Your Hope-Filled Perspective with Dr. Michelle Bengtson podcast: 017 How To Deal with Fear Effectively

017 How To Deal with Fear Effectively

Aug 8, 2019

Episode Summary:

As a neuropsychologist, I know the power of our mind, the power of our thoughts. Have you ever wondered how to deal with fear effectively? If you have ever battled your thoughts, and felt like you couldn’t win, then today is the perfect show for you. Today we’re going to be talking about training our mind to conquer challenges, defeat doubt, and live victoriously.

Today we’re talking to my friend, Kelly Balarie, about what it means to be battle ready. Her book by the same title is one that helps us proactively prepare to fight back against doubt, disbelief, and uncertainty and how to deal with fear in order to live from a stance of determination, resiliency, and faith to be all that God has called us to be. Kelly offers us tangible suggestions of ways to take heart and keep our minds focused on His truth for victorious living.

Kelly and I talk about how we fight any good fight, first in our mind, because what is in our mind will come out in our actions. When we continue to believe a lie, we really hurt ourselves. Kelly shares how she learned through her difficulties how to deal with fear by changing her thoughts. She explains what it means to be battle ready. She also gives several tips about how to do that, like what it means to adopt a buffet mindset, or how to take a mind vacation.

Quotables from the episode:

As a neuropsychologist, I know the power of our mind, the power of our thoughts. If you have ever battled your thoughts, and felt like you couldn’t win, then today is the perfect show for you. [click to tweet]
Today we’re going to be talking about training our mind to conquer challenges, defeat doubt, and live victoriously. This is an episode you won’t want to miss. [click to tweet]
We fight any good battle first in our mind.
We can either try to do things on our own, or we can find life through God. Advancement really comes when we get to the place where we admit that we can’t do it ourselves and we need God.
Our mess is our message, and God meets us in our mess.
When the trials come, we need to keep our thoughts fixed on heaven, on Jesus, and how we have the mind of Christ. Our thoughts are where the battles are won and lost.
We need God’s fresh insight in our thoughts!
Faith is a gift from God. It comes from Him, and we don’t have to try to conjure it up or strive to make it happen.
We have to preach to ourselves. We have to speak the word of God to our situation and over ourselves. Personalize scripture to remind yourself things like God says you are holy, righteous, more than a conqueror, and victorious in Christ Jesus. Just like the Socrates method of teaching, if you teach what you have learned, you hold onto it better.
For Scripture that we don’t understand, all we have to do is ask God to teach us His word, and for the Holy Spirit to reveal the word to our lives.
For some, after going through trials or traumas, it can be easy to have a victim mindset. But the truth is we are victorious because of Christ. Jesus died, but because He was raised again, He defeated everything we would face and the enemy’s power over us. We are set free by His love.
Our job is to get our mind on the same page as God’s word. It is very powerful when our mind gets in line with the mind of Christ.
Out of God’s abundance, He offers us the opportunity to have a “buffet mindset.” He gives lavishly and we never have to worry that He will run out without us getting our fill. The abundant nature of God gives us everything we need, so we don’t need to hoard, or store up, or compete with others.
Taking a “mind vacation” can allow us time to ask God for His perspective. A time distance can give us greater ability to see things more objectively. Sometimes we need to create space from our incidents or blow up moments and what God would have us do. Because of that distance, we can give ourselves time and a fresh ability to interpret a situation. The mind vacation frees us up from being too heavily critical of ourselves and adopting a more Godly perspective of our situation.
There is freedom in knowing we don’t have to be perfect to be accepted and loved by God. Our greatest advances will come not be defending ourselves but by laying it down and receiving God’s perspective.

Scripture References:

2 Corinthians 10:5, “We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”
Isaiah 41:10 “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.”

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