Why They Work And How To Use Them

If you have even a passing interest in the personal development world, you have undoubtedly heard of affirmations. Self-help speakers and authors wax lyrical about these positive little phrases – and for good reason too!

Did you know they’re linked with better self-image and are said to improve your worldview, eliminate doubt, and even help you manifest your goals?

Affirmations are a reminder that your words matter. The things we say shape how we feel not only about ourselves but the world around us too. They impact our moods and affect our behaviours and are said to rewire our minds at a subconscious level.

Want to know more and hopefully master this practice for yourself? Great. Let’s go…

What actually are affirmations? 

The Psychology Dictionary offers a simple and succinct definition:

An affirmation is “a brief phrase spoken again and again in an effort to plant seeds of happy and positive notions, conceptions, and attitudes into one’s psyche.”

To put it simply, affirmations are affirming statements that have the power to shift the way we feel about ourselves and the world. With enough repetition, they are believed to rewire pathways in our brains.

Affirmations have always been around in one form or another – they can even be found in the bible – but it’s arguably self-help author Louise Hay who brought them to the mainstream.

She encouraged her therapy patients to use affirmations and provides many examples of affirming statements in her bestselling book You Can Heal Your Life.

What does science say about affirmations?

The science isn’t clear cut, and – as is often the case with alternative practices – scientific studies are few and far between.

Still, affirmations do have some strong supporting evidence.

For example, in the 19th century, psychologist Émile Coué asked his patients to repeat positive affirmations, such as “Every day in every way I am getting better and better.”

Coué noted that the statements often helped his patients recover faster.

Self-affirmations, i.e. statements that affirm something we believe to be true about ourselves (for example, “I am a good person”) are also shown to make us feel much more positive.

Add to that, a study conducted by the University Of Pennsylvania showed that repeating affirmations caused changes in brain regions associated with self-processing. These brain changes were also shown to impact the participants’ behaviours positively.

In particular, a paper published in 2013 conducted at Carnegie Mellon University showed affirmations could boost creativity and problem-solving in students suffering from stress.

However, research shows that affirmations may not be beneficial for everyone. Researchers of a study conducted at the University Of Waterloo concluded that “repeating positive self-statements may benefit certain people, such as individuals with high self-esteem, but backfire for the very people who need them the most.”

They found that people with low self-esteem actually felt worse after repeating positive affirmations.

Does that mean affirmations can actually be more harmful than helpful? Not according to the researchers. Instead they recommended people with low self-esteem use affirmations when working with a therapist or coach.

How to use affirmations

Has the existing science about affirmations convinced you to use them in your own life? Awesome. Here’s how… 

Identify what areas you want to work through

There are two ways to do this. You can look at the areas of your life that feel unnecessarily hard (love, money, career?) and start figuring out the limiting beliefs behind them, or you can consider your biggest desires and tailor your affirmations towards them.

Our advice? Opt for an approach that combines both.

Say you want to undo your negative thinking around money and double your income this year. To do that, you’ll have to dive deep into your beliefs around money and cultivate new, more empowering beliefs by creating tailored affirmations.

Jot down all of the limiting beliefs that are standing in the way of your goal. Have you always heard that money doesn’t grow on trees? Or believed that only people who look and act differently from you can be rich? Get it all out on paper.

Once you have a list of limiting beliefs you’ll want to create affirmations that oppose them. Need an example? Well, “Money doesn’t grow on trees” could become “Money is abundant and it’s always flowing to me.”

The belief that you’re somehow undeserving of money could become “I am worthy of building wealth.” It’s all about changing your perspective and committing to the new belief.

Pace yourself

Armed with your list of empowering affirmations, you will undoubtedly want to recite them morning, noon, and night. You might want to dive right into the deep end and use all your affirmations at once.

But it’s best to start slow. Why, you ask? Because your brain is said to resist change. There is a part of you – known as the ego – that wants to protect you and keep you safe at all costs.

When you try to change too much at once, the ego perceives it as a threat and will do its utmost to stop you. (Often this happens in the form of self-sabotage.)

So, to start slowly, identify your most important affirmation first. It could be the one linked to your biggest struggle in life or to your most desired goal. Now aim to repeat it twice daily for a week.

Once you’ve solidified this habit, you can begin adding in more affirmations. Eventually, you might like to build up to five affirmations and repeat them one after the other in a sequence.

Remember, repetition is key

There’s no hard and fast rule as to how often you should repeat each affirmation. Some say three times is enough, others suggest 20 times or more. The important thing is finding a routine you can stick to you. It’s all about consistency.

While we’re on the topic, affirmations are best said aloud, but you can repeat them in your head too, or even write them down on paper. It’s up to you.

Time it right

Affirmations are powerful, but did you know they are especially powerful at two specific times in the day? Yep, that’s right. For maximum effect, you should repeat your affirmations as soon as you wake up and right before you go to bed.

Why so? Because our subconscious minds are said to be more susceptible to suggestion at these times of the day.

In fact, the thoughts we think in the 45 minutes before we sleep, are said to be repeated by the subconscious mind up to six times throughout the night. 

Make sure you’re feeding your subconscious something good!

Turn them into a regular habit

Think about the habits you repeat religiously every single day. It might be brushing your teeth, having a shower, or getting into bed. These are habits you don’t have to think about: they’re simply automatic.

When it comes to affirmations, the secret ingredient to success is remembering to repeat them on a daily basis. This is not a one-off behaviour, but something you need to do every day for maximum effect.

Want to make affirmations a habit?

In his book Atomic Habits, author James Clear recommends a concept known as habit stacking. It’s really easy. All you need to do is find a behaviour you repeat every day, such as taking a shower first thing in the morning, and use this ingrained habit, to develop another habit.

The ingrained habit acts as a trigger for the new habit. In this case, that means every time you hop in the shower, you’ll be reminded to say your affirmations out loud. 

Congratulations, you’ve just stacked a habit.

Make them believable

Many people disagree about whether you need to believe your affirmations for them to work, or whether you can keep repeating them until you do. A great way to cover all bases is to prefix your affirmations with a phrase like ‘I am learning…’ or ‘I am starting to believe…’.

For example, ‘I am starting to believe that money is an infinite resource.’ Starting with a phrase like this makes the affirmation more believable and in turn, means your subconscious mind is more likely to accept it as truth.

In time, you’ll be able to eliminate the prefix and say your affirmation loud and proud, without it feeling like an outright lie. Progress!

Do the inner work

Even with prefixes, affirmations can feel a little uncomfortable. When you say them out loud, you might notice you’re feeling a whole lot of resistance.

On the one hand, you’re telling yourself ‘I’m perfect exactly as I am’, while another part of you is shouting ‘No, you’re not!’. The latter voice is currently louder, but this doesn’t always have to be the case.

Next time you repeat your affirmations, think about what comes up for you. Why are you feeling resistant? What old wounds are preventing you from truly believing this new ideal?

Scribble down everything that comes to mind and commit to working through it. You might need a therapist to help you with this step or you can do it on your own with a regular journalling habit.

Some books that might help you on your journey include:

• Leverage Your Mindset by Ricky Kalmon
• Don’t Believe Everything You Think by Elise Read
• Mindset. Changing The Way You Think To Fulfil Your Potential by Dr Carol S. Dweck

Reminder: inner work isn’t about judging yourself for the way you think and feel. It’s about observing your thoughts and behaviours with a non-judgemental curiosity and finding ways to work through them.

Be patient 

Change takes time and as powerful as affirmations are they won’t work overnight. Well, for the most part. Sometimes you can get on board with a new affirmation straight away, but more often than not, these new beliefs will seep into your subconscious over the course of weeks. Maybe even months.

Don’t let this timeline deter you. Rather see it as a sign that you are slowly improving and evolving and will reach your destination eventually. As you progress, you’ll start seeing evidence of your affirmations too. 

Been telling yourself that you’re worthy of love? You might find your other half is making a special effort to spoil you. Been repeating an affirmation about the abundance of money? Don’t be surprised if you get an unexpected windfall. 

When old limiting beliefs rear their heads – and they will – take time to breathe and then recite your affirmation. It might feel funny at first, but with time this practice will become second nature.

According to Ralph Waldo Emmerson, “Speech is power. Speech is to persuade, to convert, to compel.” It’s time to choose your words carefully.