Name: Power Thoughts
ISBN: 9781444702705

Joyce Meyer

Joyce Meyer has a knack for coining phrases - her fans call them 'Joyceisms' - and one of her best loved is 'Where the mind goes, the man follows.' This was the basis for BATTLEFIELD OF THE MIND, and in her latest book, Meyer provides 'power thoughts', bringing the reader to a new level of ability to use the mind as a tool to achievement. In POWER THOUGHTS, she outlines a flexible program to turn thoughts into habits, and habits into success. Sections feature bulleted keys to successful thinking in each chapter and include: The Power of a Positive You 5 Rules for Keeping Your Attitude at the Right Altitude More Power To You The Power of Perspective Nobody has more of a 'can-do' attitude than Joyce Meyer. Now you can, too.

12 Strategies to Win the Battle of the Mind

Power Thoughts

Stefanie Sugia

"The battle in our minds will continue until our earthly lives are complete. We will never become so spiritual that the enemy decides to stop harassing us, but we can become stronger and stronger against him as we grow in our relationship with God and in understanding His Word."A while ago, I was kind of bored reading fiction books (probably because I haven't found any that really blew me away lately); so I decided to pick up a non-fiction book to lift up my reading mood. I chose this book because I know it will be good for me and it's something that I wouldn't get bored with. Back in 2014, I read and reviewed Joyce Meyer's other book called 
  God is Not Mad At You
, and it was really life-changing for me. It changed my perspective about life and my relationship with God. So going into this book, I was hoping for the same life-changing effect—and it definitely did. I know I had a lot of wrong thoughts in my life, but this book pointed out even the ones that I never realized was wrong before. In this review, I'm going to briefly share half of the power thoughts in this book so you can have an idea of what's inside :)"All of us have the privilege and responsibility of choosing our attitudes, no matter what circumstances or situations we find ourselves in. The key word here is choosing. Attitudes don't just happen; they are the products of our choices."As an introduction, Joyce Meyer gave a foundation that will make us understand how our thoughts will affect our attitudes—and that our attitudes are based on our choices.We are reminded that we will always have an option to be miserable, unhappy, and pessimistic; but we can also choose to be optimistic and happy despite our circumstances. I really love the part in which she said:"Being positive does not mean we deny the existence of difficulty; it means we believe God is greater than our difficulties.because there's no denying that life can be—and will be—difficult at times. But if we choose to believe the best out of our situations, we will be living with the right attitude. This book encouraged us to start making the habit of controlling our thoughts. Whenever bad thoughts started arising in our minds, we need to think about something else, think about something good until there's no more room for bad thoughts to sink in. Talking about it might make it sounds easy, but the author reminded us that bad habits will not be broken just with our desire to break it. Doing it will require determination and diligence over the course of our lifetime.

✦ 1. I can do whatever I need to do in life through Christ. ✦"God will not call you to do anything He will not enable and empower you to do. He will not allow you to go through anything that is impossible for you. Although God never authors bad things, He does use them for our spiritual growth."The very first power thought introduced in this book points out our negative thoughts regarding our inability to do certain things. For a long time—I guess even until now, I always consider myself a quiet person who's not good at talking. I have a huge problem with public speaking and felt insecure whenever I talk in front of a lot of people. I always say that this is just how I am originally as an excuse; but that stops me from growing as an individual. Even though I'm still not a very good speaker, I constantly try to get out of my comfort zone because I want to be better. Self-pity and being jealous of other people who are better than us at something is a waste of time. It is better to take things at your own pace and grow towards our better selves with God's help."Stop making excuses and start doing what God is telling you to do. Stop looking at all your weaknesses because His strength is made perfect in our weakness. It is through our weakness and inability that God shows His strength."
✦ 2. God loves me unconditionally! ✦
  "No matter how many right things you have listed, you can never do enough to deserve God's love, and no matter how many wrong things you have listed on your sheet of paper, they cannot prevent God from loving you forever."
I'm not going to go in too deep with this power thought because the book 
  God is Not Mad At You
 went much deeper into this topic. Basically, this power thought is used to defend ourselves against guilt, shame, and feeling that there's something wrong with us. We will never have a good relationship with God if we come to Him with the mindset of paying back our sins with good deeds. When we understand how much God loves us, we will have the desire to please him with our lives. So every time we do something wrong, all we need to do is repent and receive God's forgiveness. Admit our mistakes and ask God to help us change."Is God ever displeased with us? Yes, He is displeased when we sin (this is our "do", not our "who") and He loves is enough to correct us and continue working with us to bring us into better and more godly behavior (Hebrews 12:10).""Good relationships must be based on love and acceptance, not on fear. All too often we are deceived into thinking that our acceptance is based on our performance, and this is totally unscriptural."
✦ 3. I will not live in fear. ✦"Feeling fear is part of being alive.
We can only be cowardly when we allow our fears to dictate our actions or decisions, instead of following our hearts and doing what we know is right for us. Feeling fear is simply the temptation to run away from what we should face and confront; feeling fear is not equal to being afraid because being afraid means letting fearful feelings get the best of us."The third power thought is really important to me because it pointed out a lot of my weaknesses. For one thing, I always have a fear of discomfort and fear of being misunderstood. Not to mention many other kinds of fear, which I'm sure all of us also have. This part made me realize that fear will prevent us from trying new things or stretching ourselves out of our comfort zones. Like I said earlier, I'm a very comfort-zone type of person. I'm always afraid of feeling humiliated or ashamed or regret. But I understand now that I should not be discouraged when my good intentions fail at times. We should not let our fear steal God's best plans for our lives. Here are some of the quotes that I need to remind myself over and over to get past my fear:
  "Courage is not the absence of fear, it is progress in its presence."

  "Do what you believe you are supposed to do even if you have to "do it afraid"."
"We may not know what to do in a tense situation, but God does. He is never surprised by anything. He knows everything before it happens and He has already planned our deliverance, so all we need to do is keep going forward. We simply need to take one step at a time and not worry about the next one because God will be there to guide us in the next step when the time comes."
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  "I am going to live to please God, not people. I want to be accepted but I will not compromise my faith and moral integrity."
First of all, sorry for the long summary—but I'm also writing this review for myself, in case I need to refresh my memory about the details of this book. There are still 6 more power thoughts that I didn't mention in this book, which are not less important than the ones that I mentioned here. If you want to know more, of course I would suggest you to read this book yourself. I believe everyone can at least gain a thing or two from this book; because having negative thoughts is what everyone in this world has to go through every single day. Even though it will be a long journey to fix our thoughts, I think it is something worth doing. Because when our thoughts are renewed, our attitudes will be affected as well.

I've always loved Joyce Meyer's writing since I read her book The Battlefield of the Mind (which correlates with this book). She uses a lot of examples that are easy to understand and is very relatable. There are times when she repeated things over and over, but I do believe it is necessary to set a certain idea/teaching in the readers' minds. Overall, this book really encouraged me to change for the better by controlling our thoughts instead of being controlled by them. I've now written down all 12 power thoughts on my phone and decided to meditate on them every day. Failure is inevitable, but I want to be disciplined and keep making progress towards a better mind and attitude.

↓↓↓↓↓↓↓"We are not bad people because bad thoughts come to us but if we don't resist them, we can become whatever we choose to focus our thoughts on..... Seek meas "make an attempt". We also have to seek to think right thoughts. It takes discipline and training, but we can do it.""You have to be relentless about thinking right thoughts. You need to think on purpose; you need to discipline your mind; and you need to make sure your thoughts agree with God's Word in every area of your life."

Read the full review here:
http://www.thebookielooker.com/2016/0...

Power Thoughts 12 Strategies to Win the Battle of the Mind

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