Elissa SolomonLife is a long journey, one we change with and are changed by. This means everyone, no matter who they are, will experience both successes and failures. To help us remain gracious in those good times, and mindful in those bad times, it’s healthy to adopt the best attitude you can.
Most often, this means taking the bad with the good, trying to be the fairest, best person you can, living by the principles that matter to you, and never taking yourself so seriously. This means that as life goes on and unpredictable circumstances occur, you’ll be best placed to learn from them and develop into the future.
One of the best methods of achieving this is to remind yourself of who you could be via daily affirmations. Affirmations are not only reminders, but helpful parameters you can use to manage your emotions, enflame your confidence, and retain your zest for life.
In this post, we’ll explore not only what affirmations are, but the benefits of using them in your daily life.
Examples Of Affirmations
Affirmations are repeated phrases, sayings or poems that help you think a certain way, or remind you of particular truths. This can be as simple as the old confidence booster “You’ve got this,” or as specific as “shoulders back, back straight, head up when public speaking.”
The Benefits Of Daily Affirmations
- Boosting Self-Confidence
We all need a little pick me up from time to time. Often, selling yourself on who you want to be through the form of an affirmation is healthier than denigrating yourself for “not matching up” to that just yet.
- Enhancing Positive Thinking
It’s easy to fall into self-critical spirals where nothing is worth doing or you’re unable to succeed, particularly after a difficult life event such as a job loss. But positive thinking can help you see the silver lining and make the best of what you have.
- Reducing Stress Levels
Comforting words can help you navigate tough situations. For example, repeating the words of support a grandparent once gave you, or reminding yourself that you’re working hard for your little ones can help you bring up that extra bit of energy when needed, or tolerate stress with more resilience.
- Encouraging Personal Growth
Life can throw up challenges, and many of them are hard to move through. But an affirmation can help you avoid throwing the towel in. If you’re really not feeling this morning run, you might say “Success is many little things done well.” That can inspire you to get out there with your running shoes and perfect the starting momentum of your day.
- Improving Mental Clarity
It’s very easy to become distracted in our day-to-day life. Sometimes, we need an affirmation to ground us. You might remind yourself of your main priority to help cut out the noise or reaffirm your worth and goals if you feel a little imposter syndrome in that new job.
- Curating Gratitude
Gratitude is one of the healthiest emotions and perspectives anyone can cultivate because it allows you to see the best of any situation and never allow yourself to become a victim. Maybe you’ll thank the world for the chance to try again, or if you’re religious, thank your faith for keeping you strong. Gratitude doesn’t have to be faith-based, but it certainly does provide a great deal of resilience.
- Promoting Emotional Stability
Life can be tough. It throws up all sorts of situations that challenge us and cause us turbulent emotions. This is where affirmations can provide a refuge to keep us going. For example, you might quietly say to yourself “This too shall pass” when challenged, reminding yourself that this experience is temporary and you’ll make it through this, too. Such a saying can also remind you to avoid feeling too attached to the good times but to enjoy them when they’re here.
- Building Better Relationships
It’s easy to forget that other people are flawed just as we are, and this can sometimes lead to disappointment or disagreements. While no affirmation should cause you to just accept negative treatment, they can help you re-establish your appreciation for the virtue of forgiveness, or the willingness to judge less. This helps you become a more textured person who avoids viewing people through impossibly high standards.
- Overcoming Negative Self-Talk
It’s important to mind your self-talk. A good affirmation can also be a question, and in this case, we’d recommend “If a friend were to speak to me in this way, would I continue to be friends with them?” It’s a nice question that helps you think through your self-talk and preconceived ideas of how you relate to yourself. This means you get to adjust how you think and relate to your inner monologue, and improve it as suitable.
- Enhancing Self-Love
You deserve to love yourself simply for the reason that you are living as the person you are. That’s enough. You don’t have to qualify your self-love, or earn it, or pretend to be worthy of it. Affirmations can help with this, because they also help you accept your perceived flaws as someone who is a real human and not a pretend character. For example, you might say “I am strong, I am kind, I am beautiful.” This also means you relate to yourself with more support. It also means you feel that baseline sense of love you deserve, which means any changes you do make, like losing weight or getting in shape, healthier to focus on.
- Empowering Decision-Making
Decision-making can be tough, particularly if you’re used to seeing both sides of a situation. But affirmations can help you feel confident to make that choice and live with it. A positive affirmation here might suggest “I will decide to the best of my ability now, alongside my gut feeling, and live with the consequences.”
This little attitude adjustment can help you break through decision paralysis and feel ready to accept what comes, the healthiest perspective to have when taking any path forward.
With this advice and included examples, we hope you can enjoy the benefit of daily affirmations and use them to enrich your life.
