Inner Voice | Not Equal to Inner Peace

The inner voice is most confusing at first, then becomes an uninvited guest if not dealt with, and finally merges effortlessly with our being so much so that we tend to call it thoughts. And then starts the obvious change in our personality depending on who that inner voice belongs to. But what’s the confusing part? The confusing part is the character/being behind the voice.

I have grown up in a family where I was taught from an early age that conscience is crystal clear if I am ready to listen. That means, conscience is within me; inner voice, in other words. As a Christian, the Holy Spirit also speaks from within. Again, inner voice. So far, so good. Either one being the inner voice is not a problem. But nobody warned me about a third voice, which also speaks from within, and its only job is to blow up our mistakes, shortcomings, and failures.

Again, so long as we have cognitive awareness of these voices, we are still good. Why? Because we can choose what to hear and what to ignore. The problem starts when we have been listening to these voices for so long that they aren’t distinguishable anymore. And when that happens, we call it thoughts. There starts the misery.

Inner Voice | And Me

The thing with thoughts is that we assume or are at least trained to believe that they can’t be controlled. There are no clear statistics, but I would reckon a good percentage of people in this world would be living and passing away from this life without even knowing that they could control their thoughts. We will talk separately about thoughts at some other juncture, but let's focus on the inner voice.

Taking the idea of inner voice from the previous section and thoughts from the paragraph above, what happens if we mix both? We tread on thin ice. What do I mean? If I start making the mistake of assuming my inner voice is my thoughts, then I have dug my grave (or elevated myself), depending on who that inner voice belongs to. To add fuel to the fire, if I also believe that thoughts cannot be controlled, then I am literally living a life where my inner voice will non-stop throw trash on me or elevate me in life.

I have been a recipient of the not-so-pleasant inner voice while believing that thoughts cannot be controlled. Any reason for depression not being the outcome?

An Enemy Within | A Grand Mess In the Making

I had mentioned in a few of my earlier articles that I have come out of depression, all thanks to the Mighty God and the angels he sent in the form of my counsellors, but I can’t forget how horrible it was when I was trapped in my own head. It’s a mess I didn’t see coming, and I suspect neither would the others in a similar state.

I don’t know when it started, but my best guess is at the beginning of my career. I can go back to the time when I was in college too, but back then, at least, there were enough and more distractions in friends. College days were bad only when I was alone at home doing nothing. Otherwise, it was still manageable. But once I started working, hanging out with friends became less frequent, office friends, though many, weren’t the ones as close as my childhood friends, and then started the journey of lonely times. To add to the loneliness, my second job had a work-from-home option, which made matters worse; note that this was at a time when there was no work-from-home concept elsewhere. That means it was a cultural shock for me to be in a work-from-home environment.

The ease of finishing my work in no time and then having a lot of spare time to do nothing is where the inner voice crept in. That was also the time where I did not know that thoughts could be controlled. I was steamrolled by negative thoughts, which would go unabated for hours, and I could only be a silent witness. The garbage that was splashed on me under my watch was incredibly disturbing. I was breaking down internally, and my self-image was bludgeoned. The irony was, I still looked a million-dollar worth on the outside. So, nobody knew what I was suffering or going through.

Note: Now you understand why depressed people are not easily identified. Because they look normal on the outside, plus, they themselves tend to not know that they are going through depression.

Heck, even I did not know what I was going through. It took my wife and me a grand 17 years to know that something was not right. That’s when the intervention came, and that’s when the correction started. Seventeen years is a long time to be continuously killed internally, and now it is easy to see why depressed people are suicidal. Because they want to put an end to what they are going through internally.

Here is the identity of that mind-numbing, soul-tearing, self-image-butchering inner voice. What Is It?

Inner Voice | The Ungodly Within

I had problems believing that the inner voice could be from the netherworld. It just seemed to be too dramatic, and the use of terms like evil spirit, demon, etc., kind of put me off from believing that we were even seriously discussing a topic. Take yourself, for example - does it make you feel that it is worth reading, after you noticed me pointing to the devil being the evil inner voice? No, right? I don’t blame you; I was like you and hence suffered for seventeen years.

Make no mistake, all the horror movies we watch, all the narratives we hear around us [or hear in our head (inner voice)] have led us to let our guard down. Ironically, the same narratives have also made the good voice a bit of a joke and a non-serious reality, bordering on being a myth. So, the outcome of such a misplaced logic is – God is a myth and there is nothing called a devil. And in this murky environment, where there is no Savior, an evil inner voice gets to flourish unchecked. I was a victim of this erroneous logic, and I have reasons to believe most depressed people, if not all, would be too.

Having understood that inner voice can be evil, and it definitely was in my case, we get to the next step – calling in the cavalry from Calvary. I mentioned already, I am a Christian, and so Jesus was my go-to protector, and boy, did I see how I wasted seventeen years by not staying close to him. I strayed too far and thus lost a lot of time.

The good news is the identification of the enemy within. Only when we have a target do we move to eliminate it. The thing with such enemies is that they are able to conceal themselves in the guise of thoughts or self-talk and therefore remain hidden. But when they are brought to light, they wither away and flee from us. That’s what I did, and the light I shone on the evil one was Jesus Christ. The fleeing was obvious thereafter!

So, Keep Checking the Inner Voice | Don’t Let the Enemy In

From now on, keep a guard for anything and everything that you hear internally spoken about you. All the negative, all the attacks on your life, on your physical self, on your abilities are nothing but from hell. They definitely are not your thoughts. They have to be dealt with absolute contempt. Don’t go easy on such voices because, given a choice, it would never go easy on you.

You alone are not sufficient to deal with this voice. You need heavy artillery, and there is none heavier than Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit in the whole of the Universe. He is a dependable, time-tested, faithful-certified, and battle-proven ally. When your thoughts are overwhelming, just say this:

I rebuke you, evil voice (or evil one), in the name of Lord Jesus Christ.

I command you in the name of Lord Jesus Christ to leave me and go fall into the fires of hell.

Say this and see how the ungodly voices fall silent within. I have tried it and it works. Keep your chin up, get yourself ironed up, and listen to the voice of the Godly. The voice is ever-present!!

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