Affirmation Process- How to guide

I hope you have had a look at part 1 on affirmations, if not jump back there and read that first. If you want to dive right in on this ‘how-to guide’, here are a few key points you need to agree on before bothering with attempting affirmations.

1. Your inner beliefs and vision of yourself is the main factor that is shaping your current reality.
2. Will power can get you started, but eventually, you will need to address your inner beliefs to make substantial lasting change.
3. You are already making affirmations, privately, publicly and maybe with little forethought. This unplanned affirmation process has directly shaped your current beliefs and reality.

I said you need to agree on these points. Affirmations like religion need a little faith. If you have your feet firmly fixed in your current disappointing reality and cannot imagine a better situation, all the affirmations in the world are not going to help you. But if your mind is open to the possibility that changing your beliefs will ultimately improve your reality, then let’s get started.

Here is my guide to an affirmation process that works:

 

Believe it is possible

A great place to start the affirmation process is merely saying ‘it is possible’. Get in the habit of saying this, it places you in a state of belief. It is possible to be a self-made millionaire. It is possible to have a happy and rewarding marriage. It is possible to start and run a successful company. It is possible to learn a language.

People are achieving these things all the time, so obviously it is possible for you too. These simple statements are not affirmations, but this way of thinking is an essential step in breaking the grip of current reality and allowing your new vision to take root. Your affirmations should be talking about the situation as if it has already occurred, the way you might tell a person about something you already have or already do. Your affirmations should contain plenty of statements like ‘ I, I am, I have, My …’

For example,

I am a business managing machine, My  (company Name) makes X profit per month, I attract and employ smart staff and I grow leaders in my organisation.

This is an actual affirmation that I have used with great success. I can honestly say my profits have grown, the quality of the talent I attracted has improved, and there are some specific staff members that have grown in their leadership capacity.

 

Always positive

It is so easy to say something like ‘I have no bills’ or ‘I am a non-smoker’ or ‘I never eat fatty foods’. Your brain puts a picture straight in your mind of precisely what you are trying to avoid. The better way to achieve some of these changes is to focus on what you want rather than what you are trying to avoid.

‘I have no bills’ might go ‘I earn $….. per month, save …..% of my earnings and make smart profitable investments’ or  ‘I never eat fatty foods’ becomes ‘I exercise regularly and eat healthy nutritious food every day. Stopping smoking is a hard addiction and I would suggest other interventions as well, but affirmations will help change your self image towards a healthier vision.

Basically, your affirmations should be pulling you towards something, avoid even talking about the habit or problem you want to change. Focus on what it would look like without the issue. We are trying to work towards a place where the old habit does not fit the picture.

 

Consider the affirmation carefully

Imagine you have a magic wish machine. Anything you wish for you can have. Straight away, you start conjuring up images of cash, cars, houses, talents, beautiful partners etc. Then you read the T and C on the side of your machine

• To bring wishes to fruition, focus and personal change will be required from the wisher. These efforts will need to be proportional to the wish sizes.
• Specific descriptions of amounts, specifications or qualities should be included. Eg ‘I want to be rich’, is not specific.
• Choose carefully, fewer wishes at once tend to work better.
• Wasting wishes weakens your wish machine.

With these guidelines in mind, you decide to put some real thought around your wishes.

Affirmations are the same; you need to consider how you want things to be. Try and build the details in and keep it specific. This is not magic; you have to work at it, you want to make sure you get the right outcome for your efforts. Fewer affirmations mean you can focus harder. Once you lock in a future destination, you have to be consistent, to refrain or take breaks will weaken the process.

 

Own the words

We all have consistent commentary running in our heads. This self-talk naturally sounds like you, it is in the language you use and understand. Your affirmations need to be in a natural tone and language that you would use. Taking affirmations from other people can be helpful to understand the process. But ultimately this needs to be in your words. You are talking to yourself in past tense as if you have already reached the future reality, try and make them as natural as possible. Repetition, over time, will groove them in.

 

Try a balanced approach based on your needs

Making affirmations in just one area of your life can eventually leave other areas behind as with most things so try and take a balanced approach. I personally find health and fitness easy, and not much work needed there to stay on track. Alternatively, money-making and investment was not something I had great examples in my life. Currently, I have four different affirmations around company growth, marketing skills, my skill level in management, income and investments. At the same time, I have one affirmation around health and wellbeing. Not having my affirmation for health could eventually see me skipping the gym to clock up more desk time, clearly not ideal. This should be an endless cycle of self-assessment and adjustment on the current affirmations you are practising.

 

Consistency is key

Your self-talk has been a big part of the formation of your current beliefs and reality. You are talking to yourself all the time. When you wake up, on the train, before you go to sleep. It is a consistent stream of conversation that starts as we first start to form our language skills. With this weight of discussion going into the current state of your beliefs and views, it is little wonder affirmations take time to be effective. Try and take a moment every day to go through your affirmations in a set time, mornings make the most sense to me. Throughout your day try and run through them in that dead time in cars, in bathrooms or on public transport. The more you practise, the faster the process can work. Be patient as some of the beliefs you may be trying to adjust might be deeply rooted with hundreds of hours of self-talk, past experience and current reality. Any of your beliefs and views can be changed, but you need to get the hours upon the affirmations.

 

Add Some Emotional flavour

Your self-talk works, because it is packed with emotion and visuals. Imaging an argument in your head, a past confrontation or a potential future confrontation. If you get into it, you can see the situation clearly and truly feel the emotion of the situation. Your body may even respond with increased heart rate and breathing. You imagined the situation, you added pictures and felt the emotions. Your body reacted like it was happening. Try and develop this within your affirmation process. Take some time to add relevant images or people. Try and feel the level of pride and satisfaction that will come with your new outcome. This might take a little practice at first but is well worth it. Feeling positive emotions are a part of achieving things. Your affirmations will be more productive and powerful if you can feel the emotion of the outcome.

 

An example of my process in action

Affirmation

I am a sales and marketing god, great leads worth $… in recurring month revenue flow into my company, we close them quickly and retain them as clients for five years plus.

Visuals

To this affirmation, I visualise a god-like sales manager (Thor actually), I see signed contracts with my designated amounts of recurring revenue, and I see happy long term clients.

Emotions

I feel the excitement of closing new business and the happy joy of mutual partnerships with long term clients.

 

So get started. 

Try something simple at first. Take it easy you are learning the process. Work with the above steps on one or two affirmations for six months consistently. Then make an honest appraisal of how you feel about and perform in that area. I hope some of this content brings some Better Life Living to you.