Stress is an INSIDE Job

Stress is an inside job. Nobody makes you angry, sad, bitter, frustrated, etc. You choose those things. It's stress or rest. The choice is yours.

This past weekend I went to the Passion, Power and Purpose conference with Graham Cooke and Jason Upton at Voice Ministries in Elkhart, Ind. I don't want to say much about the either of the speakers (because you can click on their links and read for yourself) except to say that they operate in the prophetic. Jason is in the worship arena and Graham is more in the building up and training of the prophetic ministry.

Before the second session on Saturday night, the prophetic team at Voice got to have a question and answer session with Graham. I'm blessed to be a part of the team, so I was in attendance. He said some real good nuggets of info to us that he didn't mention to the rest of the 900 people who were there. One of the things he talked about was stress.

I constantly find myself talking about stress, trying not to be stressed, praying for people who stress me out and looking for ways to destress. Unfortunately stress is just in my life and it's a marriage that I'd like a divorce from once and for all!

Graham says, "External circumstances don't bring stress. The way you think about the circumstances causes stress."

SELAH, SELAH, SELAH and SELAH again.

So does that mean that when frustrating people come in my path I should:

A. Pray them out of my path

B. Punch their lights out

C. Thank God that they are in my path, because they are smoothing out rough edges and building character in me

D. none of the above

Answer: C - (Don't you know, when in doubt, pick C. And seriously, NEVER choose violence as an option for anything! B - BAAAAD.)

Sounds easy right! We'll see how this week at work goes.

Seriously though, since when did we start thinking it was OK to let other people's crazy emotions effect ours, blaming situations for why we feel the way we feel and so on? I can't tell you how many times, I've said, "She/he makes me so mad!" As if that person really wants me to feel that way, well, some people maybe do. I don't know why, but it sounds so easy. Don't choose to be stressed period.

So I decided to implement this new nugget of brilliance into my life - starting at work, two days ago. The plan would be to practice rest by reframing how I think about certain situations. If my thinking brings me to a negative place, I will simply have another thought - positive of course! (Because that is what Graham would do.)

It is now Wednesday and I think it's helped, but boy do I have a lot of work to do. I'm serious, I've got some wrong thinking patterns that need to be unravelled. Thank God for the unravelling and removing of veils.

Thank you Graham for your positive thoughts on stress and rest. I'm prayerfully asking God to show me what stress I'm internalizing so I can "have another thought." Yes, I choose rest.