Dr. John Warlow is a Christian psychiatrist and a member of the Living Wholeness Ltd Medical Team. The organisation is unique in it’s position to instruct, educate, and equip Christian leaders, pastors, and mental health experts to facilitate the transformation of communities.
John also established The Christian Wholeness Framework used by Living Wholeness Ltd, and he recently joined us on Rise & Shine to discuss what he feels is the one thing sure to boost your mood and improve your day.
Connection is Critical
‘For me,’ says John, ‘the one thing that would lift my mood is connection. But it’s connection in three directions.’
- Connection with God
Firstly it’s a God connection. That’s just a central part of life and it’s very meaningful in terms of lifting mood. Jesus said in the Beatitudes, blessed are those who mourn. Finding a way to connect with God, especially in hard times can help lift our mood.
2. Connection with Others
But our connection with others is also important. The closer the person is to us, the more important they are in terms of affecting our mood.
‘It helps us to have good connections with our spouses, kids and friends, but the reverse is also true if those connections aren’t there. That’s guaranteed to make us unhappy.’
3. Connection with Ourselves
‘But actually it’s not just the connection with God and others, says John, ‘it’s also with ourselves. We need to be really aware of what’s going on for us.’
Accepting Ourselves
John thinks we can only become more self-aware when we start to accept and connect with ourselves, even if we don’t consider ourselves to be right or biblical. The first step of repentance is a connection with God’s love rather than coming back to God in terms of being right.
‘The prodigal son came just as he was,’ says John. ‘All he had was his God connection. But the connection is the thing that guarantees our mood will go up in some way. Just as disconnection will do the opposite.’
John says there is a lot of research coming out now to support the fact that disconnection is pervasively bad for our health and can even affect your lifespan. If you live a disconnected life, it’s going to be a shorter one.
‘It’s just critical,’ says John. ‘Loneliness, shame, embarrassment, those sort of things are just toxic to connection. We all need to have the right support around us.’
Listen to John’s full interview on Rise & Shine below, and for more resources visit our Vision Store.
In plain language, Ian Watson’s book Can We Talk will help you build communication, encouragement and joy into real-deal relationships that stand the test of time – in marriage, family, friendships and business too. This resource is available from our Vision Store.
