A Freshwater Summer: Renewing the Mind

Hello, friends!

I’m currently enrolled in a Foundations for Counseling Ministry School at YWAM Lausanne, as a student once again.

Growing up in coastal California, I feel most at home with an ocean and most at peace on the beach. Even living with a lake has been an adjustment for me, but I’ve always loved to see and experience different types of beauty in people and places. There is definitely something to be said for the beautiful Lake Geneva. There is something purifying about swimming in the cool, blue lake, under the blue sky, with the vast view of blue mountains in the distance. I love the big, graceful swans that glide by, on the surface of the water, and the little fish that dart around below. Then resting in the grass, eyes closed, soaking in the sun is both revitalizing and relaxing. Here, I leave the world behind. It renews me, in a way.

My weekend lake days have been a strong partner to the school that I’m taking and to the environment that I have been trying to cultivate for my mind.

So far, we have studied personality profiles, active listening, family systems, creating a counseling environment and healthy boundaries, sexuality, trauma debriefing, death and grieving, and several other areas. Along with all of the learning to walk with others through growth and healing, we have gone through a lot of it ourselves. The best gift that you can give a person is a healthy version of yourself.

By nature, these topics can bring up a lot for those of us taking it all in and learning from it. It can be challenging or heavy at times, but it has led to a lot of wholeness and mental/emotional processing.

Something that has been really encouraging and empowering to me (along with many other things) is the idea of renewing one’s mind. Due to the incredibly adaptable nature of our brains, there are ways to truly retrain it and to correct unhealthy patterns in thinking. We can take advantage of synaptic plasticity to really change our lives. To put it simply, if some external source triggers a certain thought process in our mind, we usually turn to some sort of action as an emotional response or a way to cope. The more that this happens, the stronger the bond between the trigger, the thought, and the action becomes. Like a muscle in the body, it grows and becomes stronger. It is sort of like a “neural highway.”

For example, maybe seeing someone who is very attractive to you may trigger a feeling of insecurity, stemming from a subconscious thought like “that physical attribute makes him/her more of a man/woman than I am,” and it can lead to a number of coping mechanisms to make one’s self feel better. This is the driving force of a lot of addictions. Eventually, even without your realizing it, these triggers essentially determine the outcome of your day, as before you even have a conscious thought about it, you are mentally headed towards an unhealthy behavior/thought process.

There is hope, however! And this concept is truly transformational. The first key is to identify the behavior or thought process that you would like to change (could be anything from drinking to lashing out to people or even just talking badly about yourself/your body.) From there, you can begin to identify triggers, which may take a while. They can be anything, so you have to be honest with yourself, no matter how small or silly it may seem. Once you are at this point, it is possible to create a sort of “neural off-ramp” that you can take, mentally, perhaps before there is even a complete emotional response. These off-ramps can come in the form of self-talk or healthy action.

For example, if I am triggered by gray weather and it brings my mood down, my tendency may be to lay in bed all day, which ends up making me feel worse. Using this idea of renewing the mind, I could wake up in the morning, feeling fine, but I may see that it’s gray outside. If I know that this is a trigger, I can immediately decide that I will go for a morning walk/workout to get my day started. This should become a regular thing that I do, every time that I see it’s gray outside, even if I don’t feel like it. Eventually, this neural off-ramp can actually become stronger than the initial highway.

It’s incredible what our minds can do, and they drive so much of our lives.

I’ve also been finding a new way to sit, in the present moment, and to be more in touch with myself. I tend to be an overly futuristic thinker and I can be very out of touch with my own emotions, for various reasons. This often robs me of fully embracing life and its little moments. I like that I am a futuristic thinker and that I have dreams, but there is no point if I am never taking advantage of the present.

This has involved me stopping, regularly, throughout the day (usually between activities) and taking a few deep breaths, observing all of my physical senses, and then asking myself how I am feeling, emotionally. I often really don’t know, but it’s important to sit there until I have at least some idea of it. This has brought me a lot of peace and it is a way to deal with any problems that may come up throughout the day, so that they do not carry through weeks or even months. It is a sort of simple meditation that makes it easier for me to be in touch with my spirit, as well, and to hear from God, feeling his heart.

This has also helped me in creating healthier boundaries with people and strengthening my “no” muscle. Constantly doing things out of a place of guilt or obligation, instead of genuine love or desire, is not healthy. Eventually, it can lead to burnout and even to feelings of resentment towards others, as you have given them rights to yourself that in reality are only your own. Taking responsibility for myself and assessing what I really do and don’t want to do has felt like a deep cleansing. It is like a weight coming off of me. In the end, it results in better performance when you know that you are an adult with rights—that what you do, you do willingly, by your own choice.

This school, while it is simply a foundational one, has really inspired me. I am really excited about counseling others and being more qualified in the area. Already, formerly scary topics, like sexuality or trauma, are less intimidating. I have an idea of where to start and what the general goals are when helping people. Knowing that it’s not me “fixing” them but simply facilitating what they do for themselves makes it much more attainable and takes a ton of pressure off. Having trust in the Lord, letting God be God, leaves room for so much more potential and for real love.Everything we ever do in a counseling setting should come from a foundation of love, warmth, and compassion.

I’ve been having a lot of fun and enjoying the change of pace, being a student for a while, instead of staffing. Taking time for my relationship with God, others, and myself, is really transforming and refreshing. I am having so much fun with my classmates and with the beautiful Swiss summer. Together, we take time for deep processing and also just for laughs, whether it be at a lake or with instant noodles and Netflix. We know when to be together and when to be alone.

The woods here, behind the base, have always been a special place for me to connect with God, whether I am walking, running, or sitting still. Forests have always held something special for me, in my imagination. They were very magical and mystical when I was a fairy-believing child. They have now become places of beauty, serenity, life, and spirituality. Of course, one can find God anywhere, but it has always been one of the easiest places for me to focus, in this way, and to see myself as a part of this big and wonderful world.

Thank God for seasons and for change. I adore the spring, summer, fall, and winter of where I live and the intentional journeys that I take and witness through them.

We graduate from the FCM in a couple of weeks, and I’ll be sending another update, soon, about what is next!

Thank you so much for reading.

-- Emily Kathey

#switzerland #fcm #spirit #spiritual #outdoors #travel #beauty