Let me ask you a question. How kind are you to yourself? Probably not as kind as you are to your friends, your family, and sometimes even strangers. Why are we all so hard on ourselves??
I don’t have the answer to that question. But one way I’ve found to be kinder and gentler to myself is daily affirmations.
There are a couple of ways I’ve gone about this. When I first started, I had a list of things about myself that I knew to be true, but found hard to really believe. I found a little notebook and wrote them down first thing in the morning every day. Now I have a notebook full of the phrases:
I am smart. I am successful. I am beautiful. I am worthy of love. I am happy.
It’s crazy how empowering it is to acknowledge these things about yourself.
Recently, I’ve changed my pattern from writing the same list of qualities every day to writing whatever the hardest thing for me to believe about myself that day is. For example, the last couple of weeks I’ve felt really strapped for cash, so I wrote “My life is abundant and I have everything I need.” Today, I wasn’t feelin’ so hot about the way I look, so I wrote “My body is perfect and beautiful.” This will be my mantra all day. And incredibly, this small notion and declaration of self-love immediately made me stand a little taller and prouder when I left the house.
Now, I’m gonna get into The Secret territory for a second, so stick with me. The key to affirmations is to be positive and present. With the money example, I could have written “I will get out of debt,” but that just tells the universe that I’m focusing of my lack of money. It’s also projecting into the future, rather than focusing on the now. Same thing with the body image example, I wrote what I did instead of something like “I can lose weight” because the law of the universe is what you focus on comes back to you. I’m not focusing on my weight, because that will just add more on. I AM focusing on my beauty and perfection, not because I’m some egomaniac, but because in saying and believing that I am beautiful will amount to the universe reflecting that to myself and others.
Shameless plug here: If you’ve purchased a copy of my planner, you’ll notice that there is a spot every day to write affirmations. I hope you do this (even if you’re not using my planner!), and I hope it helps. If you’re willing, I’d love to hear what your affirmations are!