“It’s not who you are that holds you back, It’s who you think you are not.”
James Maxwell and Jim Dornan
If you had to give a ten-minute speech about yourself in front of an audience, what are some of the words you would use to describe yourself? Would your talk be an inspiration to those who are listening?
Would you be able to fill up the full ten minutes with positive, truthful words about yourself to others?
The answer to these questions should be a good indication of whether you think right about yourself.
There was a story of a family playing the “what if” game while driving in the car. He asked his four young children, “What if you could be anybody on earth, who would you like to be?”
One daughter said she wanted to be bionic woman. Other family members shared their “what ifs.”
When it was his youngest son’s turn, Chuckie was silent. Pulling up to a stop sign, his father looked down at his son who was sitting beside him in the front seat and said,” So, who would you like to be?”
Chuckie’s unusual and refreshing response was, “I’d like to be me.”
The father had to ask, “Why do you want to be you?”
Without hesitating, he said “I like me.”
How many of us spend our entire lives wishing we were someone else instead of accepting who we are and celebrating our uniqueness?
The Illusion of Knowledge
Wrong thinking is an illusion of Knowledge. The definition of illusion is “something imagined but not necessarily true, real or factual.” One example is thinking that what you may know is enough or all there is to know. Another example is thinking that what you’ve traditionally heard is the only way it could ever be. Daniel J. Boorstin spoke wisely about wrong thinking when he said, “The greatest obstacle to fresh discovery is not ignorance-it is the illusion of knowledge.”
Sometimes our thinking becomes warped by limitations placed on us by other people, by their unbelief, their small ways of thinking, and by their doubts, borders, limits, and fear.
Sometimes we put limitations on ourselves and then close our eyes and pretend they don’t exist. Such limitations are really barriers between what you “see” you are able to accomplish and where you actually are.
What you see may be factual, real, and true, but unreachable because of the invisible barrier either you or someone else has erected in front of you. It is like a lady window shopper who is looking at and longing for a beautiful dress in the display window. She can see it, but she can’t touch it unless she smashes the window and reaches through it.
The key to right thinking not only to see through to what you can be, but to also reach through and lay hold of what you can be by smashing through your limitations.
Be a No-Limit Person
It is impossible to perform consistently in a manner inconsistent with the way in which you see yourself. If you do not see yourself as someone who is strong in faith, you won’t become a faith-filled person. If you do not see yourself overcoming life’s greatest challenges, chances are you won’t. If you do not see yourself winning the race, you’ll never be a champion. If you do not see yourself making a difference, you’ll never change another’s life.
Say this to yourself:
No doubts,
No borders,
No limits, and
No fears.
Let Truth Shape You and Make You
Another reason for warped thinking is that we don’t possess a revelation of greater One in us. Gaining such a revelation starts with allowing the Truth to make you and shape you.
Right thinking is truth-founded. It’s not founded on human emotion or on emotional persuasion or on religious tradition.
Battle Of The Mind
“If you think you are beaten, you are:
If you think you dare not, you don’t
IF you like to win, but think you can’t
It is almost certain you won’t!
If you think you’ll lose, you’re lost,
For out in the world we find
Success begins with a fellow’s will;
It’s all in the state of mind.
If you think you’re outclassed, you are.
You’ve got to think high to rise.
You’ve got to be sure of yourself before
You can ever win a prize.
Life’s battles don’t go
To the stronger or faster man,
But sooner or later the man who wins
Is the man who thinks he can!”
Establish Your Foundation
Thinking right about yourself is a life or death decision! That is a blunt statement, but true. We have the choice to choose life or choose death, blessing or cursing.
No one can make this decision for us. We choose life (blessings) by the principles by which we choose to live. It is up to us to establish the right foundation for life by making the right choices.
It is a gift that we are able to change and rise above the difficult circumstances in life.
While we are on this earth, we still have the right to change what we are and who we are by making choices that will produce life and not death.
