This article is a guest post by Jenn Eze. Jenn is the owner of Destiny River Media, and is a spiritual entrepreneur coach who helps people to find the right strategy and spiritual practices so that they can fulfill their God given destiny. You can read more of her articles and learn about what she does at JennEze.com.
It doesn’t matter who you are, the minute you start making moves to impact the world for the better, resistance will find you – so how do you fight it and achieve victory? Here are 5 tips to help you win the fight against resistance.
Before we dive right in these tips, let’s define ‘resistance’, shall we? Resistance is a force. I personally divide into into two types – dark, and light resistance. Dark resistance is sent by the enemy of your destiny to keep you from fulfilling it. Light resistance is sent from heaven when we are off track, or heading to danger. In this article, I am obviously talking about fighting dark resistance.
Dark resistance lurks around the intersection of destiny and pursuit and it is just waiting to knock you down, or push you backwards. It works through situations, circumstances, and even those around or near you. It is a flat tire when you are on your way to a potentially life changing meeting, an unexpected circumstance that arises with the kids at school, a friend or loved one who suddenly seems to have a change of attitude towards you, a busted air conditioner that eats up the money you were going to invest in that new idea, or at worst a health condition that arises or even something as tragic as the death of a loved one.
Resistance is no respecter of persons, but the good news is that you can overcome it.
1. Be Aware of Resistance
So you may think wait a minute, how is being aware of resistance going to help me? Understand that when you are aware of resistance you are less likely to feed into it. You are able to recognize ‘that is just resistance’ and in doing so save yourself from the emotional and mental toil that can come with fighting it. It is sort of like having a diagnosis, so that you can then go on to decide the best way to treat the problem. You can understand that it isn’t really that your best friend was trying to tick you off today, it was just that resistance decided to work through her in hopes that you would be thrown off and not able to focus on that new project you were about to start. Understanding that some things are just coming from resistance will help you to forgive people, and be less frustrated with some situations.
2. Do Not Fear Resistance
This is a big one, because if you give into fear, resistance will surely keep you down. I have a friend who was starting a transportation company and bought three vehicles within a 3 month period for the company and all three vehicles had some sort of issue that caused them to slide off the road. This person had previously never had a wreck in their life! Crazy, right? That’s resistance for you. Thankfully they knew that it was just a dark force trying to keep them from moving into their destiny, and they did not give up. It would be easy for them to say ‘Resistance is going to kill me!’ and simply give into that fear and quit trying.
I remember there was a time that I was in ministry and every single time I would get up in front of a crowd and release what I was seeing in the Spirit, I would almost immediately come under attack in one of my relationships. It was like clockwork – and the person involved sometimes wouldn’t even be present – they had no idea that resistance was working through them. I knew I had to keep doing what I was doing though, I could not let resistance win, and eventually it got to the point where the occurrence wasn’t happening anymore. I had overcome that resistance. Imagine if I had given in and just kept quiet, not released the word that God wanted to give to the people, it could have kept others from their breakthrough, and kept me from growing in my gift.
3. Do Not Blame Others for the Resistance
Blaming others – even when they are quite literally the vessel of resistance – will only lead to more problems. It will also tell the dark forces that their strategy is working, so they will continue to use this same tactic over and over again every time you try to move forward.
It is one thing if someone is obviously being purposeful in resisting your forward movement, (if this is the case, tip 5 will help you) but many times people don’t even know that they are. Your child suddenly decides that they want to wake up 5 times during the night when you have 8 am meetings all week, your spouse suddenly is extra cranky right before your meditation time, or your dog decides to start tearing up the house every time you sit down to write that blog post. It may be easy to get frustrated with them, causing the issues to escalate but in reality you now know that it isn’t their fault – it’s just the resistance. Do what you can to help them in the moment, set healthy boundaries, and keep moving forward calmly. Eventually the resistance will stop trying to work through them when it knows that it is not an effective tactic.
4. Faith, Prayer and Meditation
Do not underestimate the power of calling for heavenly help against resistance. I personally believe in the power of the Holy Spirit and in angels working on my behalf. It can be easy though to forget to call on help as often as we should!
I find that meditating in the morning before I start my day, and at night when I am winding down is a huge factor in me releasing any negative energy, and receiving power and refreshment for a new day and restful night’s sleep. Resistance is a spiritual force that manifests in the natural so it only makes sense to fight it on a spiritual level. When you pray and meditate, envision the resistance being defeated, no longer able to operate in your life, or the lives of those around you. See in your mind all of the negative energy and frustrations that dark forces have heaped upon you throughout the day (or night if you had a bad dream) scurry away as you focus on the light and love of God.
Praying will also help you discern if the resistance that you are receiving is coming from dark forces, or if it is God’s way of guiding you to another path. Not all resistance is dark, some resistance is light and is sent to protect and guide you.
Having faith will help you to know if you should take a financial risk as well. I remember one time I was going to invest a large sum of money that I knew in my spirit was going to pay off hugely, but I did not have any natural guarantee of it. The very same day that I was going to invest the money my refrigerator broke down. I was a single mother of three at the time and I had to decide if I would still invest and trust God, or if I would spend the money on a new fridge. I went with investing into God’s Kingdom, and two days later the refrigerator repairman came out to look at my fridge.
When he told me the problem and I asked him how much he said it was no charge – his wife had told him not to charge me! On top of that exactly 7 days after I invested, I got a letter in the mail telling me that I was getting a huge return on my investment. Bold faith when it is guided by God pays off! I refused to give into the pressure of resistance and I was rewarded big time.
5. Self Control and Boundaries
Out of all of the people that dark resistance likes to pick on, it especially likes to pick on people who don’t have healthy boundaries in their lives, or who lack self control. Resistance has a hay day with these folks. It comes in and tosses them around like a cat does a mouse. This is because it can – for these folks are more unprotected and vulnerable than others. There is a proverb that says ‘A man without self control is like a city without walls.’ No boundaries = no protection.
Consider setting healthy boundaries in your relationships, your hours, and your activities. Just understand that at first resistance is NOT going to let it happen easily, but you must persist, as these measures of protection will be highly beneficial in the future to keep any vulnerable areas from being attacked in your life.
The obvious bonus hint that I will give you is to not give up. Resistance is a force that can be overcome, and if you fight it with wisdom, you will eventually get stronger than it. Questions or comments? I want to hear from you below!
