Training Your Brain To Take Thoughts Captive

In this episode of the Faith Filled Therapy podcast, Jo Hargreaves explores the intersection of neuroscience and scripture, focusing on the concept of taking thoughts captive as outlined in 2 Corinthians 10:5. 

 Jo delves into the workings of the brain, including the default mode network and the reticular activating system, and offers practical strategies for managing thoughts and emotions. The episode emphasises the importance of active engagement in our mental health and the power of reframing thoughts to align with God's truth. 

keywords
faith, therapy, mental health, neuroscience, scripture, thoughts, mindfulness, emotional regulation, neuroplasticity, personal growth

takeaways

• Taking thoughts captive is a powerful scriptural principle that requires active engagement.
• The brain's default mode network can lead to rumination and negative thinking if left unchecked.
• Neuroplasticity allows us to rewire our brains through intentional thought management.
• Reframing thoughts is essential for emotional regulation and mental health.
• The reticular activating system filters our perceptions based on what we focus on.
• Confirmation bias can shape our experiences and beliefs about the world.
• Practical strategies for thought management include noticing, naming, and reframing thoughts.
• We have been given the mind of Christ, empowering us to take control of our thoughts.

Chapters

00:00
Introduction and Personal Reflections

03:02
The Cyclical Nature of Life

05:52
Taking Thoughts Captive: A Scriptural Approach

11:58
Understanding the Default Mode Network

18:04
Reframing Thoughts and Neuroplasticity

23:47
The Reticular Activating System and Confirmation Bias

29:48
Practical Strategies for Thought Management

35:53
Conclusion and Resources

00:00 Introduction and Personal Reflections
03:02 The Cyclical Nature of Life
05:52 Taking Thoughts Captive: A Scriptural Approach
11:58 Understanding the Default Mode Network
18:04 Reframing Thoughts and Neuroplasticity
23:47 The Reticular Activating System and Confirmation Bias
29:48 Practical Strategies for Thought Management
35:53 Conclusion and Resources

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Transcript

Jo Hargreaves (00:01)
Hello, welcome to this episode of the Faith Filled Therapy podcast. I can't remember what episode we're on and there's definitely been too long of a hiatus between this and my last podcast. I have been busy doing lots of podcasts with other people that have neglected to do my own. And I'm just not very good at doing things regularly. Some people, see some people who podcast, who do newsletters, they're just brilliant at.

doing it weekly at the same time every week they have some level of continuation strategy I just don't so thank you if you're listening to this and you will stick with me I could always I'll always offer great content I feel really comfortable and confident that I can give great content what I don't give is regularity or continuation

or showing up doing the same thing every week. But hey, I recently did a...

Yeah, I recently did a webinar on this on seasons, cycles, states. So seasons of life, hormonal cycles, states in terms of nervous system state. And I just honestly think as a woman, it is harder to do the same thing at the same time every week because we're such cyclical beings. ⁓ If you are a woman and you manage to do that, well done. A huge high five to you. I just cannot quite seem to do it.

Also, I find myself in the stage of having a preschooler and a preteen and one in between, which we call our adventure story in the middle. We try not to perpetuate that middle child narrative. ⁓ I just hear some of that in the therapy room of I was a middle child. So I'm like, right, okay, we're going to reframe this as he is our adventure story in the middle. And I just feel very stretched across my seasons, but anyway, tell you what, enough of that.

Let's get into it. Usually I start by telling you if you're new here, ⁓ you won't know this, but if you've been listening and bearing with me on the very sporadic journey of podcasting, you will know that I very often have my diffuser. I have a disco ball diffuser ⁓ and I have an oil blend that's in there. I haven't done that today. I haven't been organized enough to do that. In fact, I'm still in my dressing gown.

having got the kids to the various places, sorted out the car which is broken down, hung out the washing, you know all the normal stuff. And actually maybe you like to hear this, maybe it makes you feel slightly better if your life is erring at all on the side of chaotic or you can't quite get your ducks in a row please feel better about yourself because yeah I am here in my dressing gown. Anyway I quite like to hear about people's lives, the inner world of people's lives.

makes me feel better about myself, it makes me feel okay about being human. Maybe it's not your thing. If this is boring for you, don't worry. ⁓ I don't edit these podcasts, by the way, ⁓ because I don't have the time or inclination to do it. So you kind of just get what I throw out there. So let's move into it. Talking about Disco Diffuser, I haven't sorted it out. If I was blending anything today, it's a spring day, the sun is shining.

I'd probably go for something citrusy, but I do like ⁓ maybe something a bit with a bit of depth to back it up. So I'd probably go for frankincense and lemon. That's probably what I'd be diffusing today. I love oils and absolutely no advert whatsoever, but I love oils. Maybe we could do a whole podcast on this, but if you use oils, I don't really like having chemicals in my house.

and a lot of candles are full of toxins and chemicals, which goes straight to your brain. Oils, pure essential oils, bypass ⁓ some of our brain's conscious thinking mechanisms that get straight to our limbic system, straight to where we process emotions and memory. And so they are really are incredibly powerful tools. Anyway, by the by. Today, I thought I'd do the podcast that I've been promising.

for a while that I was going to do and it's about taking every thought captive. 2 Corinthians 10.5, love that scripture about taking our thoughts captive, making them obedient to Jesus. Beautiful scripture, powerful scripture, amazing intersection of science submitting to scripture on this one and that's where I love to hang out at the intersection of neuroscience submitting to scripture, submitting to God's word, what God's told us all along.

But often, I don't know if you're anything like me, often I'm like, take your thoughts captive, make them obedient to Jesus. Yes, brilliant, absolutely. How do I do that? When I do that, what happens? How can I teach myself to do it? Is there a strategy? Is there something that I can do to help take this God-breathed, Spirit-infused truth and implement it into my everyday, ordinary...

mundane, miraculous life. So let's take a little dive into that. So we're going to look at how we can look at that scripture and still honor our humanity and our hope. How can we engage the brain's natural pathways for healing of which it is full of? Psalm 139, we are fearfully and wonderfully made, knitted together. There are things knitted into our natural pathways for healing.

⁓ And how can we ultimately align our thought life with God's truth and presence? mean, the irony is here as I'm recording a podcast, I'm thinking, right, I better put my phone on airplane mode so nobody can interrupt this podcast by phoning me. ⁓

But then I was thinking, well, if I do that, what if something bad's really happened? What if something happens to my daughter at preschool? What if my son really needs me or what if the school of my adventure story in the middle boy needs me and start then catastrophizing? I'm like, oh, the irony, because actually I don't know about you, but my brain just seems to come up with my leaning towards my default mode network and we'll unpack this a bit, is often towards catastrophizing. I can...

give myself a whole load of therapy about why that was, why that is, why my brain's been wired that way and I understand. But also sometimes without kind of doing the therapy thing, we just recognize how our brain works. Some of us do have a slight predisposition towards overthinking, towards worst case scenario thinking, all that kind of thing. But as I always say, my favorite quote, and it's my quote.

As far as I know, unless I've subconsciously stolen it from somewhere else, but our predisposition is not our predestination. You might have a predisposition to worst case scenario thinking. And it very likely makes so much sense why you do that. Often it was an adaptive strategy, getting a bit therapisty here, an adaptive strategy that you had to come up with usually in childhood that as an adult has become a maladaptive strategy. maybe you do have a predisposition.

maybe even some of that has been passed down to you in your nurture, but also in your nature. Stuff does get passed down from generation to generation epigenetically. And ⁓ I always begin to mention this a little bit on my podcast and go, we'll unpack that another time. That's for another podcast, but it is for another podcast. ⁓ But anyway, let's get back into the scripture to Corinthians 10.5. I would recommend that you have a read of it.

by yourself, you might want to read it in a different paraphrase. I really, really like the message paraphrase of this. I'm kind of, I'm filling guys because I'm actually going to find the message paraphrase of it on my Bible app. I love the YouVersion Bible app. It's the first app I have on my phone. So I've just downloaded the dwell one. don't know, tell me about, maybe tell me.

Send me a message if you use that. I've also, I mean, I've worked for Glorify before, love their stuff, the Glorify app, if anybody's tried that out before. There's lots of great ones, isn't there? And of course the Lectio 365, which is one of my favorites as well. Okay, 2 Corinthians 10. Let's have a look at it in the message paraphrase. It says this, the world is unprincipled. It's dog eat dog out there.

The world doesn't fight fair, but we don't live or fight our battles that way. We never have and we never will. The tools of our trade aren't for marketing or manipulation, but they are for demolishing that entire massively corrupt culture. And who knows that often that corrupt culture isn't just outside, it's in us. It's in our thinking, it's in our wiring. This is why thank you Jesus that you've made us neuroplastic, that we do not have to remain the way

that we've always been. We're only one good thought away from a whole better network in our brain that can create better thoughts. I think, I don't know if I've said that very well, essentially your brain, you're not stuck. You can do exactly what Romans 12.2 says. You can be transformed by the renewing of your mind because you have a neuroplastic brain, which means it's able to rewire.

reorganize itself, not just in the micro, but in the macro as well, which is wild. And the best way to do that is through the power of your thoughts. So the tools of our trade aren't for marketing or manipulation, they're for demolishing this entire massively corrupt culture. We use our powerful God tools for smashing warped philosophies, tearing down barriers erected against the truth of God, fitting every loose thought and emotion and impulse

into the structure of life shaped by Christ. I'm gonna read that again. It's absolutely beautiful. We fit every loose thought and emotion and impulse into the structure of life shaped by Christ. Our tools are ready at hand for clearing the ground of every obstruction and building lives of obedience and maturity.

Wow, I would just love somebody to follow me around going, just reciting that verse to me, going, Joe, don't worry, you have these tools. You're able to fit all of these emotions, all of these thoughts. You're able to bring them all and bring them unto Jesus. The NIV says, the weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 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. Wow, I love this. I'm gonna tell you, teach you, maybe you know already, so I'll just remind you of how we're able to do this. Just interestingly, bit of theology here. The Greek for take captive here implies forcefully capturing it with intention. It is active. We cannot be passive about this. If you're passive, and believe me, I am talking to myself as much as anyone else.

I'm talking to myself more than anyone else. If I am passive about my thought life, I will not step into everything God has for me. I will not renew my mind. I will not take my thoughts captive. There's a spiritual principle there, but there's also just a wiring principle because of my default mode network. And I'm going to come onto that in a minute. But the Greek is about taking captive, forcefully capturing. Imagine you're taking a thought by the scruff of the neck and saying, why are you here? You don't belong here.

What's your agenda? So it's active, it's not passive, but it also means that we have agency in our thought life, which some people say, ⁓ so you're saying that my mental health is my fault. No, I am saying that you are able to take your thoughts captive, to renew your mind, to be active. You're not a passive victim. You are an active player in the role of your mental health. ⁓ Isn't that brilliant?

So most of our thoughts, default mode network, let's talk about this. Most of our thoughts run subconsciously on autopilot. Most people, I would say, live their entire life on autopilot. Not going to war with their thoughts, not taking their thoughts captive, not wanting to level up. And instead of thinking basic human stuff, just allow ourselves to level up into flip-ins for averse thinking.

anything true, noble, excellent, praiseworthy. It's not in that order, but have a read of Philippians four verse eight. It's brilliant. And we have around 60,000 plus thoughts every day. I'm pretty sure I have way more than that. Maybe you think so too. ⁓ But we only become aware of the fraction of our thoughts really. ⁓ So let me tell you about the default mode network. Your default mode network is a set of brain regions and that becomes active during rest.

self-referential thinking, daydreaming, memory. It's basically when your TV's on standby. It's when your brain is on standby, you're daydreaming, you're of just, you're going about your everyday ordinary life, you're driving to work, sweeping the floor, doing your paperwork, whatever it might be. And when this default mode network is unregulated, so when we don't...

tune into it when we don't take our thoughts captive, when we're not being active participants in our own thought life, our unregulated DMN, so default mode network, defaults to rumination. And I often say our brains were not wired to ruminate, they were wired to meditate. Your brain is not designed or it will not work efficiently when you are ruminating on your own stuff.

When you meditate on the word of God, Psalm 1. In fact, again, this is a whole different podcast, all about the power of meditation. When you meditate on the law of God, the law of the Lord, the word of God, when you meditate on those things, Psalm 1, Philippians 4 verse 8, true noble, excellent, praiseworthy things, you interrupt your default mode network. Your brain is wired for meditation.

not new age meditation, empty your mind. What's the point of emptying your mind? You cannot trust your brain to empty your mind. It's not a good idea to empty your mind. Your brain is not designed to be empty. It's designed to be filled. It's a vessel. You are a vessel. You are a temple. You are a vessel. Your brain is a vessel. I felt a real surge of like passion then. Preacher passion. If I was preaching, I'd have got a...

a ⁓ handkerchief out my pocket at that point and dabbed my forehead. I felt really passionate about that. We're not designed to empty our minds. Become at one with the universe, empty your minds. Rubbish! That is no good for you. What is good for you is filling your mind with the word of God because you interrupt the default mode network. You actually, the more you meditate, the thicker your prefrontal cortex becomes.

prefrontal cortex is a part of your brain. I think it's the part where wisdom lives basically. It's where you make all your best decisions. That when you ask God for wisdom, ⁓ I just wonder now. I've gone off track but when you ask God for wisdom, scripture tells us if you want wisdom ask God for it basically, pray for it. Or the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. I wonder, I'd love to see.

I need to get my friend. did a, I told you, I I'm not linear, but I can offer you good content. did a podcast with who is becoming fast, becoming a great friend of mine, Dr. Lee Warren, an actual brain surgeon, go and have a look at his stuff. And if you go onto my sub stack, I've linked our podcast that we did together. And he talks about, he literally is a brain surgeon. So talks about being able to see what happens in a brain. I'm going to ask him.

I wonder if the more we ask and pray for wisdom, can we see on a scan on spec, is it spec? I think it's spec, that type of brain scanning. Can we actually begin to see a thickening or even a repairing of the prefrontal cortex? Anyway, but meditating on the word of God. Now, emptying your mind, I'm not saying that focus mindfulness, again, that's another word that's been kind of twisted, co-opted, ⁓ perverted.

but this mindfulness, God's mindful of us. Who am I that you are mindful of me? I'm not saying that that's not important, but this idea of emptying to become nothing and empty ourselves in our, our, just not sure. Anyway, I think we're designed to be filled. Anyway, when unregulated, this default mode network, goes to rumination, it goes to comparison.

That is literally the default of your brain, unless you're going to take the time and the effort. And again, I'm speaking to myself, unless you're going to allow all of this neuroscience to submit to scripture and, ⁓ and change it. So it defaults to rumination, comparison, anxiety. That's why when we engage the brain in active gratitude, we reduce anxiety. Philippians four verse six, don't be anxious about anything instead through prayer supplication.

Thanksgiving. Essentially, accept by interrupting the default mode network. Obviously that's Philippians 4 doesn't say that but that's what you're doing through prayer, supplication, thanksgiving. You're interrupting the default mode network and then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus. These aren't just spiritual principles so next time you find yourself ruminating

comparison, comparing in an anxious what if loop like I was, what if I turn off my phone and what if, what if, what if, what if. I have the agency not to allow that thought to pervade, to grow stronger. I can interrupt it, take it captive and say, I am going to think a different thought. I am going to interrupt my default mode network. I am going to do what Philippians four verse six instructs me to do and

lean into prayer supplication and thanksgiving. In fact, I'm going to actually be really, really grateful in this anxious moment. And it isn't me gaslighting myself saying, okay, I'm not anxious. doesn't matter. Actually, I'm really grateful. No, it's saying I am feeling and experiencing anxiety right now. So I am going to interrupt that what if loop with gratitude and thanksgiving.

When we consciously notice and redirect our thoughts, the DMN then helps us process emotions. It can help us integrate past experiences. How wild is that? That's trauma-informed theology. Trauma-informed theology is God's idea. To be trauma-informed, this isn't some new idea. God, good theology is trauma-informed. So when we consciously notice and redirect, when we do two Corinthians 10, five.

Our brain processes emotions, specifically the default mode network integrates our past experiences and helps us reflect and renew. So just think, if you want a reflection prompt here, just begin to ask yourself, what are the loops that you get stuck in? What's the soundtrack in your head today? You might want to get more physical and somatic about it because we're bodies. We are having an embodied experience. One Thessalonians 5.23 tells us,

that God is making us holy and whole in our spirit, soul and body. So you might want to ask yourself, where do I feel tension in my body? What thought might be behind that? Another question I love to ask myself, what am I scanning the world for? And I split it into this and I should write about this because maybe this might be helpful. Am I busy scanning the world for danger or for grace?

Often I'm so busy scanning the world for danger. And I know why. I know my predisposition. I know my nature. I know my nurture, but I have a choice. And then we get into this confirmation bias, which will, then I can tell you about the reticular activating system, the RAS. One of my favorite parts of the brain. Essentially I was learning, actually, I have another podcast to share with you that I did with my friend.

Perianne Brownback. She's taught me a lot about the RAS, the reticular activating system, which basically works as a filter for your brain in the same ways that the kidneys work for a filter for your body. So I'm going to share that podcast with you soon. She is one of the most brilliant minds I've ever met and she does a lot of work on the left and the right hemisphere of the brain and how we can have a whole brained faith. But that's just to whet your appetite.

a little bit, but there's some good reflection questions there. And like I said, I asked myself, what am I scanning for? Some of us have become hypervigilant because we had to. Maybe you had to in childhood. Maybe you had to because of a situation. Some of us have become hypervigilant. Our amygdala is the fear centers of our brain are so finely, highly tuned for looking for danger. But you know what, again, meditation, particularly out meditation on God's.

word meditation on the truth of God, it soothes the amygdala, it helps soothe the fear response of the brain so then we don't have to live out of a maladaptive practice of always scanning for danger. And again there's loads of grace there because often our practices that have become maladaptive were once very adaptive for us. Maybe you used to, maybe as a child you had to be able to scan.

everybody's feelings, emotions, because your safety emotionally, physically depended on it. But maybe you don't need to do that now. And maybe you able to scan the world for grace. I'm going to do an Instagram post about that today, I think. ⁓ But yeah, let's talk about, so we've talked about the default mode network and we've talked a little bit about the reticular activating system. It's the brainstem network. So it's right at the back at your brainstem and it acts like a filter. Like I said, my

Brilliant friend, Perianne, likens it to the kidneys that filters out toxins for the body. This can filter out toxins for your brain. ⁓ And toxins being toxic negative thoughts. It decides what sensory input is important enough for your conscious mind to notice. And it's focused by, sorry, it's trained. You wire it and train it by focus and repetition. Here is why the constant reading

of God's meditating on the law of the Lord day and night. If you focus on scarcity, your reticular activating system will filter and always look for evidence of lack. If you focus on God's provision, on the contrary of this, your RAS, your reticular activating system will filter for grace, for opportunity, for peace. It's the reason that you might notice...

I don't know I remember when I was pregnant I felt like everyone was pregnant I remember trying for a baby and not being pregnant and feeling like everybody was pregnant or you might have your own example for that and so I've recently cut my hair I mean this is such a such an insignificant example but I've recently chopped my hair cut my hair and I had to do some work to do that interestingly because at some point I digested that I should have long hair that I look I was better with long hair

And actually there's something quite freeing about going, that's a belief that doesn't even belong to me. I think I've inherited that from someone else. I digested it somewhere else and it's given me indigestion. So I'm going to chop my hair. But anyway, suddenly I'm noticing, my gosh, everyone's chopping their hair. ⁓ there's lobs everywhere. Long bobs for those of you that are not in the know. ⁓ You might buy a certain car and then realize that everybody's got that car, whatever it might be.

But what we focus on, see, which is confirmation bias, it? That's confirmation bias hangs out or what comes out of this reticular activating system. And if I'm preaching, I often use this example. I've not, I don't know if I've used it on a podcast before, but take yourself into numbers 13 and you get 12 people going into the promised land. They all have the same experience. They all see the same thing. They all smell the same smells. They all taste the same tastes.

They even see the same fruit and bring it back. 10 of them say we cannot inherit the promised land. That's something to do with their reticular activating system and their confirmation bias. They've already told themselves that they can't do it. Two of them have a completely different view. Joshua and Caleb are like, yeah, we can do it. We can inherit the promised land.

That's something to do with the reticular activating system. They've already decided that they believe what Moses has said, we're getting a bit theological here, but they've already decided that they believe what Moses has said, but when Moses says, go into the land that God has promised us. So their reticular activating system is great, God's promised us this land. Of course we can do it, surely we can do it. And then everything that they see, everything that they experience is being filtered through that reticular activating system.

what you think about really, really, really matters. What I think about really matters. Note to self, Jo. Yeah, so ⁓ let's talk about how we actually do it then. This is the longest podcast I've done. Am I being really, really chatty today? Usually I'll just nail it in 20 minutes, but here we go. Let's just talk about this idea of noticing, naming it and reframing it. This is how I...

like to do it. I began to notice what I do when I'm ruminating, when I've got into my head, when I'm not taking my thoughts captive and I'm just indulging myself in all of my thoughts about how my life is difficult, how nobody will come to help me. you know, all of these things that kind of activate my default mode network, yours might be different, but some things that I get stuck in is worst case scenario thinking and also feeling like the whole entire world depends on me.

And ⁓ again, I understand why I think that way. You might not be wired like that. You might have a whole different ⁓ script that you rehearse, but mine is very much like, there's nobody to help me. I'm all on my own. ⁓ And if I don't, I get myself in such an awful mood if I don't interrupt that. And my family all know about it. ⁓ I've been, actually, I've kind of been there over recent.

weeks and ⁓ everybody in my household's been worse off for it because I haven't taken my thoughts captive. But I'm going to extend myself grace and lean into God's truth so we name it. ⁓ I found out, I thought, notice name reframe was something I'd come up with but apparently Dan Seagal, the guy who comes has come up with a window of tolerance theory, ⁓ has coined the phrase name it to tame it which I like.

But when you name a thought, when you realise, ⁓ I'm going to name that. So actually, sorry, the first step is noticing. So you just begin to tune in. For me, I notice because ⁓ I'm irritable. I start telling myself stories. I feel stressed. Sometimes I get a headache. It can show up in indigestion in my body. So I've just learned to tune in and notice for you. It might be something completely different. The other thing I notice is I rush.

I feel like everything's a rush. Even if I'm not in a rush, I feel like I'm having to rush. And ⁓ so that's how I begin to notice. Once I've noticed it, I name it. When we name things out, not only do we reduce activity in the amygdala, is our emotional reactivity, but we increase activity in the prefrontal cortex, logical wisdom and thinking. Logic, sorry, logic, wisdom and thinking. Also, like I said, we interrupt the default mode network and all of its loop.

loops and we get into a place of awareness. We begin to activate to Corinthians 10.5, take our thoughts captive, how can we do that? We need to notice them and we need to name them and then we need to do the powerful work of reframing them. So in the naming phase, you could use the Brené Brown language. The story I'm telling myself is, I keep thinking that.

a part of me believes and whatever it might be. But here comes the brilliant, therapeutic, trauma-informed, theological, God-breathed truth. We then begin to reframe it. We read it, don't we? Romans 12 to be transformed by the renewing of your mind. I've talked about that. Colossians 3 to set your mind on things above, not on earthly things. Philippians 4, 8 talked about it. Whatever's true, noble, excellent, praiseworthy. Think on these things. And reframing isn't just wishful thinking. It is a perspective shift.

It's doing that work of grabbing our thoughts and saying, I am not going to let you passively program my reticular activating system. I'm actually going to lean into the truth that I'm neuroplastic and I'm going to reframe this. It's a faithful perspective shift. holds truth and it holds space, sorry, for truth and pain and promise. It's not, it's not saying what you're feeling isn't right or isn't valid. It's reframing it.

⁓ And let's just finish by talking about the actual neuroscience of reframing. Again, it's the ⁓ neuroscience submitting itself to scripture. Every time you think a new thought, you strengthen a neural pathway. Every time you refuse to align yourself. And really, honestly, I keep saying this, but I am preaching to myself. I can see why I've ended up in such a...

funk for want of a better phrase. That made me sound very old then I think. But I know why really stuck because actually not actively been doing this stuff. Because reframing creates alternate neural roads, it's neuroplasticity. Not only are we strengthening new neural pathways, but just by the very nature of that, the old ways of thinking get weaker. Arras! Such a cool isn't it?

reticular activating system, the RAS, starts to, I feel like there's a t-shirt in there, like, ⁓ kiss my RAS. Should I have said that? Hey, I'm 32 minutes into this now, so I can't stop the whole podcast ⁓ because I said kiss my RAS, but I actually think that's, I'd wear that t-shirt anyway. RAS starts to filter information that aligns with the new belief. Instead of reinforcing an old bias, the reticular activating system starts to find evidence.

So I just want to give some context for 2 Corinthians 10.5. It's not a spiritual principle that we can't grab hold of. It's not something that just kind of happens by default because we love Jesus. We have to get to work, roll up our sleeves and like the Greek says, we need, was it Greek? I think I said it was the Greek. We need to actively roll up our sleeves and go to work with taking our thoughts captive.

When we reframe as well, we deactivate the threat response.

and that fosters all our emotional regulation. I just think it's amazing. Honestly, I'm just kind of like pausing, stuttering, because it just always brings me to a place of worship. It really, really does. ⁓ So anyway, let me give you a closing encouragement. My closing encouragement is this. To me, to you, to anybody that's...

can feel dysregulated, overwhelmed, get stuck in their head. You're not at the mercy of your mind. You have been given authority over it. In fact, scripture goes as far as to say as we have been given the mind of Christ. God has already given you the mind of Christ. 1 Corinthians 2.16. The power of the spirit, a renewed nature that is being transformed, a neuroplastic mind, sorry, a neuroplastic brain.

You've been given the gift of metacognition, which is the ability to stand outside of yourself and witness your own thoughts and decide to choose better ones. God has given you so many wonderful ways to manage your mind. Let me read this scripture for a final time, 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 and make it obedient to Jesus.

We notice, we name, we reframe, we engage the RAS, the DMN, the default mode network. You've literally been wired for this stuff. So God, I wanna thank you that you have made us so incredibly, fearfully and wonderfully. I praise you because we are fearfully and wonderfully made. And I pray for myself and for anybody else listening that needs to...

Lean into this truth deeper to bring freedom to old ways of thinking, old mindsets. Would you help us by the power of your spirit, by the power of your word? Thank you that you've given us the ability to do this, not just in a spiritual sense, but physically in our actual God given bodies. We thank you and we praise you. Amen. So if you want to go any deeper.

If you want more, you can come along ⁓ to a webinar of mine. ⁓ I'm not sure what the next webinar is. You can listen, but you can find out. You can listen to my podcast with Dr. Lee Warren. That's going to be on my sub stack. ⁓ You can join the Faithfield Collective if you want to be part of the monthly ⁓ subscription that I run. That is 22 pounds a month. I'm not sure what that works out in dollars.

or any other currency actually, but it's not loads. And you get ⁓ lots of information sent to you. You get a, what do you get? Tell me, help me, remind me, what do you get? ⁓ You get a webinar. So you get a free space on my webinar every single month. And you also get a connection call every month. And if you're not able to make that free, ⁓ if you're not able to make that, if you're not free.

you get all the recordings sent to you. If that's not really your bag or it's a bit too much for five pounds a month, you can join the Faithfield downloads where I will send you some of the content that I send out to the Faithfield Collective. So twice a month, I'll send you some content with some reflection questions, journal starters, ⁓ and it cites all of my research as well. So if you're thinking, this all sounds good, but maybe she's just found it all on TikTok. Let me tell you that there's lots of

brilliant research that I can point you in the direction of. So anyway, God bless you. hope it's helpful. I hope it can help enhance your everyday, ordinary, miraculous and mundane life. Bless you and speak to you.