Ep 21 - This is where the battle happens ( And nobody talks about it)

Episode 21

The greatest battles we face don’t happen in public—they happen in the silence of our own minds. In this episode, we pull back the curtain on the unseen war waged in our thoughts and beliefs. This is the battleground of mind renewal—the space where old patterns are challenged, lies are confronted, and truth begins to take root. Why is it so hard to change how we think, and why does no one really talk about it? We explore what Scripture says about transformation, the neuroscience behind habits and thought loops, and how spiritual warfare often shows up in subtle mental scripts. This episode is raw, real, and designed to wake you up to what’s really happening beneath the surface. 

Transcript

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Welcome to the Truth Seekers Guide, an uplifting podcast that explores the pursuit of truth through various disciplines, such as history, spirituality, religion, philosophy, inner work and science.Alright guys, welcome to the Truth Seekers Guide podcast, where we're going to delve into a lot of deep things, including the battle of the mind, and where we're going to go from noise to knowing.I wanted to start with not onlyWhere the battle begins, for your life and for everything,But we're also going to speak on a little bit of my testimony and why I'm doing this.A while back I wasI accepted Christ in my heart in the past and then I got into a really dark place.I went to a really dark place and I didn't understand why I couldn't feel that peace and joy that I felt before.So I went seeking for truth on a deep level and I studied everythingin the beginning, from philosophy, from different religions to science, neuroscience, quantum mechanics only dabbled a little bit in that just to understand it a little clearer of what it was and what's going on.So I was searching for truth in all kind of different ways,And I also read different scriptures and Dead Sea Scrolls and Apocryphas, and all different type of things to try to search for truth.The irony, of course, is that it brought me back to Christ and it brought you back to Yeshua.But it became something that I was looking for, and I was able to see Yeshua in such a different light that I didn't see before, in a way that it was transformativeNow, what we're going to speak about. because I didn't realize this the whole time. I was trying to do external things, fight externally for things, for my life, for happiness, for the love of God, for different things,And I didn't realize that I was trapped and I was doing things that I didn't want to do,And I wanted to be a good person,I wanted to do right things and I wanted to have peace and joy and happy.ButBut no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't find it.So one of the things that it brought me to was this one truth: that, even though science, philosophy and religion might not agree on different things, but it did agree on the power of the mind and thought.And so this is where we were going to speak, where the battle lies.The battle lies in our mind,The battle is for the soul and the battle is in your soul.That's where we have control of our character and destiny.And we forget that. because, well, at least I did,I let my mind do whatever it wantedAnd I thought every thought that entered into my mind was my thought,And I thought that this is who I was,And I allowed different things in my mind, that now I see completely different.And that power of thought is so great in all these different areas- in philosophy, in neuroscience, quantum mechanics-And we understand how powerful it is, how powerful thoughts are.And then, in this revelation I would call it, I realized that I was fighting external things instead of fighting internal things.And this is where that battle lies in our mind.who are we as people? as a short thing, because we'll speak on this in depth, in depth, later. uh, we are spirits that possess a soul and lives in the body. all right, what is a spirit? a spirit is like the animation life that is given to us from god. uh, what animates us, what gives us life? our soul is our mind, will emotions. this is the part that makes you, you and me, me.When God breathed into Adam the body, which was made out of dirt, and he breathed his life into it, it created this soul.This soul becomes who you are and how we become different from each other.This is your mind, will and emotions.And so the battle is for this soul, for this individual person,And we are possessing a body.I mean, sorry, we live in a body so we can learn to grow inwardly.It's almost like this flesh suit.So the point I'm making is that the war is for this soul. but the way we can transfer spiritual things from our spirit to the physical realm is only through the medium of our soul, through our thoughts.It's the only thing that connectsOur spirit, to the body and which then produces external physical things in this realm.The body, of course, is what gives us authority in this realm, in this planet, in this organism,in this organic world, is what gives us that authority.But the soul is who we are.So this is where the battle lies.This is how we were able to. This is where we can choose.This is where our free will lies, where we can choose to either love God or disobey God or not love God.We can choose to love,We can choose to kill,We can choose to say truth.We can choose to lie.This is where the battle lies,And in that choiceis where our whole purpose of here, of being here, is. this is where our battle lies, and so the the the battle, meaning there has to be 2 armies or at least 2 opposing sides. you have the kingdom of light in the kingdom of darkness, the kingdom of god's understanding, the kingdom of ignorance of the devil,the devil's ignorance that he provides. so, through this battle, we choose every day, and through that choice there's growth and through that choice there's transformation. but it's not something we do externally, because once we start to understand the power of thought, we realize that these external actions are only fruits of the internal thought seed that we feed.So we're going to delve more into that, of course, but I wanted to show you that and explain to you that I went from a person- and I can't even take the glory of this, because they're not my thoughts, they're the thoughts of truth-And I went from one person- that I was trapped in doing what I didn't want to do and trapped in this hell pushing people away, depressed,stressful drugs, alcohol, um, lust, all these different kind of things. um, i, i depression, i mean all these different anxiety, all these things, and i i wanted to not have that. i wanted to understand things and be happy and be peaceful. and i could tell you guys, now that i live in a piece of heaven, not perfect. i still have a lot to grow and i'm going to constantly do this until i die. andBut at least I'm on the right path, where I feel more peace more often,I feel joy more often.I don't live in depression,I don't live in anxiety,I don't live in stress anymore.Again, I say I don't live there because it's not that it doesn't happen.I just don't live there anymore.I used to live there.Now I justHave these little moments that signal or show me what's going on, And I use these moments, or short-lived moments of stress or anxiety or stress or depression As a check engine sign. It's just a way of realizing something is off here And something internally is off, And this is what we're going to talk about. But I do want to say that it has completely transformed my life in a way I never thought possible,and i thought that no one could be kind of like how christ was, or yeshua the only he could do that. and not to say we're going to be god or anything, but to say that we can live a life christ-like, and that is a possible. that is a possibility. and um, and this is where we're going to talk about this whole season- we're going to go deep into the spiritual warfare.We're going to talk about how we defend ourselves, how there's offense, what's going on, how does the enemy work, how does he deceive us? and this is all important for us in this path.And I think that through this truth, through this truth that is Yeshua, once we break this down His image, once we see that there is liberation,The truth will set you free on such a level that it's hard to explain, but we're going to try.So if the battle is for the soul, the battle is for your mind, will emotions, then the battle is also in your soul, which is going to be in your mind, which means our thoughts have the capacity of doing so many things.For example, in neuroscience, we're told that when we think- because, let's just start here-our mind is not our brain, let's just start with that. okay, our mind is who we are we. when we think of something, our brain is like the interface that receives the information from the mind and translate it through chemical change, through neuroplasticity to the body. it's like the interface to the physical realm. okay, nowThat means that we're going to speak about the mind, not the brain. so that way we can separate thatIn the mind we have thoughts, and even in neuroscience it says that when we think through our mind they can't explain that conscience. yet. but when we think, we can say that there is an electromagnetic pulse and it creates neuroplasticity. it creates chemical changes in your brain and then it starts creatingneural pathways or different habits.The neural pathway is something that is created through repetition of thoughts.So if you repeat something repeatedly, it creates a neural pathway.The best way that I think I heard Craig Rochelle, a pastor that I've heard, and I've read some of his books as well, when I've heard him say that it is like a rut, right.And so this made more sense to me because I worked outside and did itand the lawns and different things. and where you know that if you have a truck and you go over a lawn, you create ruts on the lawn.Eventually, if you keep running over the same path, it creates heavy, deeper ruts.The deeper the rut, the harder to get out of the rut,And that is the neural pathway.The more we think, the harder it is to get out of that way of thinking.So the only way to do it is by choosing a different path. that's going to be with more resistance,And then you have to repeat that different path over and over until you create a new neural pathway and then create a new rut.So,and the reason i'm explaining this is because the power of our thoughts is so powerful, and that's what we're going to talk about this whole season, and this is where the battle lies. so in the bible we have, for example, where it says: take every thought, and this is in the epistles- and paul mentioned this, by the way- but take every thought captive to the and then submit it to the obedience of christ.So let's think about this in warfare terminology, let's say, or war terminology:Take every thought captive.We can't destroy the thought. the thought is, but we can take it captive, which means we take it captive and then we submit it to the obedience of Christ, which we'll get to that more, but means we need to be aware of our thoughts to take a thought.So if we're not aware of our thoughts and we let our mind do whatever it wants, then we can't take a thought captive.We have to take the thoughts captive and then submit it to that kind of Christ-like obedience, which is what that means.So this whole season, in fact this whole show, this whole podcast, revolves around one specific verse that to me stands out and gives usmore of what we're saying, which is going to be Romans, 12, 2 to be precise.But I like to explain it through Romans: twelve one and two. specifically Romans 12 2,But I like to interject 121 to kind of explain a little bit more of 12 2, because it sets it up.So, Romans 121 says: submit your body as a living sacrifice,And this is your true and proper worship.And then, in 12 2, it says: don't be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind, so you could know and test God's perfect willwill. uh, when you do this, this is what most christians or believers that believe in this in holy scripture. uh, sometimes we miss it's. we can't pray for god's will. we can't know god's will if we haven't renewed our mind. we can't renew our mind if we're not submitting our body as a living sacrifice. um,This is probably the most vital step for a believer, in the sense that if we don't understand this process and we're not fighting this warfare or this war, we're going to lose, and only lose through ignorance, because of the fact that we're going to be blind, unarmed soldiers in darkness that can't protect themselves or know what's happening.But once we realize this is the path for the believer, we start to put on this new armor, spiritual inward armor, and this fight that we begin, a fight of between the kingdom of light and the kingdom of darkness, the kingdom of truth, the kingdom of lies, the kingdom of God's understanding, the kingdom of truth,The devil's ignorance,The devil's power and reign is in your ignorance, which means when you're ignorant, that's where his power is most powerful.He thrives in your ignorance to be able to corrupt us, because if we don't know the complete truth, then he can deceive us and it's easy to keep usSo. in fact, the devil isvery cunning. that's his job. he knows that he can use truth or biblical, even scripture, to try to distort it a little bit just to sway us away from the truth. so it's it's very delicate. we're gonna get into that as well in this in this season. but the battle lies there. it lies onOne that we can learn. so if anything we could take from this episode is: we have to think about what we think about.And that does not come naturally to us.It doesn't come naturally for us to think about what we think about.It actually doesn't come naturally at all.We allow our minds to do whatever it wants.The way I like to give this analogy is: the Holy Scripture says that this is the temple of God,like a house,And when we're born with our ignorance, with our lies, we destroy this house that we're given.So much so that it's hard to see anything on the floor, walls are caved in, roof is caved in. it's a mess.And when we realize this, when we come to the truth, a couple of things happen.Now, for me, it wasI came to truth and I did feel something so great.And the way I like to explain this is: every single newborn in truth, and when we receive Christ in our heart, we immediately get transformed, almost in a temporary transformed situation where we're just so filled of truth and spirit.And what this is, and what I call this, is a survival mechanism for a baby. right,What that is is, you know, without this experience, without this instant renewal, we can't really experience God,We can't really believe what we're getting,We don't experience anythingAnd on top of the fact, as babies with ignorance, we would fall immediately away from our faith and away from everything.But I believe that this is given to us as a survival mechanism.So we can go to church, meaning not a building, but the people, with these minds that are alike.We can go to church and go to the people and grow within that body which we'll touch later.And we can also go to the Word of God, which then guides us on what spiritual warfare is and how to keep ourselves protected and how to keep this house clean and holy.Um, but of course you know in my case was a little different.Some people receive this and they persevere in it somehow and they can stay in it and continue on the battle, and that's perfectly normal-And then they start the renewal process in this process. naturally,A person like me received it, but Ii felt it really well, but i was more focused on feeding the homeless, doing other things, evangelizing, doing external things- and i understand the inner spiritual warfare- and through that ignorance, and not studying or reading the word as much as i should or or congregating as much as i said, little by little,It's like a little hole in a big boat. you know, even though it's small, eventually it will sink the boat.And so it sank me in a sense that I suppressed the truth and spirit and I went back to anxiety, stress and frustrations and different things.And the problem with that was that, of course I, as I mentioned earlier, is thati couldn't understand why i couldn't feel the way i felt the first year, a couple years, when i received this, the spirit of god yeshua. and so when i, when, when i realized that i went on the search of truth. of course this was revealed- that i didn't understand the spiritual warfare, i didn't align myself the way that i was supposed to, i didn't start renewing my mind or submitting my body, which is my desires, my thoughts and my ego,as a living sacrifice. so i can then not be conformed to the world outside of me, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind inside of me, so i can know god's will. so, with that being said, once we realize that, then the truth, the spirit of truth, allows us to clean this house inside to the point where it takes a little while to get it done, sometimes depending on the mess that we have.But it takes a while.But like everything in life, there's an organic process and it takes a while.If you want to run a marathon, you can't just wake up in the morning. if you've never run before and say I'm going to run 3 miles or 6 miles,It's not going to happen,Or you're going to bring yourself out or hurt yourself.So the point is that everything starts off a little harder in the beginning,But after the repetition, as we mentioned before, with the way our mind works, the same way with neural pathways after repeating that samea path of resistance that you're not used to over and over for the repetition. then it gets easier. then you develop the ruts and it gets easier for you to be able to do these things that you thought were difficult in the beginning, as if, like if you start with a mile first and then 2 miles and then three and then four and then 6. now, when you run 3 miles, you know it's not going to be as difficult as it was when you try to do it in the beginning, when you didn't do that. so the point is, it gets easier with everything, and that's this is anything in life. and um,This is the way I describe it.It gets easier in the sense that God and the spirit of truth allows us to organize this home and make it beautiful again and make it the way it was supposed to be.And he even makes it in such a beautiful design that we never had it this way or even thought it could be this way.But it doesn't mean that you won't have closets that are still maybe untended, or you have situate parts in the house that you won't find in the future.That's one thing.But it also doesn't mean that the house doesn't get dirty anymore.It means that the house will continue to get dirty, just like a clean house.You clean a house perfectly spotless. it doesn't mean you're not going to have to maintain it,And so the maintaining process is what's easy.Not that you won't have temptation anymore,Meaning not that it won't get dirty anymore. but it's going to be easier now to maintain a clean house than it is to clean a destroyed home with walls caved in and a roof caved in. and you're remodeling.The word I'm looking for is remodeling.Once it's already clean. if there's a spill on a table of something, it'll be easier to see. oh look, there's a spill on the table.Let me go ahead and just wipe that out real quick andAnd then you clean that situation.It's not enough now to acknowledge that there is a bad action that came out of you- maybe impatience or frustration, or anger, or different things that come out of you, or lustful thought.It's not enough now that you see the mess. but now you have to interrogate that thought or that action.Why,Where did that thought or where did this action come from?How come I was angry?Why?Why was I talking so angry in this situation?Or why is that mess there?So you look up at the roof and you see there's a leak in the roof.And so you realize: oh wow, I got to fix the roof.It's not just enough not to clean the mess.You got to fix the problem that's causing the mess.If you don't fix the problem that's causing the mess, then that mess will only get worse over timeAnd eventually it's going to be too difficult to take care ofor at least very difficult to take care of.So it does make it easier.This is where the battle is.But we got to understand that once we get here- which is not the easiest- to go from a completely destroyed house and renovate it completely, gut it completely out.That's not the easy part.It's going to be the most difficult part.But once you get through that difficult part, then of course it gets easier.And now it's just wiping the messes or cleaning small things here and there, which is normal for our growth.And I do say this,they will be surprising situations where maybe I meet with someone I used to know before I renewed my mind, that I haven't dealt with in many years, or a situation like that that I haven't dealt with many years. and then I'm in that situation and then I realize this is like a room in my house that I never cleaned up, that I forgot about. and so like I open the door and this mess comes in, comes out of it, you know it's all over the place, and I realize, oh wow, I gotta take care of this situation that's gonna happen throughout the life. I mean II think God gives us almost like a mansion with many rooms, but this is our heart.We have a lot of parts in our heart.We have a lot of things in our mind that we've developed over the years, or things that have been passed down through generation, through our blood.But it does get easier, and truth gives us the tools.God gives us the tools,Yeshua gives us the tools.These are like:this is all we need to be able to maintain this home, this temple. we could use the analogy of a garden, but we'll use that another day, but it's the same concept. there is a process. it's going to take a little time, but once you get through it- and that's what we're going to be speaking about season 2 again- we're going to go through this process again. we're going toSpeak practical, practical ways. we can apply this in our daily life, and this is the way you know. I think that most of us will find peace and joy and truth, and this is not something that I am doing or something that I think I already know everything. it's more like you're justgoing on the journey that i'm going on right now you're following me on this journey and, uh, of truth and on this process that takes time and again. i, that's the beautiful thing about renewing our thoughts. because if all the thoughts i've had before i renew my mind were me, that was my soul, my mind will, emotions, these were all the accumulation of all the things through either handed down or thoughts, or things that came through my senses that i believe or my beliefs. andIf all of that was me- and now I'm shifting all of these thoughts and beliefs to something that's not the way I used to think, but something, the way that God thinks, the way that Christ thinks, the way that truth thinks- and I change it to that- then I can't even take the glory of my actions, because now my actions are not my actions, they're not my thoughts, they're the actions of the thoughts that I renewed to, which is the thoughts of Christ, the thoughts of truth, the thoughts of light.And through these thoughts, now I can't even take the glory of these actions, because they've been around for forever.