What's On Your Mind? - book review - “Winning the War in Your Mind” by Craig Groeschel
“God didn’t give us a spirit that is timid but one that is powerful, loving, and self-controlled.” 2 Timothy 1:7
One of my favorite authors that I’ve discovered within the last 3 years is Craig Groeschel.
Prior to being introduced to his work by my pastor at my current church, I never heard his name before. What began as a brief attempt to topically join my congregation in reading one of his older books, Soul Detox, turned into a follow on Instagram to his personal page after connecting to his very approachable and casual tone; I wanted to hear from him more regularly. Right as I began to follow him somewhere around 2020, he was sharing brief quotes and concepts from his most recent upcoming publication, Winning the War in Your Mind, that would be released the following year. I didn’t know this at the time, but in concert with everything that I mentioned so far about his talent as a writer, I connected to his ability to convey just how scary it can be to be trapped in our own minds and how this experience can be connected to God’s Word, despite popular belief.
Although I wasn’t aware of what a treat it would be to read his book in the near future, I did, however, find myself refreshed by his content that came across my newsfeed every day. I found myself saving the quotes and the verses that tied to the purpose of this book whenever I saw them. I will note that this was great marketing on his team’s part, but moreover, I felt the connection to the anointing that this book had to help people literally win the wars going on inside of their minds.
Picture directly sourced from craiggroeschel.com https://www.craiggroeschel.com/books/winning-the-war-in-your-mind
Just like the anchor verse for this article is repeated over and over again – to the point, in my opinion, that it runs the risk of losing its flavor and we overlook the strength of its taste because of our “familiarity”, the same principle is applied when we wager whether the Word can truly assist us in combating wars in our minds.
I’ve felt that we acknowledge God and His power as the source of all strength, but we often separate the strength of His Word that is applicable and traceable, even down to the most human experience such as mental trouble.
Coming upon Groeschel’s book was a true blessing for me during 2020. In conjunction with so many personal issues, a worldwide pandemic, and so much more, I found myself feeling isolated and alone, not just in presence, but in my thoughts. Isn’t it funny how we often get trapped by some thoughts that were first conceived long ago? The thoughts that I was personally combatting did not arrive with the onset of the coronavirus. I fought this war for a long a time, and the anxiety of walking back onto the battlefield each day was exhausting and frightening, to say the least, and in all honesty. So when I began to see content related to this very experience popping up in my newsfeed, I knew for a fact that I would be ordering this book.
And to my pleasure, I was sold nothing short of a blessing. Let’s take a look at some of my favorite portions of this book below.
What’s on your mind?
Right at the beginning, Groeschel hits the ground running with the opening line in bold, “our lives are always moving in the direction of our strongest thoughts. What we think shapes who we are” (pg. 7). The statement he puts forth is absolutely powerful. How many times have we thought about something that ends up manifesting (that’s a scary thought depending on what you’re thinking, huh)? Like it literally shows up in our lives. How often have we experienced a thought that continues to manifest, but there seems like no way to stop it? Then he hits us with this line –
“You can allow God to renew your mind by saturating your mind with his unchanging truth. You can let his thoughts become your thoughts.”
Boom. I immediately identified with the word, saturate, because I know what it feels like to be berated with the ungodly thoughts – thoughts steeped in illegitimacy, fear, regret, and even envy just for starters. Those sorts of thoughts seem to occur at the most inconvenient times, and when I say this, I mean at the times where our guard could be down. For me personally, that is early in the morning when I first wake up. And if I don’t get a handle on what I’m thinking at the beginning of the day, I run the risk of repeating this pattern all day long, completely offsetting any progress, purposefulness, or praise.
As Groeschel uses the word, saturate, I began to wonder what it would be like if the majority of my thoughts included God specifically? What did He actually have to say about what I think? Was I going to allow myself to be brave enough to seek those thoughts out? How could I get myself in a place where I could literally be dripping, just like a wet towel, with God’s thoughts rather than falling victim to a spray of bullets from the enemy? How would my life change? Would my reality be different? Could He make the difference?
What I say, What God says
So, as I stated before, I will just briefly be going over the parts that I’ve taken away for myself. But if I haven’t been clear enough in paragraphs prior –
THIS IS A GREAT BOOK – HIGHLY RECOMMEND.
Okay, carrying on. So, I often struggle in the morning with my thoughts, and for a while, I hadn’t been able to connect how to incorporate God’s thoughts into that experience. A few weeks before I released this platform, the Holy Spirit put it on my mind to start capturing what it was that I was thinking, verbatim, in one of my notebooks. Then He led me to find a verse that directly corresponded to the seed of the thought… that is, fear, anger, distrust, or whatever it may be. Then, once I saw what God says about it, I would write a declaration for how I will move forward, especially in the case when a negative thought tries to bombard me. I can just repeat the declaration I’ve made through God to myself.
Groeschel encourages us to do the same thing using The Replacement Principle which is introduced in part 1 on page 54. This was a wonderful confirmation, that the truth Groeschel has been supporting - God has a place in the shaping of our thoughts - is actually the truth.
Here’s an example directly from the book (pg. 54):
Lie: “I’m a victim; nothing good ever happens to me.”
Truth: “If God is for us, who can be against us?... In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (Rom. 8:31, 37).
Declaration: “God tells me that I am not a victim but a victor in Christ. I am an overcomer, and ‘I can do all this through him who gives me strength’” (Phil. 4:13).
Pictures above directly sourced from https://www.instagram.com/craiggroeschel/?hl=en
Isn’t this so powerful? I think the part about experiencing negative thoughts that is ultimately discouraging and often defeating is feeling like we are powerless to confront them. So when they come, all we feel like we can do is take the beating and weakly move on from there. But what this exercise does is, it allows us to capture the thought, confront it, and make the next move by directing our attention to the truth (just like 2 Corinthians 10:5 says).
I know that when I first tried this out, it seemed small and foreign. But there’s something about repetition. There’s something about exposing your heart to God, even the negative things. There’s something about allowing Him to change your mind. And there’s definitely something about manifesting what you say when what you say is based on His Word.
Just What I Thought
As if this book hasn’t done enough, I have to mention one other feature that I was sold on. The book makes reference to the psychology behind our thinking and gives clarity to how our brains are involved in our processing. For some, this is an area of great discomfort because of the objectivity and stigma attached to anything psychological. But for myself, I can appreciate references to this school of thought possibly due to my educational background, but mostly because I am open to acknowledging my biology as some of the basis of my experiences. I think that this is healthy and helpful, to include all of our being – our bodies, our emotions, and our minds – to be reviewed by God’s resources here on Earth. He made them after all.
But on another serious note, I definitely respect and am excited for some of the doors that may be opened when we can become additionally spiritually fortified by acknowledging where our mental health meets our thought life. Groeschel does not step out of bounds in this regard, but makes reference to individuals in the field of neuroscience and psychology to help articulate his revelations in the spiritual space.
One specific example from the book that I appreciated was Groeschel’s conversation around our cognitive biases. What’s a cognitive bias you ask? Simply put, it is a distorted lens. Directly from the book, “The term refers to a standardized, consistent pattern of deviating from the reality in how we see and process things. If you have a cognitive bias, you create a subjective reality. The construction of your reality, not actual reality, will dictate how you respond and behave in the world” (Wilke and Mata, 2012).
I specifically appreciated this piece because I believe our cognitive biases also heavily influence our experiences, and even more so, our walks as believers.
Let me give you a few examples of a few ways these biases may affect our day-to-day lives:
1. A pair of college students receive constructive feedback from their instructor. One student is happy to have clarity on how to fix their final presentation, while the other student reports the instructor to the department because they don’t feel that they’ve been treated fairly. One student’s bias allows them to improve, while they other’s keeps them from excelling.
2. Two young men have a discussion about women. One believes that women should be treated with the utmost respect, regardless of what his past experiences have yielded. The other gentleman mentions that all women are the same, and they should be treated that way, accordingly. In this regard, one person comes into situations and relationships with a clear state of mind while the other person makes preconceived judgements that hurt them, as well as the people he chooses to connect with.
3. A set of best friends are sharing their plans for business ventures. One friend is excited for the challenge, although she doesn’t have all the resources to start. The other friend has angel investors but is apprehensive because of the rate of failed launches in his area of interest. There are two differing perspectives for success of new ventures and opportunities. The individual biases influence the potential of overcoming.
Groeschel shares his own cognitive bias of trying to control his circumstances and later admits that this is an illusion. He asserts, while we can’t control any outcome, we can control how we perceive it. This is the Reframing Principle in action – when we take control of how we perceive things. By using reframing we, can decide to not hang on to our old ways of thinking that have ultimately held us back. We can identify them, and let them go!
In this section, Groeschel shares steps used in psychotherapy for reframing thoughts. They are:
1. Stay calm.
2. Identify the situation.
3. Identify your automatic thoughts.
4. Find subjective supportive evidence.
Pictures above directly sourced from https://www.instagram.com/craiggroeschel/?hl=en
Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord.
I felt that this portion was completely necessary for our deliverance from negative thinking and even for our development as fellow people for others. I had to dig deep in this section and spend time considering how I have yielded to my own cognitive biases, specifically from very painful and disheartening experiences that have robbed me from moving forward in some regard. Our cognitive biases tell us that we have to do things a certain way because they’ve always been done that way. They may tell us not to take a chance because we’ve seen everyone else around us fail or struggle. They may even tell us that we are alone and without help if we’ve spent a significant time on our own.
But I am so happy that this section takes the time to expose some of the areas that can be changed. If we really sit on it, these same instances can hinder the way we see God and our relationship with Him. I think the concept is incredible, because we may finally have a tangible reason as to why we can’t always believe in where God wants to take us because of where we’ve been.
A Winning Thought
Okay, so as much as I’d love to go on and on about this book, I must stop myself and spare you some of the magic I felt being uninterrupted and devoid of spoilers. But a few concluding points: I believe we can almost all agree that one of the most personal spaces, if not the most personal and private, is in our minds. This is why when we find someone else there, someone foreign and dangerous, we can feel the most infiltrated, exposed, and vulnerable. I’ve been there. I can recall a time not too long ago when I felt dis-ease in my own thoughts. I didn’t feel safe because of the lies that I would allow to be replayed over and over again – about my past, my future, my identity, and the purpose in my life that I imagined I’d never see.
But I want to encourage you for a second (for the person who is truly in a thought storm or under some dark mental cloud). I survived it, and I’m still working, but I’m thriving. God is completely able to heal you, to heal all of us, from what seems to be a dangerous place inside of ourselves. Personally, I felt like I was at my worst when I lacked clarity, not necessarily for what my thoughts were saying, but because I was not privy to what God said about those thoughts.
I want to let you know that He’s addressed them all. He’s set them all straight. He’s in control and our lives are not out of control like our thinking may become. The fear that you may secretly feel is no secret to God. The dis-ease you feel while being inside of your mind is a lie and the enemy needs you to believe that lie, because in actuality, God gave you your mind to think, to reflect, and to ponder on His Word. He gave you your mind to create. He gave your mind to be thoughtful and to be useful. It belongs to Him, and it is a good place no matter how crazy it feels right now. If “God did not give us a spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind”, this is exactly what you will have if you believe this to be true (2 Timothy 1:7). I promise you. I can testify to this. Your mind is a real place, yes, where some things may have occurred for the worst, where healing may still be needed, but there is better, and it’s waiting for you.
So, whatever you have to do to gain peace, call that forward. Go after it. It’s yours. Open the place up. Write that down. Get those thoughts out. Read that Bible. Study the Word with that group. Seek guidance. Use therapy. Pray. Pray again. Pray some more. Then thank Him for the deliverance, even if it hasn’t happened yet. It will, and you will be whole in your mind. You will have peace of mind.
Here is a final quote to take away:
“Like any good habit, looking for God’s collateral goodness requires practice.
If you look for what’s bad, you’ll find the bad. If you look for what’s negative, you’ll find plenty to be negative about. If you look for things to be critical of, there is always going to be something to criticize.
On the other hand, if you look for God’s goodness, you will see it. You’ll start seeing his fingerprints and occasionally feel like he’s winking at you. As you pay attention to how God is working, you will also find yourself seeing the good in people. This practice will change your relationships. Your attitude will be transformed, and the right attitude always precedes the right actions” (page 135-136).
I hope that you’ll give this book a chance if it is interesting to you, or maybe you’ll gift it to somebody close who needs it.
I pray that we all find healing and clarity, that we win every war that occurs in our minds.
We are victorious, and God’s granted us that right.
Please feel free to order the book featured in this review by Craig Groeschel called, Winning the War in Your Mind: Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life on his main website.