So I’m trying to work out this Gospel in my head and heart. Let me share a few thoughts and see what you think.

Jesus presents the whole package in the most concise directive:
Whoever wants to be My disciple must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.

The New Testament writers filled in on a number of specifics. As the Lord by the Spirit helps me to grow in understanding I thought of a way to synthesize the Lord’s command with my inner life. It is, for sure, an understanding still in process.

Deny self
There is an old man that was born in sin and had a nature subject to the world, the flesh, and the devil. That whole nature was regulated and calibrated according to one setting: 'self' is supreme and all things in the man must serve it.
Because we were created anew in Christ Jesus, and the old man/nature cannot access God (by nature it has no capability to do so) Jesus demands we deny it; put it off, away. It is, literally, no longer us. Paul says to reckon the old man as dead. He says that the new nature is actually dead to sin, and alive to the things of God.
Denying self, then, is decisively putting that old man/nature in it’s place . . . gone. The small–ish problem is that most of the faculties of our humanity have been serving self most of our lives. The lust of the eye, the pride of life, and the love of the world and its ways are all too familiar to us.

Here’s where the cross comes in
The cross of Christ is the center of our salvation. It is where the body of sin, its nature and rebellion, and the payment for all sin was totally satisfied. Here, Jesus was put to death, making it possible for people of faith to be reunited to their Creator. The cross symbolizes death. In Jesus’ case it also displays an ultimate change – an ending of one thing and a beginning of another. Jesus death on the Cross was the ultimate, emphatic end of separation from God, and the beginning of life in union with God. He counted this worthwhile.

Throughout his life Jesus bore the cross of denying, dying to, and refusing every internal or external pressure to deter Him from His appointed commission. Pleasing His Father and doing His purposes was the supreme intention of His being.

Taking up our cross entails having a like intention to Jesus. Having received Christ Jesus as Lord, so walk ye in Him. Every internal or external pressure we encounter that would derail us from our purpose is a cross. It presents the opportunity to make an end to the elements in our lives that remain connected to the old man - self. Then, to make that a beginning of walking in the newness of life in which we now abide.

Follow Me
While denying self and taking up your cross is essential, it has little benefit without the ‘follow Me’ part.

Continually fighting sinful thoughts, and striving to keep from sin is a zero sum game. It keeps us focused on ourselves and our propensity to sin, and counts ‘not sinning’ as success.

Yes, we discard and refuse all thoughts and notions contrary to the new nature within us. Moreover, we must intentionally meditate on thoughts and notions that align with and nourish this new life.

Most certainly we continue practicing behaviors that are in concert with our new and never ending life . In this new nature God Himself is working in us. He wills, He intends, He impels, He does all the things He desires.

What are those things, but just what we see in Jesus. He makes fishers of men, He loves, He does good works, He makes peace, He makes the Father’s heart and ways evident to people, He proclaims the good news of God’s love in word and in power.

So, at last, there is no need to run here and there. Since the God who made us and all things is presently at work right inside us, we'd do well to just join Him.