Are You Feeling Pressured?

We may have had the experience growing up where a parent or someone in authority said “Now, you have to do this!” and then maybe “Get in there and clean your room. Get in there and clean your room! I said get in there and clean your room!!!” and maybe later on “Are you done yet?!”

If we had this constant pressure and nagging about the task we had to do eventually we not only resented the task but we resented the person who was nagging and pressuring and demanding that we do it. Maybe we began to hate cleaning or hate our mother or hate our father because when we saw them it meant – You have to do this. You have to do this!

One of the motives of Pressure Spirits (thoughts), whether coming out of the mouth of another person or as part of our own thought processes, is to get us to not enjoy whatever it is we are doing.

These pressure thoughts can seep over into our relationship with God, whether we are just starting out and exploring the idea of God or we are in the midst of trying to grow a relationship with this Spirit Being. Do we feel that we have to go to church, we have to tithe, pray, or study?

“I have to go to church. What’s everyone going to think if I don’t?”
“I’ve got to pray; I haven’t prayed for 48 hours. What’s God going to think?”

Pressure spirits do not want us to enjoy life. They want us to resent others and ultimately God and to view them and God as taskmasters. But it’s not God who is the one behind us with the whip saying “You have to; you got to! Get there and do it!” God wants us to enjoy the process of growing up and maturing as individuals.

Pressure spirits can be fueled by wanting to please others, being fearful of what others think and can be attached to our self-image. We feel pressured to do certain things in order to be liked, to maintain a certain image about ourselves.

Pressure spirits also get us to focus on ourselves too much. We get in a hurry and so focused on our own agenda and own plan for the week that we miss out on the chance of interacting with our friends, family, classmates or co-workers. The most important things in life are not things, or agendas or completing to-do lists but being able to interact with people in ways that cause positive ideas and feelings to grow.