The Reason Why Positive Affirmations Don't Work

How to Develop True Self-Confidence

Most people are afraid to speak in front of audiences. At least apocryphally, most people are more afraid of public speaking than they are of physical death. What then helps people to work up the courage and confidence to speak in front of an audience?

There's the old "picture them in their underwear / naked" bit of advice. That doesn't work for a number of reasons, one of which is it attempts to lower other people so you feel higher.

There's also the "just believe in yourself, you can do it!" advice. That's repackaging "I think I can, I think I can", and it's incredibly common.

If not for public speaking, then for some other task or event that made you apprehensive or even scared, I'm sure you've heard that second one. It's easy for others to say and it sounds "right". You just gotta believe in yourself!

Well how do you do that?

For the vast majority of people, it really is about saying to yourself "I think I can, I think I can." You don't use those exact words, but that's what you're doing when you repeat affirmation statements to yourself again and again.

According to one source, these are the top 10 positive affirmations in a North American context:

1. I am successful.

2. I am confident.

3. I am powerful.

4. I am strong.

5. I am getting better and better every day.

6. All I need is within me right now.

7. I wake up motivated.

8. I am an unstoppable force of nature.

9. I am a living, breathing example of motivation.

10. I am living with abundance.

Have you tried saying these kinds of statements to yourself? Do you do them now, every morning?

For people who are already confident, it gives them a boost. But for people who lack confidence but are trying to gain it, these kinds of affirmations actually erode confidence.

More than that, they erode self-trust because your subconscious mind knows you're trying to deceive it. It "knows" it isn't true, so your conscious mind loses credibility.

To truly live and act with confidence requires more than just instilling the right "mindset" through the use of affirmations. True confidence comes not from simply telling yourself you are what you aim to be, no matter how long and consistently you do it.

What's the term for believing you can do something or you are something even though there's no evidence you can or are that thing? Hubris.

Real confidence rests on a foundation of experience.

Your mind must have reason to believe you really can do it. That must be from your mind having "seen" you do the exact same thing before, something close to it, or something similar enough your demonstrated abilities will transfer over.

Nothing else will do it.

You really have only 3 options:

1. Erode your existing self-confidence & self-trust because your subconscious knows you're just blowing smoke at it

2. Create a fragile state of hubris where mistakes or unexpected challenges quickly & suddenly knock down the whole edifice

3. Build real, robust confidence by providing your mind relevant experience of prior success, so it knows with certainty you can do it and you'll overcome snafus that might come your way

That's it. There are no other possibilities.

One of the pillars of effective mental performance management is building, then continuing to expand and strengthen that real, robust self-confidence. Sometimes through the use of real, externally-verifiable experience. But much more often through tuning your focus, tearing down & redirecting destructive mental habits, and feeding "real" internal experiences.

What is there you're afraid of doing but know you've got to do?

Fear doesn't always manifest as terror or apprehension. It also manifests as procrastination.

Fear holds you back, and it is most powerful when you fail to address it and let it take root and grow. Like weeds in the garden, you must take action to improve the situation. It will never get better on its own.

God tells his people again and again, "Fear not". That's so we trust in him even when events around us seem uncertain or threatening. But the same "Fear not" also applies to the fears we have over factors within ourselves that we truly can control... if only we learn how and build the right habits.

"I think I can, I think I can" isn't the right tool. It isn't even a good tool, even if we give it a fancier name like "positive affirmations." Positive thinking has its place and is important when used the right way, but it makes a terribly soft, insecure and ultimately ineffective foundation.

Build real & robust self-confidence. You'll need it to fully be who you're meant to be and do the good works God has in mind for you.

Soli Deo Gloria.

Yπερνικᾶτε ἐν Χριστῷ. "Let us go be more than conquerors in Christ"