Affirmations - Why Yours Need To Be Supercharged - Part 1
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by: DebbieThomas
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If you have spent any length of time studying Personal Development these days, you must have heard that what you think about is what you will bring about in your reality. If you focus consistently on what you want you will start to really Believe it. When you really Believe it, you will begin to take the appropriate action that will move you closer and closer to what you desire. We often hear that Seeing is Believing, but it's the reverse that is really true. It's called the Law of Attraction and was talked about in the movie 'The Secret.'
When it comes to the way our brains learn things, REPETITION is key. Think about it - how did you learn your times tables in 5th grade math - repetition. How does an actor learn his lines - repetition. How did we all learn to walk and talk - repetition. So it stands to reason that if you want your mind to believe in a different way than it currently believes, you are going to have to teach it how to think that way by repeating what you want to believe.
That seems logical doesn't it? If you repeat something over and over, your subconscious mind will begin to get the message and agree with you, right? So we make up affirmations about what we want to believe. Affirmations, repeated as often as possible are the mainstay of most self help programs and THE method of choice to 'Fake it until you Make it', and keep a positive attitude, because you are essentially repeating over and over what you want to believe.
OK, that makes sense too. If we all keep repeating affirmations, we'll all be rich and happy, right? Sounds simple enough. So then.... Why aren't we all rich and happy? Because we DON'T KEEP DOING THEM!! At least not long enough for them to take effect. This happens to so many people. I think there are two reasons for this:
1. If we don't see instant results, we have a hard time actually believing what we are telling ourselves, so we give up in disgust, and
2. We don't know how to turn things around when something puts us in a bad mood or makes us unhappy, we let the negativity spiral downward and we have nothing to grab onto to stop the spiral, so we quit and tell ourselves that 'this was stupid anyway.'
The main reason we don't keep doing daily affirmations, even though we know repetition is the best way to learn is that the affirmations are aimed at changing deep rooted beliefs. It's not the same as changing your nail polish. Most of our beliefs about ourselves were deeply implanted before we were 7 years old. So if you have a deep belief that money is the root of all evil for instance, you can affirm that you are a millionaire all day long and all you will echo back is " Who are you kidding?" it won't take long before the average person gets bored, too busy or out and out frustrated long before the affirmations can start to work.
Now if you did do them every single day without fail, you would eventually see a change, but since you belief systems won't allow you to change instantly, most people give up in frustration way too soon. It's not your fault though, at least not in a conscious way anyway.
Here's the rub. We really are made up of two minds - our conscious mind and our subconscious mind - AKA your ego. Our subconscious mind - the one that runs all the minute parts of you that you have no conscious idea are going on (like oxygen and the right nutrients to every single cell in your body) is really the one who is in charge. It has been operating you just fine all these years and likes you just the way you are - even if that is broke and miserable. It knows that program. So when you consciously start to interfere with its operation of YOU, it takes offense. So you begin out of the blue to affirm that "I am successful and free" and it constantly feeds back "No you're not - are you nuts?" So you try to force the change and it will come back at your with every reason in the book why this is a stupid exercise and a waste of your valuable time. This 'Belief Detective' as I call it will keep you right where you are if you can't get past it, or at least acknowledge what is happening. The great irony in all of this is that it truly believe it is protecting you. Go figure!
So what do I do now, you ask? You need to start thinking right now about how to bypass the guardian of your 'Belief Detective.' One way to do this is to put your affirmations into a song. Your subconscious mind stops being on guard when you are singing. It's called suspending your disbelief, much like you do when you see a movie (or did you really believe in Spiderman). And once you get a song stuck in your head, you usually sing it all day long, thus feeding your subconscious on autopilot. Think about it right now and stay tuned for Part 2 where we discuss how to change your negative attitude instantly.
About the Author
Debbie Thomas is the creator of AttitudeZapz! Affirmation Jingles. These catchy little jingles with affirmations built right in will motivate you to keep positive and focused on what you WANT to believe.
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