I Lack All Self-Control

If I’m being honest, I spend most of my time thinking about myself. Saying that sounds awful, but doing it not so much. I’d say 99% of my self-talk revolves around myself, or if others are brought up, it’s about something that affected me, usually in a negative way. You’d think that with this constant attention to myself, self-control would be one of my best features. But it’s not.

The more I tried to control myself with myself, the more I realized I didn’t understand self-control at all. It almost felt like there were two versions of me, one that needed managing and another that was supposed to do the managing, but both were still me, still driven by the same fears, cravings, and impulses. And if the same self is both the problem and the solution, there really is no solution. No wonder I stayed stuck.

Let me put it another way.

Imagine your brain as a carriage. The amygdala is the horse, powerful, quick, but prone to bolt at the first sign of fear. The prefrontal cortex is the driver, trained to think logically, but easily overwhelmed by a spooked horse. Both horse and driver are part of God’s good design, but neither can give you self-control.

Enter the King. The Spirit is the One who climbs into the seat and takes the reins. But He doesn’t just take the reins, He retrains the horse and teaches the driver to trust His voice, transforming the whole carriage by the renewing of the mind (Romans 12:2).

Freedom doesn’t come when the horse is muzzled or the driver becomes flawless. It comes when the reins are given to the King.

Self-control isn’t the self controlling the self. It’s the Spirit governing what the self could never tame.

This piece comes from Fruitful: Cultivating a Love Only God Can Produce. You can find it on Amazon if you’d like to keep reading on.