How To Create And Use Self Esteem Affirmations

Doing self esteem affirmations is a great way to begin to replace the negative beliefs we hold about ourselves with positive ones. For those who are not already familiar with the concept of affirmations, they are simply positive statements that you repeat to yourself on a regular basis that begin to change the way you see yourself.

Self esteem affirmations are probably the number one success secret of most successful people and that's because the people that use them realise the power in affirming yourself, they realise that what you dwell on will ultimately grow and what you think about yourself is what you will ultimately become.

One example of an individual that used self esteem affirmations a lot was the great boxer Muhammad Ali; he would constantly tell himself (and the whole world, especially his opponents) that he is the greatest. He said it all the time and believed it and today if you want to make a list of the greatest boxers of all time, Muhammad Ali would certainly be right up there.

For you to be a success in life you need to think and talk about your goals as if you have already accomplished them, and doing self esteem affirmations help you achieve that.

How To Create Your Self Esteem Affirmations.

A self esteem affirmation is a statement that you say and also visualise and picture in your mind, and you say and visualise the affirmation as if you have already achieved your dream or goal.

There are 8 basic rules for creating self esteem affirmations that work.

1. Your affirmation must start with the words "I AM"

2. Your affirmation must be positive. Never use the word "NOT" in an affirmation.

For example

WRONG: I am not afraid of messing up my presentation.

RIGHT: I am passionately delivering the best presentation of my life.

3. Your affirmation should be kept short.

4. Your affirmation should be specific.

For example

WRONG: I am moving into my new house

RIGHT: I am moving into my 6 bedroom mansion

5. Your affirmation should be in the present tense including a word that ends with "ing"

For example

I am driving my new black range rover sports

I am delivering the best presentation of my life

6. Your affirmation should have a feeling word in it

For example

I am happily driving my new black range rover sports

I am passionately delivering the best motivational seminar of my life

7. Your affirmation should be about yourself.

All of your affirmations should be targeted towards yourself to change your own behaviour and beliefs not someone else's.

How To Use Self Esteem Affirmations

If you have been struggling with low self confidence and have been allowing it to stop you from pursuing your dreams and goals, here is an example of how doing self esteem affirmations can help you to overcome your self confidence issue so that you can begin to take action towards the fulfilment of your goals.

1. Use positive self talk

2. Set big goals and stay mindful of your goals (write them and place them somewhere you can see them every day)

3. Say and visualise your affirmations everyday

4. Take time to see yourself accomplishing the goals you've set.

5. Think about how good it will feel once you have accomplished your goals - feel that feeling you would feel when the goal is accomplished.

Here's an example of how you'd use all the steps listed above.

Imagine your goal was to become a professional singer, but you've always told yourself you couldn't do it because you didn't believe in yourself enough. Here is how you would use the self esteem affirmations exercise.

The first step is to change your Self-Talk to sound like the following:

I can achieve anything I put my mind to

I have a great voice

I am an excellent performer

I am a wonderful singer

I find it easy to practice everyday

The second step is to give your dream or goal a deadline like the following example:

I will have a song in the top 10 of the music charts by June 10, 2015

The Third step is to create an affirmation like the following:

I am happily listening to the radio hearing that my song has reached the top 10

The Fourth step is to visualise yourself having achieved your goal, do the visualisation everyday for at least 3 minutes. You can refer to the visualisation exercise in our self esteem activities section to help you with this. Sit down in a quiet place, get relaxed and begin to play the movie in your mind's eye, seeing yourself as a successful chart topping singer.

See yourself singing on stage, with your band and backup singers, see your dancers, see the crowd that has come to see you perform, hear the music, hear the sounds coming from the crowd because they are enjoying your performance.

Do all the step 3 times a day

When you wake up

At lunch

Before you go to bed.

Do this regularly and you will begin to see amazing results in your life.

The reason this works is that, when you say your affirmations and play your success movie in your mind's eye every day, it makes something happen to your brain. Your brain begins to subconsciously look for ways to make what you have been saying and seeing happen. You begin to see opportunities you hadn't seen before, you begin to eliminate the wrong beliefs that have held you back and made you doubt yourself and you begin to take action towards the fulfilment of your goals. That's the power of affirmations.

Click Here to Download the Boosting Self Esteem with Affirmations Worksheet

Dr Joe Rubino (one of the leading self esteem experts) has a great program for building self esteem. The program also has a lot of exercises and activities that will really help anyone struggling with self esteem issues. Click here to take a look at Dr Joe Rubino's Ultimate Self Esteem Formula Program.