Using Positive Affirmations to Improve your life

Affirmative statements have power.

We have all heard of curses and blessings. They work if you believe in them. If you can find a way to say something that makes you believe it then it can have a powerful positive effect on your life.

Also there are moments and states of consciousness in which you are more receptive to affirmations. In general, the more relaxed and at peace you are the better they are going to work.

I have decided to start my day with some positive affirmations. I say them before I get out of bed and continue to say them in my head for some of the morning. I find it almost surprising how good it can make me feel.

The advantage of this practice is that it helps you lay a positive foundation on which you build your day.

If you basis for decision making is "Life is an adventure and it's fun" you will make very different choices than if it is Life is hard and pointless". In the first case, your attention will be drawn to the positive aspects in every situation and this will help you find solutions and create success. On the other hand if your underlying thought pattern is that life is hard your attention will be drawn to the problematic aspects of your reality rather than the positive ones.

Many people advocate the use of recordings which play you affirmations while you sleep. I am not sure that this is the best way to go about it. I think that doing it consciously probably works better.

Designing your Affirmations

Here are some tips for designing effective positive affirmations.

• They must be said in the positive. For example say "I am wealthy in every way" rather than "I don't have any money problems." This is because your unconscious only hears the ideas and ignores negations. Therefore the first version tells it you are wealthy and the second version tells it you have money problems.
• Be specific. For example "I have more than enough money to buy everything I want" is better than "I have lots of money".
• Be short and get straight to the point.
• Have an emotional element to them. When you say an affirmation, imagine that it is already true and feel how that makes you feel. You want to say affirmations with your whole being.
• Phrase in the present tense.

You can find some examples of in this (good) article about positive affirmations.

Avoiding negative thinking altogether

What is the point in spending half an hour repeating affirmations to yourself in the morning if you are not going to monitor your thinking throughout the rest of the day? It probably will help anyway, but if you really want results (to change your beliefs significantly) then you should become aware of what you are thinking all of the time and make sure that it's positive !