A Brain Booster for Your Relationships
A Brain Booster Practice for Your Relationships:
How Your Thoughts & Words Impact Your Relationships & Brain
When you were very young you first encountered life around you through your five senses. You felt, listened, tasted, touched and smelled the world around you.
From these encounters, your thoughts began to form and guide your emotions, which created your words. You were taught to link what you experienced with words to define it: hot, cold, bumpy, happy, sad, big, little.
Your words now come from what goes on between your two ears, along with what is felt in your heart. You speak what you think and feel. This activity creates an actual spark of energy.
Science is now able to capture the energy that occurs when you are thinking from your head AND when you are feeling from your heart.
Have you ever been stuck thinking in the head: analyzing, interpreting, concluding, needing to be right, liked, understood? The energy put off by this type of thinking has been clocked 2 inches out from your head. YUP, that’s all you get when you are stuck between your two ears.
When you feel into your heart: love, joy, compassion, forgiveness, peace, kindness. The energy has been clocked over several football fields long.
Surprised? This is why focusing on the heart in relationships is such a game changer. The next time you catch yourself in your head trying to figure out why things happen as they do or worrying about how things will turn, pause and say: Get out of the two inches! Ain’t nobody got time for that small, uncomfortable space.
When you identify the feelings of regret, anger, fear, shame, doubt and learn skills to shift them to a space of forgiveness, confidence, love, kindness, compassion your life changes…why? Because your relationship with yourself and others change for the better.
Two inches or several football fields long? It’s your choice and begins with doing a self-inventory on the negative thoughts you have been giving free rent to over time between your two ears.
Have you been serving regret, anger, fear, worry or self-doubt breakfast in bed? It’s time to EVICT. You are the landlord of your mind. God has given you the ability and strength to take every thought captive for good if you choose to do so.
Two memories from my childhood offer a great analogy to the power of your thoughts which become words which guide the direction of your relationship into positive harbors or negative storms:
I grew up on the water in Long Island and would often take out our small sailboat on windy days. I was amazed at how quickly I would succumb to the power of the winds around me if I did not keep a strong grip on the rudder. The same is true for our tongue, although it is one of the smaller parts of the body it holds the power to build up or destroy relationships. (James 3:4-5).
If we do not keep a strong watch over the words that come out of our mouth we will capsize the relationships we care most about.
I also grew up horseback riding. I was amazed at how a 4 – 5 inch piece of metal (horse bit placed in the horses mouth) could control the direction the horse would go. I had a particularly spunky horse growing up and with a good bit and leg work, I could direct where the horse would go…even in the midst of spunky fits.
One round of unkind, ugly words can destroy safety and connection in relationships with other people.
My dad shared a story with me about my grandfather I will never forget. My grandfather had a sharp tongue at times and one time he fired it off at my grandmother. My dad overheard the ugly outburst and stepped in.
He said to my grandfather:“I’m going to repeat, word for word, what you just said, with the same intonation and volume and you let me know how that makes you feel.” After hearing what he said, my grandfather wept.
Many times we do not understand the negative impact our words have on other people until we experience them personally.
By your thoughts you form your perceptions of life. Is life for you? Or against you? The choice is yours and impacts your choice of words and the happiness you feel. Your words are simply the overflow of your thought life OR heart life: 2 inches or a football field long of impact.
Keep your brain happy with happy thoughts. The benefits not only have a direct impact on your relationships but also your health. Below are a few benefits of a happy brain as noted by Psychology Today:
- stimulates the growth of nerve connections.
- improves cognition by increasing mental productivity.
- improves your ability to analyze and think.
- affects your view of surroundings.
- increases attentiveness.
- leads to more happy thoughts.
Happy people are more creative, solve problems faster, and tend to be more mentally alert.
Action Step:
Keep a tight grip on your rudder (tongue) if you don’t want to capsize your sailboat (relationships).
This week keep a log of the conversations you have that result in negative feelings. Observe your thoughts before the conversation took place and after.
What words spilled out of your mouth that created a negative space between you and the other person?
What was your main emotion? What is the main thought that fueled your emotion? For example: they don’t like me? They think they know more than me? I feel threatened by them?
Apply some EFT to the negative thought.
When you wake up in the morning, take time before you run into another person to pray and set your intention around how you want to show up in the relationships with the people around you.
When I was training for the Colorado State Championship in World Tae Kwon Do, it was the intention and practice outside the “ring” that gave me victory in the ring.
Today, with your strength, dear God, I want to show up in a kind, patient and loving manner within the conversations I will have. Override me when I start to get tossed out of this intention because of negative thinking and speaking.
August 2019 New Release: Stop Letting the World Be The Boss of You!
