIVING A DEFEATED, DISCOURAGED AND DEPRESSED LIFE?
 

This book will give you practical encouragement for pursuing a more disciplined thought life which can lead to greater peace, joy, contentment, and overall better health and energy.

 

Changing ingrained thought patterns takes time, but it is a worthwhile investment of time and energy. Readers should reap the benefits almost immediately through developing a more disciplined thought life, but greater benefits those who persevere in taking every thought captive into the obedience of Jesus Christ. Readers will find their thought processes being rewired as they learn to replace negative thoughts with faith-filled thoughts.

• Language: English
• Publisher: eLectio Publishing
• Release date: Jan 13, 2023
• ISBN: 9781632134592

Book preview

DISCIPLINING

YOUR MIND

30 DAYS TO A BETTER YOU!

Stephanie R. Reck,

LMSW, LBT, BCCC

eLectio Publishing

Little Elm, TX

Disciplining Your Mind: 30 Days to a Better You!

By Stephanie Reck, LMSW, LBT, BCCC

Copyright 2017 by Stephanie Reck. All rights reserved.

Cover Design by eLectio Publishing

ISBN-13: 978-1-63213-459-2

Published by eLectio Publishing, LLC

Little Elm, Texas

http://www.eLectioPublishing.com

5 4 3 2 1 eLP 21 20 19 18 17

Printed in the United States of America.

All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated are taken from the Holy Bible, New King James Version, Life Application Bible. Copyright 1988,1989, 1991, 1993 by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. Scripture quotations marked ESV and MSG are taken from The English Standard Bible and the Message Bible.

The eLectio Publishing creative team is comprised of: Kaitlyn Campbell, Emily Certain, Lori Draft, Court Dudek, Jim Eccles, Sheldon James, and Christine LePorte.

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Publisher’s Note

The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

This book is dedicated to my supportive husband, Stephen Reck. If it had not been for his encouragement in pursuing my passion of writing, I would have never completed this book. Thank you for all your editing and proofing!

Introduction

This book is intended to help those who struggle with wrong mind-sets. These mind-sets could have been brought on by difficult circumstances, or perhaps you have a predisposition toward negative thinking. I had a combination of both: difficult circumstances and a bent toward negativity. Some of us have personalities that are more negative or melancholy. That does not mean with a little hard work and discipline you can change your thinking as well as your attitude.

This book will give you practical suggestions to encourage you to pursue having a more disciplined thought life which can lead to more peace, joy, contentment, overall better health and energy. You will also be encouraged to take the 30-day challenge to a more disciplined thought life at the end of the book.

Read through this book once, and then go through it again this time applying what you have learned including taking the 30-day challenge. Take your time, changing ingrained thought patterns takes time, but it will be well-worth your investment. You should start to reap the benefits almost immediately through a disciplined thought life, but keep going because the more you take every thought captive into the obedience of Jesus Christ and renew your mind; the better it gets! To achieve a disciplined mind, it could take longer than 30 days, especially if your mind has been negative for a long time. Do not get discouraged if it takes longer, every time you discipline your mind your brain is rewiring a new path for thinking. This new muscle that you are developing is strengthened each time you stop a negative thought and replace with a faith-filled thought. I suggest detoxing or fasting from ALL negative thinking for at least 30 days, and during that time renew your mind with scripture.

I will encourage you not to give up during this journey. You may want to, but keep going! The battlefield is in the mind, so you may have a bit of a challenge in the beginning. I know firsthand about this, it took me months before I could get my thought life under control. Some days were just frustrating and felt as though I was losing the battle, but this is coming from the enemy and even our fleshly nature wanting us to get discouraged and give up.

Thinking the thoughts of Christ instead of whatever comes into your mind, if you have been doing this for a while, may take some time. I use the word discipline to describe how it will be if you are desiring to change your thoughts. We should look at it like an athlete in training, who has to undergo rigorous training for competition or a sports event they will be in. Ask an athlete in the beginning of their training if it is easy, and most will say it is hard work! They will also tell you they have to get under a strict and disciplined work-out schedule. If we look at changing our mind-sets as discipline, we will not get as discouraged when we have to work hard at the beginning and possibly fail many times. When an athlete is training let’s say for the Olympics, they most likely will have to repeat the same course or whatever they are training for over and over again. Most Olympic athletes are not ready for the Olympics immediately, they have to train sometimes for years. The same with our minds, if you have a wild, uncontrolled mind for years, then do not expect that you will begin to think positively immediately.

You may be amazed when you start this journey to find out how undisciplined your mind really is. Just like we are to control other aspects of our lives such as our eating, what we drink, or even how much time we spend on the Internet; we too must learn to control what comes into our minds. Many people believe if a thought comes into their minds they must think about it, or that the thought is from them; this is not true! We do not have to think or dwell on whatever comes into our minds, and a lot of what pops into our minds is coming from the enemy or old storage files in our brains that we may not need to be reflecting on. We should test all thoughts that come into minds asking these questions, is this coming from God, the enemy, or my flesh?

If you are ready for a brand-new you, then come with me on a journey that could change your life. We can pray for God to perform a miracle with our thinking, I know I did; but if He does not He may want you to go through it. If you need to read this book several times, it is okay. If you need to continue to work on your thoughts after the 30 days, that is okay too. What is important is that you stay determined to not give up, and continue until you have more thoughts like Christ than the enemy.

This book will also help you uncover why you may have trouble disciplining your mind such as with addictions or codependent behavior.

Stay hopeful through the process, that change is happening-even if slowly. Any change is better than no change at all. Surround yourself with people who are positive and faith-filled as much as possible.

► Changing your thoughts can change not only your perspective but your world!

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Chapter 1: Why Discipline Your Mind?

Negativity affects your physical health.

Change your thoughts and change your world.

—Norman Vincent Peale

Chronic stress from negative attitudes can upset the body’s hormone balance and deplete the brain chemicals (neurotransmitters) required for feelings of happiness. Negative emotions can weaken the immune system. The mind, body, and spirit are interconnected. When one is affected, the other two will suffer. For example, someone with chronic negativity toward life can also have co-related depression and fatigue. Anger and hostility has been linked to hypertension and cardiovascular disease. Many health problems such as chronic fatigue, depression, insomnia, and gastrointestinal diseases will not entirely clear up on their own, unless the mental and spiritual aspects are also addressed.

Some common negative emotions are: worry, fear, depression, guilt, resentment, lack of contentment, complaining, and anger. These emotions can open the door to sickness and disease. Worrying generates anxiety and revs up your body. People who are chronically anxious have a dramatically greater risk for developing asthma, arthritis, headaches, and peptic ulcers. Studies have shown that worry, fear, anxiety and other negative emotions weaken natural killer cells in our bodies. Killer cells actually attack abnormal cells.

Research has shown that positive thinking can aid in stress management and even plays an important part in your well-being. According to the Mayo clinic, positive thinking is linked to a wide range of health benefits including: longer life span, less stress, lower rates of depression, resistance to the common cold, better coping skills, and better psychological health. However, is positive thinking alone enough? No, you must replace every thought with a faith-filled statement and scripture.

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things Philippians 4:8, ESV.

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect Romans 12:2, ESV

We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ 2 Corinthians 10:5, ESV

An Undisciplined Mind Can Lead You into Wilderness Thinking

The Christian wilderness can be defined as a period of testing and refinement, and it can come about through our chronic, undisciplined negative attitudes. It may seem during this experience that you have a dark cloud that hovers over you. It can seem like God is distant and does not care or hear your prayers. Your character, sins, and shortcomings are exposed to the light of Christ to bring healing.

There is a preparation period that God brings His people when He needs to correct undesirable behaviors or even to test our faith. This preparation will be used for something greater in the