“The greatest spiritual battle of our generation is being fought between our ears,” contends Jennie Allen in her latest, popular book Get Out of Your Head – Stopping the Spiral of Toxic Thoughts. Noting “we are what we think,” it’s Allen’s passion to help people capture false, destructive thoughts with the interruption, “we have a choice” and deliberately build healthy thought patterns and sound minds based on the truth of God’s Word.
Published in 2020 by Waterbrook, Get Out of Your Head is timely and transformational. Allen is a popular podcaster, sought-after speaker and Bible teacher and author of several books and study guides. She also is founder and visionary of IF:Gathering, an organization that equips women to know God more deeply and to disciple others.
In Get Out of Your Head, Allen draws from scientific research, findings from mental health professionals, Biblical truths and her own experiences. She candidly shares her own story of a dark season, living with lies that resulted in fear, anxiety and doubt. When she recognized this was an attack by the enemy and began fighting the lies as if she was in a battle, things started to change. It was this season that prompted the writing of the book, a book she states “was by a million miles the most difficult.”
Allen teaches about retraining the mind with weapons God has given us to combat seven strategic enemies such as: combatting busyness with stillness before God, combatting fear with trusting that God is in control and combating cynicism with delight in God.
One of the things I loved about the book is the practical way Allen gets to the root of self-defeating, self-denigrating thoughts with a clear action plan to redirect thoughts. With the goal of being conformed to the mind of Christ, she suggests a spiral model. She recommends using a downward spiral for negative thoughts and upward spiral for rewriting positive, truthful thoughts. Readers can identify the emotion, thought, behavior, effect on relationships and consequence of the emotion. This is a life- changing way to get rid of toxic thoughts.
While Get Out of Your Head addresses a heavy topic, the book is easy to read and written in a conversational style. This book would be beneficial for anyone desiring to “get out of their head” but particularly those struggling with fear, anxiety, doubt, negativity or complacency. Allen shows that there is hope. It is possible to take every thought captive and let Christ transform our minds.
Other resources to accompany the book include a six-session Bible study entitled Get Out of Your Head based on the book of Philippians and a book club kit with conversation questions, activities and worksheets and podcast episodes for each week. For more information, go to JENNIEALLEN.COM.
