How often do we find ourselves caught in a downward spiral during the week simply because we have allowed our minds to linger on unwholesome, unkind, or unhelpful thoughts?

Maybe we keep going back to dwell on an injustice done against us years ago. Maybe we reflect on the rude behavior of someone in the supermarket yesterday and imagine how we might have retaliated. Maybe the gossip we heard about a colleague this morning confirms the suspicions we have long been pondering about them. Maybe we habitually rehearse a past argument with a loved one over and over, allowing hurtful words to injure us or make us angry all over again. Perhaps, we listen to our own inner voice expressing an untruth about ourselves so often that we begin to believe it. Perhaps, we call to mind impure images or impulses as we are drifting off to sleep. Maybe we daydream about how we will finally tell off our boss, or about how we will get revenge on a neighbor. There is no shortage of such things with which to fill our minds.

But in Sunday’s epistle reading from Philippians 4, St. Paul exhorts us:

 Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. (Philippians 4:8 NIV)

Breaking out of the downward spiral of oppressive ugly negativity is sometimes as simple as taking control of our thought life. We do not have to keep returning to old patterns of thinking. It is not just about learning positive thinking, it is learning to take every thought captive and making it obedient to Christ. (2 Corinthians 10:5)  

If we begin to heed St. Paul’s exhortation, we may be surprised at how our entire outlook on life will be transformed. Indeed, learning to think on excellent and praiseworthy things is an important step toward being transformed ourselves into the image of Christ through the renewing of our minds.(Romans 12:2)