Source: Lesson 3 Negative programming:

Many of us make the mistake of not carefully screening the company we keep around us. Sometimes we are guilty of keeping the wrong company under the right intentions… In other words, we may spend time with friends or relatives because those are the people in life we are not suppose to turn our backs on, right? Let me ask a question… What if who you have been friends with becomes unhealthy to continue the relationships? Do you continue because love and time is already invested? What about unhealthy relationships with relatives? ( bloods thicker than water right?)  Today we examine further how unhealthy relationships sometimes become toxic to our health…

I think each of us can say with surety we all have kept company with people so full of negativity; that time spent with them had our central nervous system in an uproar. If you are prone to depression, you may ask yourself why do I keep going around certain people who hurt me to the core or why do I care about someone who really doesn’t care for me? Why do I keep subjecting myself to their mistreatment? My friend, the answer is quite simple… We tend to believe our love and kindness is enough to change hurtful people… Let me remind you, only God can change the hearts of others.

There are times we must distance ourselves from negative people for a time. This is us setting up a boundary making it known, we no longer will tolerate certain behaviors. Distance is necessary due to the fact that we often take on symptoms caused by their negativity. See, negative people tend to hold negative ideas that indirectly are teaching us to fear things they believe to be true, but rarely hold any truth at all. An example would be the person who makes their opinion on everything known and try to enforce their way as the only way.  Such as “you should not do that with your kids it instills weakness” or “don’t wear your hair that way it looks tacky. what will people say?” ( now imagine for a moment this is being said by someone you trust and believe will gain nothing by saying something to hurt you.. this could be a friend, sibling, parent , aunt, uncle, grandparent etc.) If we trust this person we may question if their comment holds truth and begin doubting what we thought was right. This means, as we correct our child we may hear their words in our head and change our methods which really only begins confusing the child being corrected;  because the way we always did it is now being corrected like someone in the family or how a friend corrects their child.  This is an indirect consequence of spending time with negative people.

Let me clarify… Negative people hold ideas in their thinking that becomes their beliefs. For us to spend time with them causes us to hear their repetitive beliefs that stemmed from ideas in their thinking. ( These ideas held were planted in their thinking by someone else they were around; possibly even by someone who raised them. They then were transferred onto us and expected to be our ideas held as well.)  Sometimes we have to politely say no thank you to things offered and this is one area to begin in. Their ideas do not need to become ours.

If you find yourself around someone who keeps your stomach in knots, fear to be felt such as disappointing them or losing their approval, anger to swarm inside of you, anxiety felt after time spent with them, and floods of self doubt overtake you; then you spent time with someone who is toxic to your health…  This person stressed you out…

Here we go…Stay with me:

Constant negative emotions keep us subjected to stress. Stress causes us to become more sensitive to stressful situations. Why?   Stress causes us to release a hormone called cortisol.  Cortisol  prepares our body for the  fight or flight response by flooding us with glucose. This is what allows immediate energy to our large muscles. Whenever we get a surge of cortisol, we get flooded with glucose, which increases our heart rate. (Personally, I always called this my superwoman adrenaline because it was during this immediate surge of energy I was capable of doing things that were normally unnatural for me to do. My body went into fight response yet other parts of my body felt anxious and scarred at the same moment.)

To continue spending time with people who stress us out can be toxic to our health… That stress releases cortisol. Anytime we have elevated levels of cortisol many things happen in the body. Listed below are a few of the possibilities:

Blood sugar imbalance/ diabetes/    Weight gain/ obesity     immune system suppression   Gastrointestinal problems  /      Insomnia  /    Chronic fatigue/    thyroid disorders /    dementia /        depression  /       and this list goes on and on…..

Take a good look at that list and see how many symptoms you hold from holding too much stress. As we have been going through lessons on how to be fearless and breaking free from upset, depression and anxiety; you owe it to yourself to screen the company you keep. Your health may be failing because of your commitment to toxic people… Distance yourself for a time in  order to pray and strengthen. Surrender these people over to God and let him work on their hearts, because my friend your love , commitment, and  investment in them is not enough to change their negative impact on your health…. Stress is known as the silent killer; distance is required in order to heal…

Blessings,

Robin Worgull          Author of The Conflict Within and The Right- Minded Woman