Have you ever waited a long time to upgrade your phone’s software? Where you notice apps really start to slow down, even routine tasks take forever like opening or sending a text message? It starts to get to be an incredible pain to do anything, because everything is bogged down and not running as smoothly as it used to be. Have you noticed how sometimes just upgrading the operating system increases the speed and efficiency of the phone, even if you are still using the same old device? The hardware is the same, but somehow everything works faster and more seamlessly.
Where am I going with all this? Well, I think that our minds work in much the same way. Over time, we develop routine patterns of behavior that don’t end up serving us. We accumulate repetitions of thought that slowly sap energy from us instead of rejuvenating and energizing us. We let things that don’t really matter take up too much of our headspace. Just like a bloated operating system that’s using way too much memory for simple tasks.
I recently learned this lesson the hard way, but it ended up being extremely freeing. It began with me starting to notice how many things were annoying me every day. It wasn’t so much that they were new irritations, it was an awareness of how many little micro-stressors were wearing on me throughout the day. Things my wife does, things my kids do, things friends say, or even things I personally do that annoy myself.
One day I was thinking about the torrent of constant irritations, and I couldn’t seem to find a way to escape. Then I felt the Holy Spirit say to me “What if you could upgrade your operating system so you aren’t annoyed by these things anymore?”. Huh. Now that’s an interesting thought. I hadn’t really considered that before, which to me was a solid indicator that this was coming from God, not from me. I filed this away in my mental filing cabinet to ruminate on further when I had some free time.
Around the same time, I had recently started doing an online guided Christian meditation program. It consisted of thirty-minute Christ-centered breathing meditations that I would do first thing in the morning. I found doing this practice to be incredibly relaxing and energizing. If you haven’t tried something like this, I would highly recommend it. After doing this for about a week or so, something completely unexpected happened. I noticed certain things that used to annoy me severely no longer had any effect. It was weird! I knew that meditation has been known to help people with stress, but I had no idea it would influence daily annoyances and irritations in such a positive way.
I then knew that this was part of what the Lord was saying to me about upgrading my operating system. I saw how meditation was a way to do this, to discharge old blockages which I believe were the source of the irritations. A way to refresh and rejuvenate our mind, body and soul with the presence of God and clean up junk that accumulates in all of us over time. Kind of like changing an air filter after a few months. With how powerful this was for me, it made me wonder if there were other ways in which we could upgrade our thinking.
So much of our life is not what physically happens to us, but how we perceive the world around us. Can we reframe how we see events in order to bring us peace instead of stress? For example, many times I find myself fixating on what people might be thinking about me and whether I put my best foot forward with them or not. Did I say the right thing? Do they like me or think I’m a weirdo? Did they like my jokes? Do they find me good looking? I think the best way to understand how to reframe this is to think about how often you think about other people compared with how much you think about yourself. For me, almost one hundred percent of the time I’m thinking about myself more than other people. I would bet it’s the same for most, which means the same people you are worrying about what they think about you, aren’t thinking about you at all. They are worrying about what YOU are thinking about THEM! This made me feel much better and helped tremendously to take the pressure off for social gatherings. For me it was a game changer.
How else can we upgrade our thought life? Can we improve how we think about God? Is he a hard-to-please dictator in the sky? Or is he a picture of the most loving friend you’ve ever had who sees the best in you and encourages you at every opportunity? How would that change your daily world, knowing how much you were loved, appreciated and celebrated by your Heavenly Father? What if instead of more demands on your time and energy, He really wanted you to let go more and enjoy the love He has for you instead of worrying about what you were trying to do for him? What if he didn’t need you to do anything for him? How would that make you feel? Would the burden feel a little lighter? What if he simply wanted you to love him? And the greatest way to love him is to receive the immeasurably great storehouse of affection he has for you?
I encourage you to take this approach with everything in your life. Really take some time to identify burdens and stresses in your way of thinking. How much of it is self-imposed? How much can you let go that doesn’t serve your best interests? How can you adjust your belief systems to allow yourself to experience life in a bubble of liquid peace instead of a constant barrage of arrows, darts and pins and needles? What would that life be like? Would you be freer? Would you be a more authentic “you” than you’ve ever been? Would it be worth it to find out?
Pray this with me:
Father, I thank you for your love for me. I ask you to show me old destructive thought patterns that are keeping me imprisoned and separating me from experiencing the river of your Peace that is always flowing from you. Please help me to upgrade my operating system and ways of thinking so that I may fully be aware of my union with you, so that I may better receive your love for me and express my love for you and for others around me. Thank you for your peace that passes all understanding and for being my comforter who never leaves me. In Jesus’ mighty name, amen.
Peaceful Streams 
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