How to Change your Thoughts and your Heart

As many of you know, we are doing a New Testament Reading challenge here at Heights in Heels! It has been so interesting reading about Jesus’s life in chronological order in Matthew this month and I have learned more about his life that I ever knew. Other than the smaller books of the Bible, this is the first time that I have read an entire book of the Bible. While all of Jesus’s life is miraculous, the chapter that stuck out to me was Matthew 15 where Jesus talks about the condition of our heart.

Jesus says that what defines us is what comes out of our mouth, and what comes out of our mouth is a direct reflection of what lives in our heart.

What lives in your heart? Is there hate toward yourself or others? Is it shame or embarrassment? Does judgement, jealously, sadness or grief fill it?

Thinking about the thoughts that I have toward myself and towards others, the condition of my heart could use some improvement.

So what can we do about it? How do we change the condition of our hearts?

Living for God, not Tradition

Another big theme in this chapter is about living for God, and not for the traditions of our land.

Matthew 5:3- “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of tradition?”

At first, I wasn’t sure how all of this thought about tradition fit into the condition of our heart. However, when I thought about the way that we are raised (at least here in the USA!) we are taught to be pretty selfish. We are taught diet culture! The TV shows that we watch teach us about gossip and lies and deceit. The USA has some wonderful traditions, but a lot of the things that our nation says are okay, really do go against God’s law.

God calls us, foremost, to keep his commands. His second charge to us is to love others as we love ourselves. Gossiping, lying, pettiness, and speaking ill of our own bodies do not follow this command at all. But our tradition has told us that it is okay to do these things.

It’s not.

To change the condition of our hearts, we first have to realize what traditions we have allowed into our lives that the world says is okay, but God doesn’t condone. We have to make the conscious decision, daily, hourly, minute by minute, to turn away from theses traditions and towards God.

Spending Time with God

The biggest way that we are going to change our hearts is to change who we are spending time with. If we are always on our phones, comparing ourselves to others, watching others lives and envying, that’s not okay! If we are hanging out with people who are constantly going against what God has commanded against, it’s time to hang out with other people.

The most important thing? Spending time with God, daily, consistently. It’s only through your own time with God that you will learn from Him and speak with Him. I used to be a Sunday Christian- doing my own thing through the week and only praising on the weekends.

Matthew 15:8-9- “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.”

Now, I talk to God every day. I have my breakfast, then I have my time with my Father. I do a devotional and pray with Him every morning. I talk with Him about my struggles and my successes, I tell Him my fears and failures.

To change the condition of our hearts, we have to make the conscious decision to do it. I can’t tell you that I jump out of bed early every morning excited because I don’t. Sometimes, I would rather lay there for the extra 30 minutes.

But my relationship with my Father is the priority, not my extra snooze time.

We have to make time for God in our lives! It is our choice, every day, how our day goes. We have so much more power than we think we do. We are all blessed with the same 24 hours everyday. Choose a time, daily, that you are going to spend with God, working on you!

Our Words Matter

Matthew 15:18-19 “But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart and these define them. For our of the heart comes evil thoughts- murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander.”

Yes, our words are important. That inner monologue that you have to yourself though? Those are important words. Those are from your heart as well. Thoughts have to happen before words do.

If we keep allowing these negative thoughts into our minds, eventually those thoughts become words and those words become action. I’m not saying that we are going to do anything as horrible as murder, but what if, through your thoughts, you are killing the relationship that you have with others and your self.

What if the thoughts that start out as lies become the monologue that you believe? My monologue made me believe that food- the life giving substance that we need to survive- would kill me. These lies have to be pointed out and dealt with right away, otherwise you might be subjected to believing them.

If our thoughts keep comparing ourselves to others and engage with jealousy, soon our thoughts will lead to beliefs about ourselves based on that false information. The comparison has to stop so that the slander- to ourselves and others- doesn’t happen.

Your words matter. Your words matter so much more than you know. You want real recovery? A real, content and peaceful life? Change up that thought process into something else.

Changing your Thoughts and Your Heart

I had a conversation with my students today that was enlightening. It was with 2 students who were always complaining about things. They told me that I was their favorite teacher because I was so kind to them. I thanked them, but then we had a conversation about WHY I was able to be kind to every one of my students, not just the ones that I liked.

I can genuinely tell you that I like all of my students. But when I thought deeper about WHY I liked all of my students it’s because I had chosen to like them. Instead of focusing on the negatives about a person, I chose to focus on the positive about that person.

My students were enthralled with this response and kept talking to me about it. I told them that with every student I met, I looked for the good in them, no matter what their paperwork told me about their behavior, academics, home life or social activity, when I meet students, I look for the good in them. The good, the positive, the fun is what I choose to build a relationship with students on.

Imagine if we did this with every relationship (including ourselves) in our lives. Instead of looking at another person and playing the comparison game and turning that into a reason to not like them, or not like something about ourselves, we took it as an opportunity to build a relationship with them and say something positive about ourselves. Does a person at work have awesome style? Instead of hating them for being fashionable, mention that you love their outfit. If you find your mind start comparing, start to tell yourselves positives about YOU that have nothing to do with that person.

When you focus on your positives instead of the negatives that you see, you will notice that the negatives become less important. Find your positives and FILL your mind with them. Read your positives every morning before you start your day. Your positives might be better than your daily affirmations too!

Some positives that you might want to focus on are:

• Your work ethic
• Your characteristics (like loyalty, a good listener, the kindness that you give others, your patience)
• A relationship that you are proud of maintaining
• Your friendships
• How far you have come from your past
• Your abilities
• Your talents
• Your God Given gifts
• Your purpose

Another way to start changing your thoughts is to write down what you WANT to be thinking, instead of what you are. I’ve had panic attacks my entire life. From mild ones, to ones that have sent me to the hospital, the one thing that they have in common is the loud, circling thoughts.

Recently, I was sitting behind my desk when a rather aggressive panic attack started. I started writing out what I wanted to be thinking instead of what I was actually thinking. While my brain was telling me that I was not safe and that I was going to die, I was writing that I was safe, that I was okay. I was strong and a mighty warrior. That the panic would end and I would live. Once I had these written out, I just kept reading them over and over again. Changing my thoughts changed the game that was going on in my head. I was actively fighting the lies that my panic was making me believe.

I can’t write a blog post without mentioning affirmations. To me, these are the cornerstone of rebuilding your mental health and starting to think in a positive way.

Take a look at the two articles that I’ve written on Affirmations: How to Write your Own Affirmations and 100 Christian Affirmations.

Find your 5-10 affirmations that you are going to say everyday, no matter what. Change your words, change your thoughts- and your heart will catch up.

And while you are working on changing your heart and being more intentional with your words, know that the Lord is with you. Know that He wants to see your heart soften toward Him. His love for you is not fathomable.

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I am always praying for you,