Spiritual Mind Renewal Prayer Sessions

The pattern of this world is different for each person according to each individual’s family of origin, church of origin, schools of origin, friends of origin to name a few. Origin speaks to original (from the beginning). All these relational spheres of origin helped to lay the foundation of belief into our lives. These beliefs were built one experience at a time into the foundations of our lives to create engrained patterns of behavior and establish our world views. These experiences that were captured, print into each person’s soul are better known as memories. 

Romans 12:2 says, “And do not be conformed to this world (world patterns), but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, . . .” (NKJV) “Do not be conformed to this world (this age), (fashioned after and adapted to its external, superficial, customs), but be transformed (changed) by the renewal of  your mind (by its new ideals and its new attitude), . . .” (AMP) 

Stop imitating the ideals and opinions of the culture around you, but be inwardly transformed by the Holy Spirit through a total reformation of how you think. This will empower you to discern God's will as you live a beautiful life, satisfying and perfect in his eyes. (TPT) 

These beliefs were built one experience at a time… 

Our Experiences in Memories 

There is an old saying, “we become a product of our environment.” Each of us is molded through our life experiences whether good or bad. Everything you experience in life is recorded in your memory. When entering your son’s high school basketball court, you breathe in a familiar “old” gym smell and hearing the squeaks of tennis shoes brings you back to winning your high school basketball championship. Twenty years later, the memory is so real, you can feel the trophy in your hands. You are at a party, and you hear people singing a favorite song from the 80’s. You remember most of the words to songs you haven’t sung in 20 - 30 years. Or you smell a particular antiseptic, and a sad memory of visiting your father in the hospital comes flooding into your consciousness, even though you haven’t thought about that event for years.

These are the experiences of life. Much like a computer, a person’s memory records each experience in what we will call memory files. As an adult, a person draws from a lifetime of memory files to handle the new situations that person will face.

Adults process thoughts in two ways to help them make decisions. The most influential process is experiential or life experiences. This is the process by which the brain takes one’s past life experiences and matches them to a present situation to create the perspectives and thought processes one uses to fully make those decisions, solve problems, and walk through situations.

For example, Tom is afraid of small, confined places. He goes into an elevator and has to hold onto the rail to keep from falling down. He breaks out into a sweat. Anxiety grips his chest like a band that restricts his breathing. The door has not even shut yet. What is happening? He knows mentally or consciously he has “room to breathe.” He is even telling himself that, repeating it over and over like a broken record in his head, but the physical response is still the same. Tom’s brain is pulling up a memory file on a subconscious level (from the hard drive) from a time when he was playing war with friends. His friends buried him up to his neck in the sand as a prisoner of war. He is not consciously thinking this, but his subconscious memory file is controlling how he deals with the present situation. He begins to experience emotionally what his mind has accessed in the past memory even though it is not in his conscious thoughts.

A lie believed through past life experiences stored in memory files will always feel like truth to someone even if the person can mentally or consciously say that it is not true. Memory files stored through these experiences help to create our belief system by which we process present life experiences. The truth and lies we believe about each current situation are defined by what has happened to each one of us in past situations.

A lie believed through past life experiences stored in memory files will always feel like truth to me...

The Process Looks Like This: 

In the previous scenario, Tom may have felt like he was going to die as he was confined in the elevator because as a child, he thought he was going to die in the prisoner of war game situation. His mind associated a memory file of the past situation of being buried as a child to his present circumstance. Even though he didn’t die as a child, the belief that he would became truth to him.

Here is another good example: a beautiful woman has a model build that every woman would envy and the men would rank a ‘perfect 10.’ She can look in the mirror and know (mentally) that she is beautiful. She can say to herself, “I am beautiful.” However, her memory file tells her something different. She was a late bloomer and kids gave her a childhood name of “pizza face.” She was verbally abused by her dad saying no one would want her because she isn’t pretty enough, and she trusted his statement that she was “ugly duckling” in the family. Because she affirmed, agreed with her dad, she will hear or see ugly inside even though the mirror reveals something entirely different. Why? She believes lies which appear to her as truth. I call lies believed as truth my small “t” truth.

So, our souls (mind, will, and emotions) are constantly interacting with the circumstances we find ourselves facing. As we each live life, our souls (the hard drive) are constantly pulling up memory files from a subconscious level to help us live through present circumstances. Our hard drive interprets the present situation and pulls up memory files that it thinks most resembles the present situation to try to give us perspective for the present. As the file is pulled up, any lies and negative emotions that are in it will show through as part of the present thoughts and feelings even though they are “seeping” from our past. On the other hand, if the memory file(s) that our minds pull up are of real capital “T” Truth, the files will hold positive emotions and correct information to help us handle our circumstances in the present in a positive and mature way.

With this basic understanding, one can start to gain perspective as to much of what is going on in present living. Let’s say I am driving down the road with my spouse and she reminds me to turn left at the next road ahead. I immediately burst into a rage with thoughts that are expelled something like, “WHAT? Do you not think I can drive! Do you think I am so STUPID that you have to remind me! Do you think you can do a better JOB?!? @#%$ I’ll tell you what, why don’t I just pull over and you can drive if you think I can’t do it and you can do a better job!” (By the way, I have missed the turn by now.☺) It is safe to say that the level of my emotion in this situation does not match the level of my present circumstance in any way. Typically, when the level of your present experience does not match the level of your emotion, an unresolved childhood memory (file) is involved. And, we call this past bleeding into the present being triggered.