God is the designer of our minds and our bodies. God is the one who teaches us the truth through His Word.
Tip #1: Realize that your feelings are not facts.
Feelings are just information. It is factual that you are having feelings. You are having certain feelings, and these sensations may be labeled with a certain word that says what the feeling is. This does not mean the feeling is telling you the truth about your value, about the situation, about someone else's intent, or about whether you're in danger.
Our emotions are not indicators of our worth, of our salvation, or of our spiritual standing. Emotions are signals letting us know how our body and mind are reacting to circumstances. Feelings don't define you. Feelings are simply messengers that God put into the body to alert you. Jesus Himself felt grief, righteous anger, compassion, and sadness.
1 Peter 5:6-7 says, "Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you."
Tip #2: Realize that your body is not separate from your spirituality.
Jesus had a fully human body and he was fully God and fully human. It was by the shedding of Jesus' physical blood and the physical raising of His body that saved us. Jesus is perfect.
Knowing that we are safe physically can help us to feel more into the truth that Jesus is our peace. If your body is not able to recalibrate and rest, it's hindering you from the fullness of the experience of being able to rest our bodies, minds, souls, and spirits in Christ.
Tip #3: Boundaries are Biblical.
God Himself gave Adam and Eve boundaries.
Genesis 2:16-17 says, "And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, "You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.""
God gave people free will with choice and warning. Adam and Eve ate from the fruit in the garden of Eden and that's what caused the problem. As a result, God set up more boundaries.
Genesis 3:23 says, "therefore the Lord God sent him out from the garden of Eden to work the ground from which he was taken."
Jesus set boundaries for Himself while on earth. He was not available to everyone all of the time. Even Jesus went away to pray.
Healthy boundaries are simply saying that we as humans have limits to our energy, time, resources, and should steward them wisely.
Tip #4: Prayer is powerful and so is therapy.
Therapy is not a lack of faith, but is an act of stewardship. The Bible tells us that there is value in counsel. Jesus Himself is the mighty counselor. You have to be wise with the person you choose as your therapist, so that they don't lead you into anything that isn't according to Godly parameters. God uses many tools to bring about healing and therapy could be one of them.
Prayer connects us spiritually and therapy helps us to heal. Therapy can untangle the emotional, mental, and behavioral patterns that might be keeping us stuck.
Proverbs 15:22 says, "Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisers they succeed."
God created your brain, body, and emotions. He knows how they work and He is not limited to only what seems like a spiritual intervention. God works through skilled, Godly professionals...and ungodly professionals too.
Tip #5: Rest is important.
Too many times we criticize ourselves for needing to take a rest. Jesus Himself took rests and God implemented Sabbath. Sometimes we need time to decompress, or recharge so that we can think more creatively, be more effective, and more of service. You are not meant to run on empty. We can honor God through rest. It's okay to take a nap and step away from your endless to-do lists.
Tip #6: Community matters.
You were not meant to do life alone. Healing happens in connection with people. Although, isolation is not always bad, but thinking that you don't need anyone is not healthy. God made us to encourage one another. Find healthy people who speak truth, encourage you, build you up, and pray for you.
Tip #7: Grace is for you too.
God's love is for you too. Often we have so many thoughts running through our minds that are critical and you go down the rabbit trail. Grace is for YOU. You are not the exception. Jesus already took all the hits for ALL the sin and He overcame it. The gift is free for the taking. Jesus died for your freedom.
So stop measuring your worth by your productivity, performance, or feelings...you are loved because God is love and He loves YOU.
Romans 8:1 says, "There is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus."
God has a wonderful plan for your life.
Raw Podcast Episode Transcript -
Welcome, today we're talking about strong feelings strong feelings so many times Christian women are frayed to have their own strong feelings it's almost like everybody else in the world gets to think and feel the way that they think and feel but if we have strong feelings somehow we're sinning or somehow we're out of line or we shouldn't do that or we silence ourselves or we have a lot of shit around it and a lot of guilt or a lot of condemnation or a lot of putting ourselves down those kinds of things and I'm here today to tell you that strong feelings remind you actually because I've said this before but sometimes we need to be reminded of these truths strong feelings are not saying having strong feelings simply means that we are picking up on some thing That is not right something bothersome whether that's within ourselves or from others or from our environment we're picking up on something and it is impacting us with strong feelings and they're strong because they're trying to get our awareness that somethings up and so if you have that issue where you feel guilty for having strong feelings or for having a point of you I want to just challenge you to think about strong feelings as simply Physiological responses just like you know your temperature rises when you have a fever it's not saying that your temperature rises it's there to help you fight off the germs the fever helps fight off the germs the fever doesn't feel good the fever is intense the fever might make you sweat There are many different feelings some of them are for making us aware that we don't have enough space carved out for ourselves and we need more time to just take some time to regroup carving more time of space in our day so that we don't go to rage and anger with our kids are with our families Some of them are there because somebody did something really horrible to us and we shouldn't allow it it's OK in our anger do not sin right and when we are weak he is strong Jesus wept Jesus overturn the tables right feelings are not sin How we act with those feelings can be said or not Jesus I'm sure he did not sing because he was perfect so even turning over the tables I don't know that I'd be so bold to do that all the time but There are certain situations that might call for certain things as long as they're not sin and you are taking control of these responses this physiological feelings and deciding what they're telling you what infection so to speak they're trying to fight off for you Then you can decide what's needed what's appropriate the feelings are not a problem welcome them except them trust them as advisers That are telling you something needs to be looked at further don't let them overtake you such that they guide everything you do or lead you to negative choices or sin But view them as welcome indicators that help you regulate what you're doing what you're feeling what you're needing what you want to take action on these are the things that feelings are here to help us to they let us know when boundaries have been crossed they let us know when we've been sent against they let us know when we need to protect somebody else they let us know when we have to set boundaries when we have to say no I don't like this because And then figure out why figure out what it is that this feeling is responding to from your environment or from within you Notice what's happening and when you can realize why that's happening why did I just get this feeling right here like I remember this one conversation I had one time where somebody acted like they were having a nice conversation with me and they just slipped in something that was incredibly rude insulting and presumptuous and totally not me They were kind of questioning the motive of mine and that was not my motive and I got really angry really fast and some might think well why would you get angry if that wasn't your motive I got angry because I was being kind of underhandedly accused of doing something that I was not doing in fact I had gotten really angry because it was the exact opposite I was going to bat for this person and they were thinking that I wasn't going to bed enough for them And yet they have no idea behind the scenes how much I thought to go to bat for them and so in this circumstance I had righteous anger because I was being told that I was something I wasn't or that I was doing something I wasn't doing and that ticked me off because I wasn't and you know I could cave and go OK maybe I did they think so so no don't do that don't do that know yourself It What It doesn't mean you can't be wrong sometimes and apologize if you are but if you really don't suspect you're wrong somewhere start paying attention to that I'm not talking about false pride or anything like that but I'm talking about truth there are things that we can righteously get angry about and stand against and go no that is not OK with me that is not who I am that is not what I've done that is not OK with me I don't like how you're treating this person I don't like how you're treating me I need you to stop I need to get out of here whatever that sense of emotions are I know I'm talking more in the anger here and what to do with it and in that situation I said that makes me Angry That is not at all what I've been trying to do here and the person backpedaling so I'll never say that again I was like good and I do you know graciously gave them away to get out of this conversation but I would rather not ever have to have a confrontive experience I mean let's just be real ass not fun although some people thrive on that because they feel powerful that way I like to get along with everybody because I like to treat people fair and I like to believe they'll treat me fairly Is your friend says or that your spouses or that your kids do it may be time to speak up not deny the feelings not put them down not take blame for something that isn't yours if it is yours of course that's different you make amends repent and change and ask for forgiveness and all of that but I'm talking about those things that you're not doing anything wrong you're just having intense feelings and maybe somebody's wronged you it is totally OK To validate those feelings and go hey this is an indicator that somethings not OK with me here and then to do something about it set a boundary have that conversation a gentle answer turns away wrath it doesn't have to be a big deal a lot of people think that intense feelings mean arguments and fights They don't need to they can be handled with when this happened I feel this way Would Would you help me buy whatever or I'd really appreciate your help with this or if you could not say that that way that would mean a lot to me It depends on the situation of course but finding what you really need that your feelings are trying to tell you is OK it's OK to trust that you can have a self who has feelings and sometimes intense feelings and they're there is your friends To help you realize when something is needed or something is wrong So that you can tend to them so that you can live life more fully and informed and intentionally feelings are friends unless they take you into sin unless they get bottled down inside and don't get adequately addressed I often think though those Christian women we take our feelings and think that we need to tamp them down to be nice to be acceptable to not sin we can have our feelings and choose what to do with them and that choosing what to do with them is not sad songs we choose wise things to speak the truth and love a gentle answer turns away wrath Trust in the lord with all your heart lean not on your own understanding those are the ways to deal with feelings for affectively I hope that encourages you and empowers you today take care.
