Removing Negative Blockers through Positive Affirmations

I remember when I first started to focus on using positive affirmations. It was pretty incredible how many people felt that they needed to be "real" with me when they said that "Just thinking positive is a waste of time,"

Well-intentioned, they missed the mark on what positive affirmations are and how they help a person remove negative blockers. Before I get into positive affirmations, let me first say that no strategy will work if you don't believe it will work. Belief is an incredibly powerful motivator. It is why those who believe in God are hard-pressed to not see Him in their everyday lives, and those who don't are hard-pressed to find Him at all.

Our beliefs define our experiences. Now that we have that out of the way let's dive into positive affirmations. Positive affirmations are statements written in the form of a positive rather than a negative.

For example, if I wanted to lose weight, I could say, "I don't want to be fat anymore," or I could say, "I want to lose weight and feel great," on the surface both statements seem as though they would produce the same results.

However, if you dig deeper into the psychology behind the words and the message, you will notice that the two statements produce significantly different results.

Let's peel away the layers of the first statement. "I don't want to be fat anymore," You start the statement with a negative 'don't.' By beginning your statement with a negative, you have already started to tell your mind to ignore everything that comes after that negative. Instead of thinking of ways to make a positive change, you are now focused on the negative, which is that you are fat.

You see yourself as fat, so when you lose the willpower that one day (which just about everyone will) rather than being kind to yourself and striving to do better next time, you lament your choices and validate that you are now and will always be fat.

What happens next is that instead of eating that one slice of cake, now you eat the entire cake. Or instead of having that one scoop of ice cream, you are eating the whole container. Does this sound familiar?

With positive affirmations, we start by telling ourselves something in the affirmative. "I want to lose weight and feel great," In this statement, you focus on what you want rather than what you don't want. You want to lose weight and feel great. If I am honest, some who challenge this statement as a positive and would rather see something along the lines of "I am happy and healthy," instead, and that's fair. I still like to include a statement about losing weight because it was an essential part of my transformation.

You will want to craft your positive affirmations based on how they make you feel when you say them. If saying "I am happy and healthy" brings you good vibrations, let that be one of your positive affirmations. If it is, "I have found my soulmate, and it feels amazing," go with it.

The vital thing to note is that positive affirmations ideally should be written you and vibrate at where you want to be. When you choose an affirmation that invokes positive feelings when you say it aloud, you know you have chosen a good one.

Write down a list of affirmations that inspire, motivate, and encourage you to chase after your goals.