When Positive Affirmations Don’t Work (And How to Fix It)
Hold on, hold on. If you’re someone who uses mantras or positive affirmations and loves them, don’t grab your pitchfork just yet. Positive affirmations can and do work for a lot of people! And they didn’t work for me for the longest time because of a key detail that isn’t always made super clear in self-help spaces.
There’s a difference between thoughts you believe in your heart and just need practice to remind yourself of, and thoughts that you don’t believe at all. One of these works as an affirmation, and one isn’t going to work because your brain is going to call bull. I have a feeling you can probably guess which is which. On the surface level in a lot of spaces, when people talk about affirmations, they just say something along the lines of “think a nice thought about yourself and repeat it often.” Here’s the things I was never told though: if I don’t actually believe the thought, it’s not really going to get me anywhere.
You might be thinking, “If I already believe it, why practice it?” To that end, I want to make a distinction that there’s a spectrum of belief. On the one end, you have thoughts that no part of you believes. If your brain is convinced that you are ugly and unlovable and you try thinking “I am beautiful and worthy!” your brain’s probably throwing a big red X because that doesn’t feel believable. Thoughts that you totally believe in every part of you aren’t super helpful affirmations either because there’s nothing to practice or improve there. It would be like practicing the thought “I am a human,” which most of us believe already, your brain would respond with “okay… and? Why are we doing this?”
But the middle of the spectrum is where effective affirmations live, and this is how you make shifts in your brain. There are different centers in your brain that can believe different things (I like to differentiate between logic and lizard brain, which will be a future blog post). These different beliefs are what cause cognitive dissonance. You can logically know that there are people that love you, but emotionally feel unlovable. The goal of affirmations is to coax the emotional part of your brain in the direction you want to go, but that’s a lot easier if some part of your brain is already on board. So instead of trying to think “I am lovable,” using “there are people that love me” might help nudge your emotional brain in the right direction.
How do I know if I believe a thought? It feels a little bit differently for everyone. I have a teacher who describes it as “when I think the thought, something shifts in my body.” I like that description but it can feel a little unclear to heavily logic-leaning brains. I don’t really have a better description either, but I sometimes like to imagine a little guy in my head that has three signs: “definitely not,” “maaaybeeeee?” and “heck yes!” The maybe is what we’re shooting for here, it’s like I could convince my brain, it can see the path there, it just needs a little repetition to play with the thought.
The other complication I’ll highlight is that what your brain believes can shift hour by hour depending on your thoughts, feelings, and nervous system state. So when I’m calm and grounded, I can believe “it’s possible I’m lovable,” but if I’m mid sensory meltdown or shame spiral, I’m for SURE not on board with that thought, so I have to downshift to something that’s easier to believe, “people I trust have told me they love me before” or “people like me have people who love them.” With time, finding the right thought to practice moment by moment can get easier, but it’s helpful to have a scale of these thoughts on standby for the big thought you’re working towards. I was taught this concept as a “thought ladder” where you’re climbing up the ladder towards your goal thought, but that made me feel bummed when I had to go back down a rung. So I like to call these “lilypad thoughts,” I can hop back and forth between lilypads without feeling bad about it. (Plus, imagining my brain as a little goober of a frog helps take myself less seriously).
These lilypad thoughts come up super often in my coaching sessions, and it’s the exact tool I use to shift some extremely core thought patterns regularly. The more often you practice thoughts that your brain is holding up the “maaaaybeeeee?” sign for, the more you build neuroplasticity and shift towards the goal thought. You just can’t jump straight to the other side of the river, you need some lilypads! If you want to implement this in your life, work through teh short journal prompts below.
Journal Prompts
What do you wish you could believe about yourself that you want to work towards?
What is the thought that your emotional lizard brain believes now?
What lilypad thoughts can you set up between here and there?
Which of those lilypads feel like a solid maybe (like one part of your brain believes, but the other isn’t quite on board yet)? What does that level of belief feel like in your body?
How do you want to practice that sweet spot thought regularly?
Have fun with your lilypad thoughts, and always feel free to reach out if you have questions! <3
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