How do positive affirmations influence reflection and self-improvement?
I have a somewhat complicated relationship with positive affirmations; I have read and understood the science (at a high level) behind positive affirmations; I believe in the value and outcomes that can be achieved through it, I try to be a positive thinker, I try to encourage others to do the same; but, I know that there is little in life that comes to those who do not put in the work. That’s where I find many people talking about positive affirmation misleading or ingenuine — they almost dismiss the need for work; dismiss the concept that we can learn from negative situations, dismiss the need to reflect, learn and develop ourselves.
Let us take a step back and start again, positive affirmation is a psychological term to describe the behaviour of repeating positive phrases or statements used to challenge negative or unhelpful thoughts. There is academic evidence that positive affirmations can have a positive influence on the decisions that we make in common situations, in short, when under the influence of positive affirmations, we are more likely to choose actions that lead to positive results. There is even MRI evidence suggesting that specific neural pathways are increased when people practice self-affirmation tasks leading to better decisions — that’s pretty incredible, right?
Amazingly, the below benefits of daily affirmations are documented in this article at PositivePsychology.com
Self-affirmations have been shown to decrease health-deteriorating stress (Sherman et al., 2009; Critcher & Dunning, 2015);
Self-affirmations have been used effectively in interventions that led people to increase their physical behavior (Cooke et al., 2014);
They may help us to perceive otherwise “threatening” messages with less resistance, including interventions (Logel & Cohen, 2012);
They can make us less likely to dismiss harmful health messages, responding instead with the intention to change for the better (Harris et al., 2007) and to eat more fruit and vegetables (Epton & Harris, 2008);
They have been linked positively to academic achievement by mitigating GPA decline in students who feel left out at college (Layous et al., 2017);
Self-affirmation has been demonstrated to lower stress and rumination (Koole et al., 1999; Wiesenfeld et al., 2001).
What’s the catch? The catch is that “positive affirmations” are often misrepresented as a solution to a problem without putting in the work — that’s where I cringe a little when reading posts or stories on the “power of belief” — like simply believing in yourself guarantees success. These are actually not positive affirmations in most cases, they are click-bait or marketing strategies praying on peoples desire for easy wins in life. Just saying “I want success” or liking a post on social media promising success is not going to get the job done. Even worse, framing this mindset around effective reflection; somebody who is of the mind to always be positive, may be less likely to evaluate situations they are in, and their actions and outcomes in a truly honest way.
This brings us back to the question we initially set out to answer in this article; “How do positive affirmations influence reflection and self-improvement?” — if I had to choose between the two, I would take reflection every time; reflection is a way of analysing your actions to identify how you could have achieved better results within the context of that situation, sometimes by tweaking your choices, sometimes by making completely different choices. To do this effectively, we must be honest with ourselves and review the bad, along with the good.
In saying all of that, I appreciate the importance of your state of mind when reflecting, that is exactly why My Reflections recently released its sentiment analysis features, and clearly, somebody who is using positive affirmation techniques will tend to have more positive sentiment results when completing their reflections. Positive affirmation can, as we have discussed, shift your mindset and the choices that you make, both personally and professionally and that is really important when evaluating performance and learning from mistakes. Further, having the right state of mind, using positive affirmations, will allow you to analyse situations in a more pragmatic way, helping you to identify potential areas of improvement without attaching emotional responses that may hinder your personal growth and self-improvement.
In conclusion, positive affirmations are scientifically proven to make a significant difference to our perception of ourselves and the way that we respond to situations that we find ourselves in. Combining positive affirmations with self-reflection potentially increases the value you can gain from both exponentially; that is you will get more out of your self-reflection and you will therefore make better decisions and reinforce the results of your positive affirmations.
