Affirmations. Oh how I have a love/hate relationship with affirmations. At first I hated them. I loathed them. I thought they were stupid and ridiculous. But my therapist thought I would benefit from them so I dutifully gave it a half-hearted try, at least this was my attitude to begin with. I hated the idea of saying things to myself that I felt were a lie. It felt disingenuous to tell myself things like I was happy, loving, forgiving, safe, peaceful, or positive, when I was anything but.
I would say the affirmations and then finish by saying, “This is dumb.” Followed by lots of eye rolling. And usually followed by lots of crying. Yes, I cried through my affirmations. Like I told you I hated them, they made me feel miserable.
I promised that I would do them for 21 days so I was determined to stick to my promise. But a funny thing happened on the way to hating my affirmations. I began to see the truth and beauty of them. I started to see myself as a good and worthwhile person again. And I started to remember that I was all of those things I said in my affirmations BEFORE all this crap happened to me. I remembered that I was still me. Whoever came up with the idea of affirmations is an absolute genius!
Simply speaking, affirmations helped me to recover my true self. I said all of those dumb things to myself until I could remember that all of the things I was saying were really who I was. Not this broken version of me I had become as a result of extreme betrayal.
Now I love my affirmations! I make them up every week and say them everyday. I have even found some great I AM Affirmation on YouTube that I love. I listen to them in the car when I have to drive anywhere more than 15 minutes away. It helps me to remember who I really am. Affirmations have become a significant part of my healing. I highly recommend them to you! Even if you think they are stupid, do it anyway! Do it for 21 days and see if it makes a difference for you. You will be glad you did.
Be Strong, Stay Sweet
The Cupcake Warrior
