Butterfly Theology--As A Man Thinks, He Becomes

In relation to my last post on the Pygmalion Effect, I wanted to further emphasize the importance of guarding what kind of self-images and beliefs about ourselves that we hold to be true in our mind. The reason it’s so important to have a healthy self-image, is because it completely affects everything we do. If we have the belief that we are a loser and nobody likes us, we will live in accordance with that belief, and likely end up actually becoming a loser that nobody likes! However, if we believe we have the ability to succeed, that we are liked by others, that we are loved by God, and that our life here on earth has a purpose, we will live in accordance with that belief as well and our life will reflect it. As a result, we would likely be successful, liked by others, and live a life with purpose and love!

Our world is shaped by our beliefs, which is why it is so

important to be mindful of what we are thinking. This is especially true when it comes to our spirituality. Do you see God as a tyrant and unmerciful ruler ready to smite any human that does not obey Him with a lightning bolt? Or, do you see Him as loving, compassionate, merciful, full of grace, patience, and slow to anger? What about yourself? Do you see yourself as a dirty, rotten, unforgivable sinner who is just “too far gone” to be saved or loved by a benevolent Creator? Or, do you see yourself as someone who may make mistakes, yet is loved, valuable, worthy, beautiful, healed, purpose-filled, forgiven, cherished, and treasured in the eyes of God?

Your answers will determine the kind of life, and relationship with God that you have.

Your relationship with Him may be non-existent, because you think He is an unmerciful tyrant ready to smite humanity. Your relationship with Him may be one that is based on guilt and fear, because you have been manipulated into your religion and believe that nothing you ever do is “good enough” and that you must “earn” your salvation. Or, your relationship with God may be intimate, meaningful, fruitful, and of great value to you because you know that God loves you unconditionally, that you are forgiven and treasured in His sight, and that He has given your life a purpose. You know that there is nothing you could ever do to “earn” your salvation, but that you are saved by His grace. You know that you may still sin and be imperfect, but because you believe that the blood of Jesus has wiped your slate clean, you are a new creation in Him, and you are perfection in God’s sight because of Christ’s sacrifice for our sins.  

Like the Pygmalion Effect, Butterfly Theology is the belief that what we believe about ourselves, and what we believe God says about us becomes a reality. As Proverbs 23:7 says, “As a man thinks in his heart, so He becomes,” which is why it is so important to align your beliefs about yourself with God’s.  I want to share with you a quote from Bruce McNicol’s, “The Kingdom Life” that further and beautifully explicates the importance of monitoring and altering the way you see yourself to match the way God sees you:

“When Christians see themselves as “sinners saved by grace,” they have no choice but to live life as sinners, strenuously striving to become saints. Naturally, this effort leads to failure because we’re not in charge of our sainthood. Our sainthood has already been accomplished by our loving Savior, Jesus Christ. Therefore, when Christians are able to see themselves as “saints who sin,” as Christ-in-me creatures, as clothed with robes of righteousness, they have the only basis to grow up into what is already true of them. God says we are righteous, and this becomes the context or the condition that allows Christ to dwell in us. If my vision of what I can become is based on my vision of who Jesus says I already am—righteous—I can relax and mature into something I already am. When we trust God (remember humility?), our self-identity builds on His assessment, not ours—on His righteousness, not our own ‘righteousness.’

Sometimes when we lose our grip on who God has made us to be, we must remember the butterfly. Nature provides many examples of this incredible discrepancy between who we appear to be and who we truly are. Consider the caterpillar. If we brought a caterpillar to a biologist and asked him to analyze it and describe its DNA, he would tell us, ‘I know this looks like a caterpillar to you, but scientifically, according to every test including DNA, this is fully and completely a butterfly.’ Wow! God has wired into a creature that looks nothing like a butterfly a perfectly complete butterfly identity. And because the caterpillar is a butterfly in essence, it will one day display the behavior and attributes of a butterfly. The caterpillar matures into what is already true about it. In the meantime, berating the caterpillar for not being more like a butterfly is not only futile, it will probably hurt his tiny ears!

So it is with us. God has given us the DNA of godliness. We are saints—righteous. Nothing we could do will make us more righteous than we already are. Nothing we could do will alter this reality. He knows that we are ‘Christ in me.’ And now He is asking us to join Him in what He knows is true.” –Bruce McNicol

2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us, “If anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!”

When we accept God’s love and power into our lives by acknowledging that Jesus died for our sins, the Bible tells us that we are made into a new creation. Ephesians 2:10 says that, “We are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.”

And it doesn’t matter whether or not you may feel like a new creation, or a masterpiece yourself right now, you must know that God sees you differently, and start living according to who HE says you are. You may not feel like a masterpiece, but that’s what God says you are. And you can’t argue with God. Romans 4:17 tells us that God “calls things that don’t yet exist into existence.” He calls things what they are before they actually exist. God called Abraham the father of many nations before he even had a son. In fact, the idea of him having a son was laughable, considering him and his wife’s old age, but the time came to pass where God followed through on His word and made Abraham the father of many nations. Know that God is not done with you yet, and that “he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion” (Philippians 1:6). God finishes what He starts. You may not feel like a masterpiece now, but you are a masterpiece in the making. What matters is not how you feel, what matters is knowing who God says you are, and accepting it as truth, then living in accordance with it and lining up your self-beliefs with His word.

So how does God see you? He sees you as His beautiful workmanship (Eph. 2:10). You are His beloved child (Romans 8:17). You are the apple of his eye, He’s even numbered the very hairs on your head (Mat. 10:30). He loves you so much He can’t even take His eyes off of you! His thoughts towards you are more numerous than all grains of sand (Psalm 139:17).

 It is clear that God loves us, and that He has nothing but good plans and intentions for us—that we are more precious to Him than anything else. And if you don’t believe me, then just take a look in the Bible! The message of His endless love for you is quite clear!

And just to help you re-frame and re-fresh your mind onto how God really sees you, I’ve included below a list of Biblical affirmations that tell us just exactly who God says we are, and who He made us to be. I highly recommend reading these aloud, meditating on the meaning of them, and allowing them to soak in, and permeate your beliefs that you may know who God says you are and who He has made you to be so that you may live, act, and speak in a way that is in accordance with how He sees you!  Remember that “as a man thinks, so he becomes!”

I have been set free in Christ, I am no longer a slave to sin (Galatians 5:5, Romans 6:14).

I am God’s masterpiece (Ephesians 2:10).

I am God’s child (Romans 8:17, John 1:2)

I am loved by God (John 3:16, Romans 8:38, Proverbs 8:17, Romans 5:8).

I am a new creation in Christ, the old is gone and the new has come (2 Corinthians 5:17).

I am a believer, not a doubter (Mark 5:36).

I have been justified (Romans 5:1).

I belong to God (1 Corinthians 16:19-20).

I am complete in Christ (Colossians 2:9-10).

I am a citizen of heaven (Philippians 3:20).

I am born of God and the evil one cannot touch me (1 John 5:18).

I am God's temple (1 Corinthians 3:16).

I am chosen by God (John 15:16).

I live in love, not in fear (1 John 4:8, 1 John 4:18).

I am not fearful, I have been given God’s Spirit of Power, Love, Courage, and Sound Mind (2 Timothy 1:7).

I am conscientious of my words, because I know they hold power and reflect my fate (Matthew 12:37).  

I guard my thoughts because I know as I think, so I become (Proverbs 23:7).

The Pygmalion Effect–How Your Self-Perception Alters Your Reality

What Kind of Person do you think you are? How do you perceive yourself to be?

What if I told you that how you answer this question determines the outcome of your life? 

How you see yourself is of absolute importance because it affects everything that you do. How we see ourselves determines what kind of goals we set, what kind of thoughts we think, how we act and behave, and what decisions we make.

To start off, I'm going to give a little lesson in Roman legend 101. According to Roman legend, a sculptor by the name of Pygmalion had envisioned a woman so remarkably beautiful he could not help but bring his vision to life through his gift of sculpting. His sculpture was more than beautiful; in fact, it embodied every ideal, hope, dream, possibility, and meaning that Pygmalion held. It wasn’t before long that Pygmalion fell in love with his idealistic sculpture, so much so that he bargained with the goddess of love, Venus, to bring her to life. And according to the legend, she did.

Now what does this have to do with you and I you might ask? Well, like Pygmalion, who brought his sculpture to life simply through the power of his belief, you and I have the power to bring to life certain traits within others and within ourselves simply based on how we perceive others and ourselves. In positive psychology, this power of belief is referred to as “The Pygmalion Effect,” and its implications reveal that our belief in another person’s potential, or our own, actually brings that potential to life.  

To further explain, I’ll share a little story with you: Back when I was in high-school, there was a classroom clown cracking jokes and causing apparent disruption to the classroom. Instead of simply asking the kid to be quiet, giving him a pink slip, or kicking him out of the class, the teacher told him to hold out his right hand and turn it over. The student did said procedure as the teacher responded, “Good, now at least I know you can flip burgers at McDonald’s, because that’s what you’re going to be doing the rest of your life.” What this teacher may or may not have realized at the time, was that he was speaking prophetic words of negativity into this child’s life. Rather than kindly encouraging the class-clown to pay attention, he publicly belittled and humiliated him, and sure enough, a couple years later, that kid had dropped out of high-school and began flipping burgers at McDonald’s.

Here’s another example: A new teacher was given the names of her students as well as their locker numbers. She mistakenly took these numbers as each of her pupil’s IQ scores. Consequently, she spent the rest of the school year under the impression that each one of her students was an utter genius, and her verbal and non-verbal actions communicated that quite clearly to each of her students. By the end of the year, the school’s principle called the teacher into his office asking, “What on earth did you do to get these kids’ test scores so incredibly high?” Her response was, “Well sir, they are genius.’” “And how would you know that?” he replied. “Well because of their IQ scores you gave me in the beginning of the year!” she returned. With a grin and a shake of the head he said, “Those weren’t their IQ scores, those were their locker numbers!”  

Story upon story, study upon study continues to prove the dramatic effect our beliefs have when it comes to influencing others. Our beliefs in others can either discourage them to sink into failure, or encourage them to rise up and realize their full-potential. The same is true of ourselves. The way we see ourselves determines how we act, behave, what we say and think, what kind of goals we set (if we believe we are destined for failure, the bar will be set very low, and vice versa) and what kind of decisions that we make. If we don’t believe we can do something, what’s the point in us even trying in the first place?

Why did my high-school friend, the class clown, drop out of high school? Because he listened to what he was told and didn’t believe he could do anything else with his life. A student who doesn’t believe they will ever amount to anything is more likely to drop out or get poor grades. Why even try in the first place? A young girl who doesn’t have much self-worth or self-value is more likely to seek love in the wrong places, because she doesn’t think she can do any better or is worth any better. A husband who is constantly nagged by his wife is going to feel as if there’s no point to doing anything nice for her at all.

When we encourage others, when we help others to see their unlimited potential, we are aiding in bringing that potential to life. When we listen to self-degrading thoughts of negativity and failure, we are only hindering our future. When we chose to seek our strong areas, improve on our weak ones, and know that the potential within each of us is unlimited, we are creating a future that is bright, meaningful, and completely fulfilled and purposeful.

As Sean Achor puts it, “When we believe we can do more and achieve more (or when others believe It for us), that is often the precise reason we do achieve more.” Science has barely begun to glimpse into all of the remarkable ways our mindset actually shapes and determines the objective world around us.

It is truly proof of the timeless wisdom that, “As a man thinks in his heart, so he becomes” (Proverbs 23:7).

Now let me ask again, “Who do you believe you are?”

I hope you answer differently, or at least a little more positively knowing that how you answer will be reflected in  how you behave, live, the goals you set, the thoughts you think, the words you speak, and ultimately, the kind of life you will have.

"I am by nature a dealer in words, and words are the MOST powerful drug known to humanity" -Rudyard Kipling