Affirmations
Our subconscious mind is like a computer,
and it is programmed through repetition.
Ron Hulnick
Repetition forms the foundation of learning theory, explains cult brainwashing, and is how we get porpoises to jump through hoops. The advertising industry knows this technique well, and spends billions to tell us over and over we would be beautiful if we would only buy their shampoo, or beer, or makeup. (Spoiler Alert: you are already beautiful!)
Affirmations are a way for us to harness this powerful force of change for our own porpoises. An affirmation is: one sentence long, written around something that has an emotional charge, in the first person, placed in the present, using positive language, with imagery to make it real.
How do we write an affirmation? During my mindfulness practice, I might notice I’m feeling: fear & anxiety, distrustful & disconnected, powerless to change my life, unloved and unlovable. I would then write down the qualities opposite of those judgments I would like to change. See the example below.
Ideal Scenes take this form one step further by placing the “I Am” statement in the middle of the page with phrases around a topic completing affirmations radiating out from this center. You then use the power of Repetition by saying a different affirmation several times a day. Print out your Ideal Scene and put it up by your bathroom mirror, front door, refrigerator door, under your TV remote. Then repeat an affirmation whenever you touch one of these objects.
My current Ideal Scene describing my spiritual journey is below.
I keep to (my) routine every day without variation. The repetition itself becomes the important thing; it’s a form of mesmerism. I mesmerize myself to reach a deeper state of mind.
Haruki Murakami
