Commandments of Emotional Health cont……
- 6. Share our feelings instead of stuffing them
- Anxiety, fear, boredom, frustration
- Feelings are meant to be felt, not stuffed
- Don’t repress or suppress feelings but express them and confess them to God
- Galatians 6:2, “Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ
- Share with others; 2 Corinthians 1:8
- Revealing our true feelings is the first step to healing; grief is a good thing
- 7. Seek advice before making major decisions
- Under stress our brain function drops to lower levels, therefore we are not thinking at our best
- Check with others
- Proverbs 15:22, “Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed.”
- Seek advice and listen to great counsel
- There is safety in seeking multiple counsel, Proverbs 11:14
- 8. Space renewal breaks throughout the day
- If we take several small breaks, it will increase productivity
- We have to re-new our mind
- Incorporate a work:rest cycle
- Use spacing and dosing
- Figure out what renews us emotionally, then do it several times a day
- Consider nature, which is both healing and calming; take walks and talk to God-it will re-charge us, Isaiah 40: 30-31
- Isaiah 58: 11, “The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.”
- 9. Serve someone suffering more than us
- Focus on someone who is hurting more than we are; get the attention off of ourselves
- We need to give back and get out of self-centeredness
- It’s not about us; we should be helping others
- The most vulnerable people are orphans, widows (elderly single adults); James 1:27
- Participate in public charity and private purity
- Feed people, help those most vulnerable
- Find a place for us to serve , it helps us to re-fill our emotional and spiritual tank
- Proverbs 11:25, “A generous man will prosper; he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed.”
- Be a servant to others
- 10. Control what’s controllable and trust God for the rest
- God has a part in your emotional health and we have a part
- He gave you a brain and a will
- Ask yourself, what is controllable? The things that we eat, the time that we eat, the time that we get up, and the time we go to bed…..but then let God handle the things we can’t control,
- Faith and actions work together; James 2:22, “You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did.”
- All we have to decide is what to do with the times that we have been given
- We can’t control the pandemic, gov’t, etc., but we can choose how to respond
If we implement these principles, we will come out of this pandemic stronger, emotionally healthier, and spiritually more mature.
We don’t have to do it by ourselves, Jesus will be our savior if we let him