How To Create and Maintain Your Daily Affirmations
At aSweatLife, we love writing about how to achieve your goals, including how to reevaluate goals going in to the new year (which is right around the corner!).
For many women, goal setting consists of a couple key steps: establishing a goal, writing it down, and putting the written down goal in a place where it’s seen every day, such as a desktop background or mirror.
But what if we told you that there was another step you could take that would make your goals seem even more within reach? Saying affirmations out loud every can, surprisingly, do wonders in helping you visualize your goals coming true!
Read on to learn how to get started and why you should make reading affirmations out loud part of your daily ritual.
Mindset matters when creating affirmations
When sitting down to make affirmations, it’s easy to become sidetracked with a million distractions. Just remember: you’ve made a deliberate choice to take this time for yourself by creating affirmations in order to get closer to your goals. Don’t let the hustle and bustle of life and to do lists get in the way!
Just before creating your affirmations, try to relax your mind. A few suggestions to achieve this are doing 10 minutes of yoga, drinking chamomile tea, or meditating.
How to create an affirmation
Typically, an affirmation is a positive statement or declaration that is stated in present tense. They project a goal or type of lifestyle you envision for yourself. Then, they make it sound like you’ve already achieved the goal.
Karol Ward, LCSW, a psychotherapist, confidence expert, author and professional speaker, shared advice on creating affirmations.
“Exploring the ‘why’ of the affirmation is always a good first step and followed by ‘how’ and ‘what,'” said Ward. “If we don’t know the reason we need the affirmation, we can’t craft the one that will mean the most to us. Understanding the motivation behind the affirmation connects us to its importance.”
A few examples are:
- “I have more than enough money to thrive and afford the type of lifestyle I desire”
- “I am confident and successful in my career”
- “I am an incredible mother and do a great job juggling my business and children without guilt”
As you create your affirmations, a great first step is to think about a goal you want to achieve. Write down a present tense scenario in which you’ve achieved that goal, and voila! This is an affirmation.
Perhaps you only want to create one overarching affirmation, or maybe you write down several. There’s no right or wrong number of affirmations to create for yourself–make however many feel right to you!
Also, make sure you don’t get frozen with fear at trying to create the “perfect” affirmations. Try setting a timer for 20 minutes and writing down whatever affirmations come to mind. Once the timer goes off, review what you wrote and narrow it down to what you most want to achieve.
Repeat your affirmations out loud
Believe it or not, when you say your affirmations out loud, it triggers the reward part of your brain. According to research published in the Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Journal, this section of the brain also exists to lessen the impact of pain and remain calm in the face of threats.
However, what stops people from saying them out loud is the fear of someone walking in on them. If that’s something holding you back, a solution could be to record yourself saying your affirmations. Try it at a time when no one is home or in a private place where you feel anonymous, such as an empty room in a library.
Once you record yourself reading your affirmations out loud, the recording is available for you to play back every day using headphones for complete privacy.
Should I repeat my affirmations during the morning or evening?
The short answer to this often asked question is–it doesn’t matter!
Many people read their affirmations first thing in the morning to start their day off on a positive note. Others prefer to read their affirmations in the evening just before going to sleep.
The one important key is repetition, repetition, repetition! Listening to or reading affirmations out loud every single day helps you engrain them in your brain. Then, when you come across a challenge or setback, your brain is more likely to remember those positive affirmations because, well … you trained it to!
“Reading affirmations out loud moves them from words on a page to claiming them for yourself,” said Ward. “I also encourage people to share their affirmations with someone they trust and to acknowledge verbally to that person when the affirmations are working. This creates a double shot of positive energy.”
In short, there’s no easy way to achieve your goals. Accomplishing goals is often the product of hard work, determination, and the persistence to get it done. However, when you create affirmations and say them out loud every day, you get yourself one step closer to believing those goals are completely within your reach.
