Cracking Down The Strongholds

Cracking Down The Strongholds

Posted by Sylvester on Monday, July 28, 2014 0

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It’s often a light bulb moment for me when someone casts a deeper understanding into phrases or situations I have hitherto ignored or just never really truly contemplated! I believe everyone has had such a moment where you suddenly get clarity and understand something that has never been clear before; it’s like being in the dark and someone suddenly puts on the light! That illumination or understanding is what I call a light bulb moment!

So I got a light bulb moment last week and it pulled together a lot of things that had been accumulating around me! I spent a lot of time alone growing up and I developed a voracious appetite for books, I can read and understand so fast that most people often believe that there are some books I must have read before as it’s almost impossible to believe my rate of assimilation! People who read a lot will back me up and confirm that the more you read the easier it is to get assimilated into a plot and as such it’s possible to digest it at incredible speeds! Well a couple of years ago, my grey matter went on a prolonged strike!! I simply could not pick up a book and any time tried I just lost interest! After a while I just assumed I had acquired too much junk information and deserved a breather. Along the line I still kept on getting books as presents and I kept quiet about the “strike”; it’s a bit weird to say you don’t read when you write so much!

For the first time in close to four years I woke up looking for a book, I was longing for a book by the same man who had touched my life incredibly in the year 1991. I still remember that morning, walking along the Fountain at Tinubu square when I noticed the book on the floor. Back then booksellers in Marina (the wall street of Lagos) were allowed to display their books on the sidewalks and people could peruse at their leisure and buy! The book was an altogether not new copy of Norman Vincent Peale’s “Power of Positive Thinking” and buying it opened a new chapter in the life of the twenty one year old I was back then! I can’t tell you how many copies of the book I have bought since and I continue to buy as I don’t believe in libraries!! I believe such life changing nuggets ought to go round and most of my books have long queues of people waiting to be blessed by them! A great book is one you often crave for and reading it again and again offers new insight every time! It’s almost impossible to describe how I felt at the restoration of my love for books and I started searching the entire house for the book.

I eventually found a spinoff of the original and it did the trick!! “The power of the Plus factor” is another book by Norman Vincent Peale and I was not even halfway before my mind was revitalised and I was totally invigorated by truths so deep a lot of my strongholds were loosed!!

Strongholds are not necessarily a very strong point for me and I am familiar with them because of 2 particular verses of scripture. 2 Corinthians 10: 3-4. “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds!!” Most Christians are familiar with the quote but I got more enlightened as someone took the time to explain it. It was the second service and a pastor was leading us in prayers when he explained why strongholds were such an important point. He said that they were they were the negative mindsets and perceptions that mitigated against success.

Words that had been spoken to our psyche and affected growth in every area of life! I am sure quite a lot of people already knew this but I wasn’t one of them! To be sure of his point I took the time to check out the meaning in the dictionary and confirmed that a stronghold was defined as a place where a particular group, activity, or set of opinions is concentrated; a place that is fortified or that can easily be defended. I had perceived strongholds as something of a place of war in the ilk of the walls of Jericho and it never actually occurred to me that they were actually within me, around me. Something of a self sabotage mechanism that we all have acquired either consciously or otherwise!

The human mind remains the most fascinating piece of creation for me; it is the seat of the soul and residence of the Divine and I know for certain it holds all the answers! What I haven’t figured out is how to best use it and given that most ninety year olds haven’t either, I safely assume it is a quest that transcends life as we know it into eternity! I recently discovered another book by Dr Joseph Murphy and it pays particular attention to the state of the mind, its strength and the power of suggestions. The book is titled “The Power of the subconscious mind’ and is a must read for anyone with a quest for knowledge! In the first chapter you learn that “The law of your mind is the law of belief; this means to believe in the way your mind works, to believe in belief itself”. Very simply put, you are what you think you are; you can achieve what you think you can achieve; first step in success is faith that you are able to do it, faith in yourself, faith in the divine; next step is doing it and guess what? You can!

One of my favourite books is by Gary Zukav “Soul Stories” and it tells a most interesting story. The creator of the universe gathered all of creation together. He wanted to hide something from all humans, until they were ready for the knowledge; the profound truth that they create their own reality! The salmon volunteered to hide it at the bottom of the ocean but he said no “they will one day go to that bottom and find it”.

The bear volunteered to bury it deep into the mountain and once again he said no” they will dig into it someday and find it”. The eagle volunteered to fly it to the moon, he said no “they will one day go to the moon and find it. Grandmother mole rose up and everyone became quiet; they expected her to volunteer to bury it deep under the earth’s surface but she being blind and using only spiritual eyes gave the clearest and only acceptable answer!” put it inside them, it is the one place they will never look”.