7 Ways to Fight Discouragement: By Jennifer Maggioনমুনা

# What's the Plan? ## The Lord God has a plan for your life. We talked earlier in the week about reasons we may be facing Discouragement, and one of those reasons was being out of alignment with the will of God. Of course, this is not the reason in all cases, as we listed several potential reasons why we face Discouragement, but I want to encourage you to camp out on this thought for a moment. God's plans for your life are always good and not evil, always to give a future and hope. We must regularly seek the will of the Father. Seek God's plan for your life in the big and small things. Sometimes, our Discouragement is rooted in trying to do our own thing without regard to the Lord's plan. We are going to "make it happen" one way or another. This is dangerous. Some of us know how dangerous it is because we've tried to manipulate and control our way into the life we want rather than follow the Lord. When we attempt to control our lives, we can step into new seasons too soon – seasons we aren’t prepared for yet. Perhaps it means we move too quickly into a new relationship or move to a new house without asking the Holy Spirit for guidance. When we pause and seek godly, wise counsel from those God has placed in our lives and seek the Lord in prayer time regularly - asking for the Holy Spirit to guide - we move into seasons that have God’s hand of blessings upon them. We don’t find ourselves running on hamster wheels going nowhere. When we do it ourselves, it can often feel like we're toiling through quicksand. The more we lean into His plans for us, the more we walk in encouragement, hope, and optimism. Make choices that honor His plan for your life. ### Points to Ponder: * The hardest thing many of you will need to do to battle Discouragement successfully is remove things from your life that God never intended to be there.