Dreams without action or a plan remain just that, dreams. The mind controls whether or not dreams can be reached, and through the power of affirmation, the mind can be programmed to achieve whatever you are striving for. Simply put, affirmations are the act of writing down a thought or phrase relative to a specific goal or outcome and repeating it to yourself daily until your subconscious mind helps you turn this goal into reality. For me personally, I have a small book of ever-changing affirmations I repeat to myself daily until they become my reality. There are 4 components of a quality affirmation. There must be a concrete and well defined goal, a set completion date or time frame, a process or plan that will lead you to success, and what you will need to give up or sacrifice along the way. With this in mind, let’s discuss how to structure your affirmations using a specific goal that many people may resonate with, exercise!
Affirmation Example Broken Down
Losing weight and exercising is such a popular goal, however, people plan on doing this all the time yet have lots of difficulty following through or staying consistent. To combat this trend, insert affirmation. Start to ask yourself questions such as, “why am I going to the gym and what is my goal here?” For some people it may be to lose weight or gain muscle, no matter what it is, it needs to be clearly defined. For example, lets just say the goal was to lose weight and that you know you’d feel better if you lost 20 pounds. Great! Your goal is now clearly defined which makes the rest of this process a whole lot easier. Next comes the deadline. How long do you anticipate this will take you to accomplish and how much do you want to push yourself in a healthy yet moderately intense way? The day I am writing this is July 6th so lets say that you want to give yourself 3 months to lose that weight. That would mean your completion date would be October 6th. Setting milestones along the way with a timeframe might be advantageous as well so you know you’re staying on track. Next comes the plan and process. For this, you decide you will go to the gym 5 days a week, spend at least 20 minutes on the treadmill at the gym, and make sure you eat under 2,500 calories a day. Being specific about this will help keep you from cutting corners and force you to stick to your plan. Lastly, being clear on what you need to give up along the way is crucial. This allows you to let go of anything holding you back from achieving your goal and reinforces its bad nature in your head deterring you from it consciously.
A completed affirmation for this goal would look something like the following:
I will lose 20 pounds by October 6th because by doing so, I know I will look and feel better overall. To do this, I will go to the gym 5 days a week, run on the treadmill for at least 20 minutes during those 5 days, and keep my daily caloric intake down to 2,500 calories or less. Accomplishing this goal will require me to give up all junk food and to stop drinking every Friday night at the club. I know that by doing this I will be giving up something unimportant in favor of achieving a truly meaningful goal, my health and happiness.
This is just one example of an amazing affirmation. Please use the formula and tweak it for your goals and circumstances. it should be written by you, and meaningfully stick out to you in your mind. If it doesn’t, try again until you create something that resonates with and excites you. You can create affirmations for multiple goals at once, but be careful not to overwhelm yourself. It is advantageous to stick to around 3 or less goals of this nature at once and rotate new affirmations once previous goals have been completed and your priorities change. This is meant to be an ever-changing process so change and adapt it to your current goals all while making sure you stick to and complete previous ones.
Why New Year’s Resolutions Suck
It’s time to talk about the elephant in the room and why they never work, New Year’s Resolutions! How often do we go to the gym from January 1st – January 7th and it is fully packed? Why is it that just after that gym attendance returns to normal? People make empty promises to themselves to change every single year at this time and for the most part never do. This is because their affirmations are weak as well as their desire to accomplish their goal. With the implementation of the proper affirmation along with passion and desire to complete a goal, New Year’s Resolutions can actually become meaningful improvements in your life, even if it isn’t around New Year’s Day! The power of the affirmation is extremely abundant and clear for those who use it. For me personally, it has improved the confidence I have in myself to achieve anything, and I’ve seen tangible progress towards my extremely large goals everyday. Affirmations are a staple of my daily routine and will continue to be for the foreseeable future due to the impact they’ve had and continue to have on my life!