The heart of something is its center, from where everything flows.  It is where our disposition rests and our strength or character resides.

How our disposition, strength, and character develop is largely up to us. Outside influences and experiences, good and bad, affect our development but ultimately our spirit, in concert with the Spirit, determines our attitude. Our view of life and response to circumstances and other people expose who we are, our heart.

If our view is doom and gloom, woe is me, nothing good ever happens, then our response is always negative. We will be hurt without relief, angry without reason, self-centered, self-conscious, and selfish, with no passion or happiness. We live without life.

When we see only negatives our spirit is wounded, it can be shattered easily because it is incomplete and weak.  It will become exhausted because it will work hard to get out of the pit of negativity, that is not its natural habitat.  We cannot be productive when our spirit is cold and has no nourishment.

When we look and see beyond the negative and grasp the positive our view is filled with love and light, it is good to be who and where we are, anticipating and expecting good things.  Our hurts, though often deep, are eased, we are forgiving and compassionate, we have hope and joy. We live life fully.

A good attitude, a good heart, is a blessing, one that we can choose to use or lose. It is not easy work to be of good disposition and strong character; it is easy to give up and slide into the pit of nothingness.  But we are not alone in our working for in our heart the Spirit dwells.  He is our helper, our encourager.  He is the medicine to cure what ails us.

A cheerful heart is good medicine,

but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

Proverbs 17:22 niv

I wonder, have I thought about the Spirit’s discipline as medicine? 

I wonder, now that I see it this way, if the medicine will be easier to take?

Just wondering…