Four Things that Weaken the Soul (and Five Ways to Strengthen It)
When Satan wants to attack a person, he’ll often target the soul (the mind, will, and emotions — not to be confused with the spirit of a person.) If something happens that weakens our soul, it makes us vulnerable to this kind of attack. We’ve all been through things that weakened our soul, but if we’re alert to what’s happening in those moments, we can help protect ourselves from Satan’s schemes.
Here are four basic things that weaken the soul:
1. Trauma
This could take the form of an accident or injury, particularly one that requires a long time to heal. The healing process involves our whole being, because our mind and emotions must heal as well. Although a lot of attention is given to the body during the recovery, the life-disrupting aspects of such an event can take a heavy toll on the psyche.
2. Loss of Freedom
An injury that requires bed rest can leave someone with a sense that they’ve lost their freedom, because it’s not as easy to move about. Even when it’s not connected to injury, loss of freedom alone can wear down the soul. During COVID, most people experienced a loss of freedom in some way—being unable to go certain places or do certain things for a long time, and this contributed to the weight of that event. God created people to have free agency, and our souls suffer at time when we feel trapped.
3. Environment
An incident that weakens the soul doesn’t have to be an acute experience or a single moment; sometimes it can be a series of lesser events drawn out, which weakens the soul over time, as with the previous example during COVID. This can also apply to environment. Someone who lives in a hostile environment, whether it’s at work, at school, or at home, will eventually bear the impacts of that environment on their soul.
4. Significant Loss and Grief
Any significant loss—whether it’s the loss of a loved one, or the loss of a job, for example—will, of course, strike at the soul. This is especially true when it results in grief. Grief is a personality. There are grieving spirits that will operate during these kinds of intense events, and their aim is to prolong the mourning process—indefinitely, if they can.
Such events also share common characteristics, such as confusion. When the incident first occurs, there’s great confusion—things don’t make sense, the world has been turned upside-down. This is a very vulnerable time for the soul. Another common characteristic is change—the significant loss causes change, whether temporary or permanent, and this is something else the soul has to deal with.
It can be difficult to keep up our spiritual defenses when our souls are already dealing with so much, but it’s in these times that we need those defenses the most. When our souls are weakened, we can be more easily influenced to do things we wouldn’t normally do—go places we wouldn’t normally go, spend time with someone—sometimes anyone—that we wouldn’t normally hang out with. While these are natural responses to traumatic events, it can cause us to leave the kind of openings that Satan would love to exploit.
So what can we do about it? Here are five things we can use to build up our souls:
1. Run to Friends and Family
If we recognize that we’re in a vulnerable moment, we can protect ourselves by gravitating toward people that keep us steady—whether it’s parents, a spouse, a brother or sister, or close friends. It should be someone who knows us well enough to understand what we’re facing and help us avoid emotionally-based decisions that we wouldn’t otherwise make.
This is most helpful in the early stages of a soul wound, but eventually that wound needs to be healed. And that will require a spiritual approach.
2. Scriptural Declarations
We can use scriptures that talk about restoration, rest, peace and comfort, and read these out loud on a regular basis. Initially, we may not feel much different. But Psalm 23 says the Lord restores our souls—we’re not looking to only soothe the soul, we want to heal it. That’s a spiritual process that won’t always affect how we feel, especially in the beginning.
3. Listening to Teaching
Along with declaring scripture over ourselves, I recommend finding a spiritual teacher that you like to listen to and who comforts your soul—whether it’s because they’re funny or enlightening or thought-provoking. This can simultaneously soothe our souls and strengthen them spiritually.
4. Listen to Music
Have you ever heard that water particles will reshape themselves in response to sound? A constant layer of worship music in the background (worship that heals, not the sad, lamentations-type stuff) can create a spiritual atmosphere that will soak into the soul over time.
5. Fellowship
Continuing to spend time around other strong Christians on a regular basis will uplift our souls. I think the most effective version of this is at church, in the worship service. Bible studies useful too, and outreach/social events may help, but there’s something about being in a large group of believers that stirs our spirits and refreshes our souls.