Affirmations are the act of “affirming” or stating as fact, emotional support or encouragement, according to OxfordLanguages (Google’s Dictionary).
Positive affirmations are positive phrases or statements to challenge your negative thoughts.
It seems simple enough to repeat positive phrases to yourself throughout the day to keep motivated or happy.
However, positive affirmations have been criticized and studied to find out if they really work.
Why focus on positive thoughts?
No one wakes up wanting to be negative, stressed or have anxiety about something.
Unless you have the personality of the main character in the book, A man called Ove by Fredrick Backman. A must-read book about an angry old man with a powerful message on how people impact yourself.
I have been struggling lately with my son’s (Baby No. 2) childbirth. At 36+ weeks, his birthday is just around the corner.
Although childbirth is pretty much unexpected, I had a decision to make after having a C-section with Brooklyn. Do I try for a vaginal birth or do I get a repeat c-section?
I feel blessed to have the opportunity to even have the decision as an option. Yet, the decision has been weighing on me this whole pregnancy. As the days get closer, I started to have more and more anxiety about it.
One of the recommended ways to prepare for a positive birth experience is to use affirmations.
I have known about positive affirmations before, and have used daily affirmations to reach goals.
But I started to really question, do affirmations work? Can I create the positive birth experience that I want to have with baby boy?
This is when I started to research…
How to make affirmations work?
I wish it was as simple as just saying, “I am happy” or “I am successful” over and over again to make real change happen.
Unfortunately, that’s not quite the case.
Here’s a few tips I’ve learned to help make affirmations work and help better your life.
1. Affirm beliefs you value
According to self-affirmation theory, affirming traits or behaviors about yourself that you value will help you cope with stressful experience or negative thoughts.
However, a study on self affirmation explains that the key is using self evaluation to know what your core values are in life. Using phrases or terms that are too broad won’t be as helpful.
Instead of saying, “I really like myself,” you would say, “I am strong,” “I am an amazing mother,” or “I am confident.”
Using words of affirmation that are core values like the importance of family, admiration and love, or words that make you feel inspired, can help you feel a sense of security.
This can be empowering when you have feelings of self doubt, fear or criticism.
2. Affirm through action
Positive affirmations need intention and purpose when it comes to being effective. Studies have shown that using a daily journal to write down your affirmations is a great way to start affirming the process.
Along with that, it’s even more important that your daily actions align with your affirmations.
For example, one of my affirmations is going to be for my birth experience - “I trust my body.”
Beyond telling myself that about my birth experience, I need to remind myself that during my workouts. I need to remind myself that I trust my body when I have backaches or Braxton Hicks.
I also think back to times when my body was so powerful and my body earned that trust.
• When I had my daughter Brooklyn in an expected C-section, but I recovered.
• I went on to after her birth to lose more than 50 pounds.
• I completed 75 Hard, which challenged me physically and mentally.
When you start to think about reinforcing experiences the list could go on and on. My reflection of that just gives me more fuel to truly trust my body.
3. Affirm reality over fears
Sometimes you may not have past experience to reflect on positively, but it’s just as important to remind yourself that fears are not real.
I’ve written about limiting beliefs before, or what could also be referred to as, fears.
So much anxiety and stress is based off of what could happen rather than what actually does.
Before you make a decision on those positive affirmations, it’s important to understand where your fear or anxiety is coming from.
Is how you are feeling based on reality?
With my birth experience, I have this extreme sense of fear because it didn’t go as I planned with Brooklyn. It was traumatic. There was a pandemic going on. I didn’t feel connected to my daughter. All scary things.
These fear feelings can happen after a diet failed. After you witnessed a bad relationship, or you keep ending up in bad relationships. After you recently lost a job or when you retire after years in a career and have never known a life without your work.
Fears stem from something. A past experience, an outsider’s experience, or maybe, uncertainty of the unknown.
However, those experiences are not your present. Ask yourself, what is happening right now? What can I do right now?
You can make new experiences happen. The past does not need to repeat itself.
Worst-case scenarios are not your reality.
Affirm confidence in your life
Positive affirmations are not going to magically change your life or self-perception.
It takes dedication, self-evaluation and some simple daily practice to make real change.
I wish I had the secret to confidence. I wish I had a crystal ball to see into my future and know exactly how things were going to pan out.
But what a boring life to know everything that is going to happen before it happens.
It’s those unexpected joys that give us life, and unexpected sadness that gives us perspective and appreciate for our life and those around us.
Live your life to the fullest. Affirm a positive life.
Stay simply confident,
Kayla