I wanted to share a few thoughts about a topic that has been on my mind of late…
Everyone is familiar with the notion of “affirming.” It is good and important for us to set our minds with a clear intention in the direction towards whatever goals we have. Everything starts with consciousness. In many ways, the world around us is merely a reflection of our own inner states of being. As one of my favorite songs puts it, “The world smiles when I smile, looks blue when I’m blue, and that blue shade I don't like at all…” We may not be able to control our circumstances, but we can at least strive to better our reaction to them.
Thus, affirmation (the repeating mentally or aloud of a phrase or attitude one wants to make part of oneself), can be very helpful. Repeating to oneself, “I am brave; I am strong” when feeling weak or afraid can actually help, as we tend to listen to those voices in our head, for good or ill…so we might as well make them good!
But my recent thought is that this needs to be done carefully. I've seen some who are so deep in affirming that, in a sense, they create an alternate personality that is a bit disconnected from who they really are. Just as faith ought to be merely a step or two past one’s experience lest it become presumption, affirming needs to be somewhat tethered to who we really are. Like yoga posture or exercise, we want to push the limits without tearing a (consciousness) muscle! We need to accept who we are and where we are at, and then gently, with compassion, do what we can to move steadily in the direction we have chosen. If affirmation helps with that, wonderful! If it is used to pretend to be someone else…perhaps less good. Let us all affirm together that we will use affirmation to bring us to our next step in growth and unfoldment.