I have thoughts about affirmations. I use them. I like them. Your words shape your life. This isn’t me telling you affirmations are pointless.

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What I think is pointless is how they’re often taught. Pick the life you want, write sentences saying you already have it, repeat them 47 times every morning. Boom, reprogrammed.

Repeating words isn’t automatically the same as changing what you believe.

Do affirmations work?

They can. Back when I was broke in the middle of Arkansas, I said things like “I’m a business owner. I’m extremely wealthy.” And eventually it did land. But with what I know now, that was the long way. There are much more potent ways to use your words to shift your beliefs.

It’s not about finding the magic words. It’s about what’s happening inside you when you say them.

Take “I am beautiful and I love my body.” Person A says it and thinks, “Yeah, I actually do.” It reinforces something she already believes. Person B says it and immediately feels resistance, disgust, and every negative thing she believes about her body comes up. Same words. Completely different internal experience.

There’s research on this too. In one study on positive self-statements, participants repeated “I’m a lovable person.” People with higher self-esteem got a benefit. People with lower self-esteem actually felt worse afterward. The same positive sentence isn’t universally positive. What you already believe matters.

Why affirmations backfire

We tend to picture the brain like a whiteboard. Erase “I’m not good enough,” write “I am extraordinary,” done.

Humans are so much more complicated than that. We have memories, associations, emotional responses, expectations and evidence stacked in one direction or another for every area of our lives. Saying a sentence, however many times, doesn’t instantly erase all of that.

If a statement creates an immediate internal argument, don’t spend 10 minutes a day practicing the argument. You’re just fanning the flames of resistance.

Don’t make it positive. Make it accurate.

Instead of a giant leap, build a bridge. If you’re at “I hate my body,” you can’t go straight to “I’m obsessed with my gorgeous, perfect body.” Try:

• My relationship with my body can change.
• I’m learning to speak to my body differently.
• There are things about my body I appreciate. (Literally, my liver is working. It doesn’t have to be aesthetic.)
• I’m becoming more comfortable in my body.
• Eventually: I love my body.

Money works the same way. From “money is always a disaster for me,” a jump to “money flows effortlessly and I’m incredibly wealthy” gets an internal “lol, have you seen my bank account?” A bridge sounds like:

• My relationship with money is allowed to change.
• I’m learning to make different decisions with money.
• I’m becoming someone who feels safe paying attention to her money.
• I’m building evidence that I can handle more money.
• I’m open to receiving more money.

This doesn’t mean only saying what you already believe. You can absolutely rehearse something you haven’t embodied yet. That’s the point. You’re expanding your current belief, not pretending it isn’t there. Look for language that makes you feel, “Okay, I could see that.”

Resistance is information

This is one reason I love pairing affirmations with EFT tapping. I’m not trying to overpower resistance with a pretty statement. When resistance comes up, now we have something to work with.

Say the affirmation is “it is safe for me to be seen,” and the immediate response is “no, it’s not,” followed by a list of every comment, DM or childhood moment when being visible wasn’t safe. Great. That’s information. In tapping, it might become: “Even though part of me doesn’t feel safe being seen, I deeply and completely love and accept myself. Even though I learned that visibility can mean criticism and rejection, I’m open to creating a different experience.”

One of my favorite phrases, which I learned from Brad Yates, is “maybe it’s possible.” What if it’s possible for someone to criticize me and for me to still have a good day?

Pay attention to what you rehearse all day

You can spend 10 minutes saying “I trust myself, I follow through, I’m capable,” and then spend 15 hours saying “I’m such a mess. Of course I messed this up. I’m terrible with money. I never follow through.”

Which language are you rehearsing more often? Your intentional affirmations don’t exist separately from how you narrate yourself all day. It’s not about policing every thought. It’s about noticing repetition. The reps you do most are the muscle you build.

How to use affirmations so they work

1. Choose it. What do I actually want to believe?
2. Check it. What happens inside me when I say it right now? Belief, relief, excitement, nothing, an eye roll, an argument? Write it down.
3. Bridge it. If it’s too far away, what’s the next believable thought on the way there?
4. Feel it. Let the words connect to something real. Don’t manufacture excitement, and don’t mechanically read 50 statements while thinking about dinner.
5. Prove it. Create evidence through your behavior. If the affirmation is “I’m capable of rebuilding trust with myself,” say “I’m going to go fill up my water bottle,” then go do it. If it’s “I follow through” and the 45 minute gym session isn’t happening, take a 10 minute walk. If it’s “I’m good with money,” make one small money decision that matches.
6. Repeat it. Give the new language enough repetition that it becomes familiar.

Affirmations aren’t magic words, and they aren’t useless. They’re a tool. I’m not trying to bully my brain into believing something way out in front of me. I’m practicing language that supports where I’m going, and paying attention to everything that comes up along the way.

So don’t throw your affirmations out. Just get better at listening to what happens when you say them.

Want to go deeper? Come to my free class, Stop Starting Over: 5 Steps to Becoming the Woman Who Follows Through.

Watch the full episode of The Purpose Show here.