When Beth Moore and Good Housekeeping collide

I'm notorious for hammering myself with self-destructive thoughts. Countless times a day, I find myself on trains of thought that lead me down paths of regret and shame. Nothing is off limits. Things I've done. Things I've thought. Things I've said. People I've hurt. People I've offended. Big or small, it doesn't matter. I can find a way to abuse myself with it. Sometimes I'm not even aware of the moment I've jumped on that train, but will find myself traveling along throughout my day emotionally beating myself to a pulp.

What I find most troubling about the whole thing, is that the regrets I find myself reliving are the very things I've sought forgiveness for and have attempted to rectify to the best of my ability. So what the heck?!?

While recuperating from my surgery, I've spent the past couple of weeks lying in bed reading things I've been meaning to catch up on. First and foremost, my current Beth Moore workbook, "When Godly People Do Ungodly Things." The current section is addressing 1 Thessalonians 5:17: "Pray without ceasing." Beth Moore says: "By 'pray without ceasing' Paul didn't have in mind repetitive, wearying formulas. He was talking about a perpetual line of open communication with God throughout the entire day. A pray-without-ceasing relationship means seeing everything against the backdrop of God's presence."

Sounds nice. So I mentally added that to my 'to-do' list and moved on to the next riveting piece of reading material beside my bed. My giant stack of Good Housekeeping magazines where I came across an article by Betsy Rapoport titled, "How to stop beating yourself up, putting yourself down, and selling yourself short." One line was larger than the rest and written in bright purple font and it said, "Imagine snapping a rubber band around your wrist every time you put yourself down."

And that's when God took over and connected a few dots for me. What if I combined those two philosophies?

For the past few days, I've been mentally wearing a bright red rubber band around my wrist that says, "I will pray." Every time I find myself on my self-destructive train, no matter how far down the tracks I've gone, I 'look' at that bright red band, give it a hard snap, and immediately talk to my Savior.

"Remember that time I hurt that person when I".....*SNAP*......"Thank you Father, that you alone can forgive the unforgivable."

"I can't believe I made such foolish choices when".....*SNAP*....."Thank you Father, for never giving up on me."

"I did it again. I'm so stupid"......*SNAP*....."Thank you Father for creating me and for being a God who doesn't create mistakes."

"I'm unlovable".....*SNAP*.....(Singing) "Jesus loves me, this I know......"

It's still a pretty new practice for me and the muscle it requires is weak. But so far, it seems to be working. My goal is two-fold:

1. I want to pray without ceasing.
2. I want to stop being a willing passenger on Satan's train of self-destruction.

Enough is enough. I screw up. I have regrets. I'm a sinner. But I was obviously important enough to God that he sent His own Son, Jesus Christ to die for me. How dare I diminish that sacrifice by allowing Satan any say in how I see myself?

"Nobody is going to read this. People come here to laugh, not to read some lame attempt at".....*SNAP*....."If this helps even one person, Father, thank you for using my fingers to say it."