Do you feel like affirmations don’t work for you?
So you’ve learned all about positive affirmations. Spent the time writing them out. Been practicing and repeating them, trying to bring them into your life as the norm, but are now feeling lost. Have you been left thinking ‘is there something wrong with me?’. What do I do when positive affirmations don’t work for me?
If you’ve tried working with affirmations and positive self-talk but don’t feel like anything is changing then read on.
You’re in the right place, in this article I’ll:
- Explain why they haven’t been working for you.
- Give you a new way to work with them that can make a huge difference
- Share a meditation that will take working on your mindset to a new level.
The issue with positive affirmations
When you are looking to change your mindset, working on any limiting or unhelpful self-talk is really important. The things you say to yourself, daily has a huge impact on the results you get and the experiences you have.
One common way to help create change is by using daily affirmations. (We cover this in our free download Create The Life You Desire). To get the most benefit from these, they need to be structured in a certain way. But even then you may not feel they are working for you.
The issue is that when you make a statement that isn’t currently true for you, that little voice in your head casts doubt.
So when you, for example, state confidently to yourself in the mirror “I am confident and self-assured” your sub-conscious mind (which knows that currently you are not) will pipe up – “No I’m not, I’m full of self-doubt”, “Stop lying”, “You’re not you’re insecure” or words to that effect.
So you can end up in a battle between what you want to create and what your subconscious already believes to be true.
I used to have this feeling when I started using affirmations. I’d say a positive statement and get an immediate reply in my head saying “No, that’s not true”. But recently I’ve learnt of a new approach that stops this happening.….
The power of using questions instead of affirmations.
I first heard about the concept of Lofty Questions when a friend shared a MindValley video with me. The idea was started by intuitive healer Christie Marie Sheldon. Rather than using an affirmation as a statement, you create a question around it instead.
As previously mentioned, when you state an affirmation such as “I live my perfect life”, so often we can hear that voice in our head answering “No you don’t” straight after.
But when you ask the subconscious “WHY do I live my perfect life” it starts searching for the answer.
This is a really interesting way of working with affirmations for manifestation. It puts a whole new spin on things and helps your subconscious to truly begin working for you.
You are not stating something that isn’t true that it can challenge, you are asking a question. That sets the cogs going and the hunt is on for answers. Your subconscious and super-conscious (the all seeing and knowing part of you) can be left to figure out the answer and can give new insights, creative solutions and spark intuition.
The key to creating great lofty questions.
As with Affirmations, there are a couple of things to do to ensure you create great questions.
1 – As with affirmations make sure they are positively stated.
Create a question about what you WANT rather than what you don’t want.
So instead of asking “why do I sabotage my efforts to loose weight”, ask “Why is it so easy for me to always make healthy choices”
2 – Start with a Why.
This stops the self-talk challenging the statements and is the key to getting your subconscious on the path to finding the answers. It’s an open question evoking curiosity and creativity
3 – Create a relaxed state of mind
Honour yourself and the process and give yourself space and time to work on these questions. If you do a little meditation first, or some breathing exercises to ensure you are relaxed and calm, the mind is more open to receive the question.
Here are some example questions to give you inspiration.
- Why is it so easy for me to achieve my goals?
- Why am I able to achieve so much in a day so effortlessly?
- Why am I surrounded by such loving and amazing people?
- Why is my body always in perfect health and energised?
- Why it is so easy for me to find the help I need to achieve my dreams?
- Why is my business so incredibly successful?
A Meditation for Lofty Questions.
The following meditation is designed to be used with affirmations that have been turned into questions. Firstly I guide you into a relaxed state and then give space and cues for you to ask your subconscious the question you want to work on.
You may want to have a pen and paper or your journal with you to do some free writing afterwards. Sometimes the ideas and inspirations come after the meditation in the days afterwards.
Using this meditation regularly with the same question will keep your mind working on creating the results that turn your question into reality.
So if you feel like affirmations don’t work for you, go create some lofty questions for yourself and pick one to use in this meditation.
