Our garden 2016Do you like to garden? I LOVE it! Planting a little seed or plant and watching it grow and produce whatever it’s supposed to produce. Whether it’s vegetables, fruit, flowers, trees….I don’t care. I love it all! Except weeds. I don’t like weeds. In fact hate is pretty accurate. I hate weeds! They rob nutrients from the good plants and crowd them out and eventually take over. If left unattended, they will kill all the good and consume your garden.
Our mind is a lot like a garden. Small seeds…or thoughts…are planted in our minds each day. Both good and bad. We can choose which ones we nurture and help grow and weed out the ones we don’t want. Sometimes it can feel like we have nothing but weeds and there is so much work to be done that it’s overwhelming. I understand your pain.
As described above, when left unattended, weeds will over take the garden. In the same way, negative thoughts can overtake the mind. Because of our nature as humans, it’s easy to allow the negative thoughts to flourish. We naturally have a negative bent and if not reigned in, it can kill our joy and rob of us hope. Many people think that that’s just how they are, it’s part of their personality. And while I agree that we all have different temperaments; we all have the capability of thinking positive thoughts.
It’s all about choosing what stays and what goes. First, you have to be aware that a thought is negative or not. Do you think thoughts like “Nothing good ever happens to me” or “I can’t do this” or if you always feel like something people don’t like you.
If those are the types of thoughts you mainly think than it’s very possible that you have a negative mind-set. The good news is, it doesn’t have to stay that way.
In the Bible, Proverbs 23:7 states “As a man thinks in his heart, so he is.” Your thoughts create you. So you should be careful about the thoughts you allow to stay. Do you have control over your thoughts? Yes! We all have negative thoughts that come in to our minds. No one is immune to that. But what we do have the power to do is either dwell on that thought and allow it to grow or pluck it out and throw it away. The key here is to replace it with a positive thought. Remember, weeds come back if the ground is left unattended!
So today I encourage you to do some gardening. Weed out all those negative thoughts and let’s plant some positive ones. Let’s create beauty where there once was just a bunch of weeds!
Is it hard work? Yes! But are the results worth it? YES!! I don’t know about you but for me a beautiful garden brings a smile to my face! I hope all who read this have a wonderful, blessed day and that this will help you to be on your way to a more positive, joy filled life. Happy Gardening!
Becky
