It Is All in Your Head

The phrase "it is all in your head" sometimes causes us to take offense. We may interpret that statement to mean that whatever ailment we have complained about is, in reality, simply part of our imagination and not real. The truth is that many of the things we experience begin in the brain and can be treated in the brain. One concert master found this to be true related to the tremors in his arm. His situation and correction were reported by Diane Sawyer on ABC Evening News (watch the video).

I watched the report and began to wonder - are there some things in my brain that need to be adjusted to improved the way I live. No, I don't play the violin, or any other musical instrument for that matter. But I do have impulses in my brain that certainly affect my life in a negative way - the impulse for another piece of fried chicken or seconds on dessert; the impulse to tell someone off to relieve my stress but to greatly add to theirs; or just the impulse to waste time on something trivial when more important matters wait. (I know that those don't sound like deep, dark sinful impulses, but you didn't really think that I was going to confess those things to everyone who can read a blog, did you?)

In 1972, Charlie Shedd wrote a book titled "The Fat Is in Your Head." His point was that we all make decisions and choices about the kinds and amounts of food we eat. If we want to be thinner or healthier, we must decide those things and then make choices that are consistent with the choice.

I would consider a surgery like our violinist friend had if my irregular impulses would be corrected. The results could be the beginning of not only a weight loss journey but maybe, just maybe, there would be a few other things improved along the way.

The reality is that surgery is not the key for myself and probably not for you either. The key for us probably doesn't even fall in the categories of stronger self control, determination, or will. The key may be a spiritual one in that we begin to allow the God who created us in His image to have control in our decision-making and actions that we take as a result of those decisions. He alone has the loving power to control my impulses and give me the desire to live life His way rather than mine.