Holy Noticing: How A Christian Can Practice Mindfulness Sample

Thoughts: Become aware of your current thoughts

When we practice holy noticing, we not only battle mind wandering, but narrow and unbiblical thinking as well. Professor Melvin Laird paints a profound picture of the plight of our minds and hearts when he tells a story about an unusual sight he saw during one of his daily walks. 

His route led him across open fields where he frequently noticed a man walking his three Kerry blue terriers. Two of the dogs exuded energy, speed, and grace as they bounded through the fields. But although the third dog would run, it ran in tight little circles.

One day Dr. Laird mustered the courage to ask the owner why this dog ran in such a strange way. The man explained that before he acquired him, the dog “had lived practically all its life in a cage and could only exercise by running in circles. For this dog, to run meant to run in tight circles. So instead of bounding through the open fields that surrounded it, it ran in circles.”

Sometimes our mind can keep us in similar mental cages, our thoughts running in repetitive mental loops, like a DVD that gets stuck repeating a scene. Rather than running in open fields of God’s grace, we run in small, tight mental circles. 

Our busy, agitated, and distracted mind is like a glass filled with muddy water. As long as it is agitated, the mud clouds the water and doesn’t allow light to pass through. However, if the glass remains still, after a few minutes the mud will settle so that the water becomes clear. Holy noticing helps settle our thoughts and emotions so that we can see our inner world more clearly, observing our thoughts more like things. 2 Corinthians 10:5 describes it this way: “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” (NIV). 

In this component of the BREATHe model, T, you’re trying to become more intentionally aware of your thoughts. Find a quiet place and tell the Lord you want to submit your thoughts to Him and change the ones that need changing. As thoughts rise up in your mind, try to reframe troublesome ones like, “I am anxious,” to a de-centered thought    such as “I am having feelings of anxiety,” which, in turn, will actually lessen anxiety. By labeling thoughts in this way, you’re adding some distance between them and their effects on you. Other phrases could include, “I am having memories of …, feelings that …, thoughts about …, bodily sensations of …, etc.”

Try to simply name your thought instead of spinning a commentary about it. Yield your thoughts to God and let Him change them to the ones reflected in the list in Phillippeans 4.8.