Have you ever heard the phrase, “Happy endings follow happy journeys”? Today, I’m sharing the power of future thinking.  You have the ability to change your thoughts to positive thoughts. We’ll see what God’s Word says about what we should be thinking and how we can use our thoughts to get to where we want to be.

Resources Mentioned:

Emotions Episode: https://ashleyvarner.com/unstable-emotions

The Mindset Reset: https://ashleyvarner.com/mindset 

Get Ashley’s ground breaking program The Mindset Reset. It is a self-paced program made to guide you to taking your thoughts captive and finally control your emotions, so they stop controlling you! 

Highlights from the Episode:

Think on These Things

Start to think thoughts that are fixed on Jesus.

Philippians 4:8, “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right,
whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.”

I had a client recently who had a difficult conversation that caused her to be anxious and she didn’t want to go into work. I had told her to go through the motions and go to work. Once she was there, she messaged me and said that she felt better. If she had stayed home, she would have been fixing her
thoughts on anxious things, instead, she let herself think about positive thinks and it literally changed her physical anxiousness.

I’m not saying to ignore your emotions, and we’ve talked about that on the Avoiding Emotions episode, but I want you to see how your thoughts can completely change your feelings and ultimately change your actions.

Thinking Future Thoughts

We tend to think that it’s going to better at the end of our difficulty.

As soon as I get that promotion, I’ll be happier. As soon as I lose the weight, I’ll be happier. But what if you decided to be that person right now?

Let me explain:
Say you want a new car. You may think, “Oh, when I have that new car I’ll take such good care of it. I’ll
make sure to wash it every week, I’ll clean out the junk and won’t leave trash in it.”

But how are you treating the car you have right now?

The person you are right now will be the same person you are when you have that new car. HGTV has a show called Love It or List It. It’s all about homeowners who are tired of their home. They decide that for whatever reason, they want to list the property and by something different.

In each show, a designer and a real estate agent each help the homeowners.

The designer transforms their current home making it more what they want, while the real estate agent looks for new homes for them to buy.

I’m always happy when the people decide to stay where they are. They realize that they didn’t need a new house to be happy. They just needed to be a better steward of what they already had.

Being the Future You

God created us with imagination. The ability to think and dream and envision possibilities for the future.

So I want you to start using that imagination and praying and dreaming about the person God wants you to be. And I want you to dream big.

I want you to pray and ask God the areas that He wants you to change. And just like the example with the new car, I want you to begin developing habits of that person.

Maybe she spends more time in the Word. You may be someone who only spends fifteen minutes a day, and that’s okay. But maybe the future you needs to spend a half hour a day.

• Maybe the future you wakes up earlier.
• Maybe she spends less time on social media or less time watching tv.
• Maybe she eats differently.

So as you dream about the person that God wants you to be, I want you to be thankful for where you are now, and then make subtle changes.

I’ve been making a lot of small changes recently. at the beginning of this year, I gave up soda. Then in April, I gave up all beverages except water. There’s nothing specifically wrong with soda, but it was beginning to take over my habits.

Then in May, I gave up specific foods.

It’s because I envisions the person God wanted me to be, and that was a person who wasn’t driven by specific tastes.

The biggest way I changed this was by thinking differently. I started to think as someone who didn’t drink soda.

I said things like, “It may taste good for a moment, but what is it really costing me?”

• Then that thought turned into “I’m fine without it.”
• Then that thought turned into “I don’t need it.”
• Then that thought turned into “I don’t want it.”

That is a tool called bridging thoughts and we’re going to talk more about it next week, so I hope you’ll join me then!