How to Use Affirmations to Accomplish Your Life Goals

Do you use affirmations in your day-to-day life? Do you believe that they can help you achieve your goals? Or that affirmations contribute largely to your personal development?

If you do, you already know the power affirmations have on your life journey. You also know how effective they can be in helping to accomplish your goals.

And if not, I hope this article will convince you to use affirmations in your daily life.

Why use affirmations?

Affirmations are positive statements or phrases that you say out loud repetitively and believe to be true.

They help to restructure your thought process by weeding out any negativity or lack of belief in oneself. The more you verbalise affirmations, the more you believe in them and consecutively achieve your desired goal.

Use of affirmations is a self-improvement technique that’s backed by science and has been proven to work on confidence, self-control, and problem-solving abilities. 

According to a study on chronically insecure people, when people who strongly fear rejection use affirmations for 15 minutes, they become more confident up to 8 weeks later.

In another research on self-affirmation and self-control, it emerged that the use of affirmations shapes the way humans interpret the world around them, thereby improving their self-control.

According to the study, affirmations work by helping you to interpret changes in your life, approach difficult situations and tackle barriers in your life journey.

So, if you want to achieve a certain goal but your weaknesses are holding you back, a daily dose of affirmations can be extremely beneficial.

For instance, let’s say you want to start a business. You have the idea, a well-laid out plan, and resources. However, you’re afraid of getting started. You also fear that you’re not cut out for business, that your idea is not good enough, or that people will reject it.

You can use affirmations to get rid of your fears and take the step towards realising your dreams.

How do you do that? Below is a short guide on how to use affirmations.

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How to use affirmations to accomplish your goals

Whether your goal is to start a business, get a promotion at work, improve your self-confidence, reduce social anxiety, or develop a personal relationship with God, affirmations work for everyone.

But before we talk about how to use affirmations, there are three rules you need to adhere to for the technique to work. Without these three rules, you can’t make progress.

1. First, you must verbalise each affirmation repetitively.
2. Second, you must believe every affirmation you say out loud. 
3. Finally, your affirmations must be stated positively and talk of what you want.

Here’s how to effectively use affirmations.

1. Identify what you want to achieve

To get started, think about your goals and write them down in terms of priority. This will make your affirmations more practical. You want a scenario where your affirmations actually work, not overwhelm you.

Once you have your goals in writing, prioritised and ready to go, make sure you have broken down each goal into something readily achievable.

For instance, let’s say your goal is “Be happier and more fulfilled”. If you are constantly negative, this could take a lot of time to fully attain. 

You could then break down the goal into something you can achieve in the next four days or a week’s time, e.g. “I have a peaceful, joyful and more positive week.”

When repeated week after week, such a goal becomes a habit and leads you to a negativity-free life, accomplishing your major goal.

To easily identify what you want to achieve, focus on your negative attributes and weaknesses. Are you confident enough? Is there a trait you’d like to get rid of? What negative feedback have you gotten from your friends?

Conduct a self-evaluation test on yourself and write down all negative traits that keep you from succeeding. And then create goals that address these traits.

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2. Write down your affirmations

Using the goals you came up with in step one above, formulate your affirmations for each goal and write them down.

Putting down your affirmations on paper makes it easy for you to visualise what you are committing to do. It also helps you when you are feeling down and need to reaffirm yourself that all will be well.

Everything you write should be positive and in present tense, as if you have already achieved it. Use words such as “I am” and “I have” to begin your statements.  

For instance, let’s say your goal is “to have a closer personal relationship with God.” Some affirmations you can come up with include:

• “I have a personal relationship with God.”
• “God is my friend and companion.”
• “I talk to God for one hour every day.”
• “I read the Bible for at least 10 minutes in the morning and evening.”

Here’s another example. If, for instance you’re bad at saving money, you can set a goal to become better at saving. Using an affirmation such as “I save XXXX/- every month and love seeing my savings accumulate” can help.

Avoid using statements like “I can” or “I will” when creating affirmations because they don’t commit you to a specific thing or action.

At first glance, affirmations may sound weird and untrue, but the more you say them out loud and believe, the better you will be at actualizing them.

The list of affirmations is endless as they are unique to each individual. An affirmation that works for another person will not necessarily work for you. Ensure that your affirmations are true to you and address your needs.

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3. Start using your affirmations

Once your affirmations feel right, it’s time to implement them.

To start with, make sure the affirmations are readily available. You don’t want a situation where you need a confidence boost and can’t find them.

• Write the affirmations in your diary, on sticky notes at your desk, fridge, computer or car and on cards that you carry with you everywhere. If you are outdoors a lot, they should be in your wallet, purse, handbag,or pocket.
• Use affirmations when you wake up, several times during the day, and just before you go to sleep. You can also incorporate them into your meditation practice. 
• Keep in mind that, affirmations are more powerful when spoken out loud. This means that saying them to yourself internally is not as effective as speaking them out.

Do this every day and you will begin to see changes in your thoughts, feelings, attitude and behaviour.

4. Enjoy the fruits of your labour

At first, you may not notice any progress. In fact, you’ll probably feel like fake, discouraged and even weird when you write and say your affirmations.

But when you complete the three steps above successfully, you should be able to see results over time.

You’ll become a more positive person, react to difficulties differently, and feel constantly motivated to achieve your goals.

Also, you will become more aware of negative traits you may not have known you had. When this happens, use your affirmations to reverse the negativity. 

Useful Resource: The Success Principles: How to Get From Where You Are to
Where You Want to Be by Jack Canfield 

Conclusion

Affirmations are great tools when you want to become a better person and achieve your life goals. When you write your affirmations by hand and repeat them daily, you’ll be able to accomplish any goal you’re working on.

Challenge yourself to use affirmations each month. Identify one weakness or negative trait you’d like to get rid of and create affirmations around it. Let this month become an experiment for you.

What affirmations have worked for you? Share your experience in the Comments and motivate others.

 (Image Credit: markamoment on Flickr)