You’ve heard or read that positive affirmations can change your life. People have been talking about them for decades and anecdotal evidence seems to back up the claim: If you spend a few minutes each day declaring what you want as though it had already happened, your reality will change to match that declaration. And so, you spent every morning, perhaps for weeks, standing in front of the mirror chanting “I’m rich. I’m rich. I’m rich”, only to check your bank account and see that it had miraculously, um, declined. If you’re one of the people for whom affirmations haven’t worked thus far, this post is for you.

An Affirmation is a declaration that something is true. In that way, it’s correct that when you affirm something with the goal of actually making it happen, you have to state it as though it has already happened. “I’m rich”, instead of “I want to be rich.” But just using the right grammatical structure isn’t enough. Let’s look at what affirmations actually are and why they work (or not).

The process of creating and receiving has nothing to do with the words that you speak and everything to do with the vibration you offer. Your vibration is a result of your thoughts and beliefs. Whatever you focus on, comes into your physical reality, providing you focus on it enough. When you want to receive something into the physical that you don’t currently have, you must find the vibration of that thing – its frequency – and match it.

1. Use your emotions to guide you

The Law of Attraction doesn’t respond to your words, it responds to your vibration. If you match the frequency of whatever you’re trying to create, it will manifest. How do you know what frequency you’re matching? You can tell by the way you feel. I’ve written extensively about emotions, so won’t repeat all of that here. You can read the articles about emotions and/or download the free e-book to get the full story. In a nutshell, your emotions are a kind of vibrational feedback system, that tell you if your thoughts are serving you or not. You can use this guidance system to help you find the exact frequency of what it is you’re trying to create. You can match the frequency of your desire, by finding the feeling you would have if you already had it.

Let’s say you’re poor as a church mouse and you want to be rich. You can find the frequency of being rich, by figuring out what you would feel like if you were rich.  For example, getting a bill in the mail wouldn’t bother you at all. Shopping trips would be adventures of possibility, not disappointing journeys. You’d think “I could get that. Do I want to?” instead of “I want that, but I can’t afford it.” Looking at a luxury car, you’d think “I like the leather seats, but I’d choose different rims” all while knowing that you could easily buy it, instead of feeling jealous of the current owner. Every financial transaction and interaction would feel different, and by finding that feeling, you can shift your energy.

So, just saying the words of an affirmation isn’t enough. You have to find the feeling place of what it is you’re looking for.

2. Don’t go for Quantum Leaps

Don’t try to shift too far from where you are. Energetically speaking, if you try to shift your energy too great a distance in one go, you either won’t make it or you won’t be able to hold on to it, both leading to the same result: Your affirmations will fail.

Let’s say you’re currently a size 16 and you want to be a size 8. Can you really find the feeling place of being a size 8? There’s a huge difference between those two states of being, and chances are, it’s going to be hard for you to imagine what it feels like to be that much thinner. But you can probably find the feeling place of a size 14 fairly easily.

Here’s the thing: You don’t have to start by affirming your end goal. You can change your affirmations as you go along. Your affirmations will only work, if you have the ability to believe them. If you’re affirming “I’m a size 8” while a size 16 is staring back at you in the mirror, there’s a big part of you that’s probably screaming “I’m not a size 8!! And I never will be!!” It’s hard for you believe. But again, a small, incremental change is easier for you to wrap your brain around. The trick is to find affirmations that are close to what you believe now, but are just a tad outside your comfort zone – they represent a small change in the right direction. So, if your current belief is “I will always be poor”, the first affirmation you’ll want to go with is “I could possibly be rich one day”, instead of “I’m rich.” Then, when that feels completely true, you can move to the next step – “There are lots of ways in which I could become rich, even if I don’t know what they are yet”, for example. Take baby steps instead of quantum leaps and you’ll get there.

3. Spend enough time on your affirmations

The dominant vibration always creates your reality. No exceptions. What does that mean? If you hold a belief that you’re fat (or some other belief that leads to that result), and you spend 2 hours a day focusing on that, you’d have to spend MORE than 2 hours a day focusing on the opposite: “I’m thin”, in order to create any change.

This isn’t as hard as you think. While you may spend a great deal of time hating your body and focusing on your size, it’s usually only for a few seconds at a time. So, focusing on the opposite vibration for a concentrated period of time, say 10 minutes a day, can bring about massive change. It takes a lot of stray thoughts to equal 10 minutes… The point is that the amount of time you have to spend on each affirmation is directly related to how much focus you give to the belief that’s causing the unwanted situation. A small issue could be shifted by focusing for a few seconds just once, while larger issues may take several minutes each day for weeks. Focus enough energy on the belief you want to hold, however, and your reality must change. That’s why they call it a law.

Affirmations can and do work, provided we do them correctly. Now that you’re armed with the information of how they actually bring about change, you’ll hopefully find the success with them that you were looking for (providing you hadn’t already). I know you can do it! I know you can do it! I know you can do it! 🙂

Have you had an experience (good or bad) with affirmations? Don’t forget to share your thoughts in the comments and let everyone benefit.