In our world there are lots of self-help guides and books, presentations and recordings to help a person lift their self-esteem, self-worth or overall and general positivity towards life. These can be an accumulation of many so-called ‘loving’ words and affirmations that one can say once or twice, or be recalled repetitively throughout the days, months or years to come.
Affirmations can be telling ourselves things like, “You are good enough,” “You are beautiful,” “You are positive, happy, amazing, worthy, successful etc. etc.,” and even “You can do anything.”
But does telling ourselves we have all these positive, easy-going and highly desirable traits and talents really work? Does it feel real? Does it last? And do we really live it? Or are these words really just presenting to us the knowledge that if we tell ourselves repetitively that something is true about us, we will eventually believe it?
What if a true affirmation was actually something that was felt in our own bodies, already known absolutely and just simply remembered as a configuration within our every living cell: that we are already everything – that we are already enough.
Would it be possible to then use our daily words and personal appreciations to simply support and confirm this, and never to just tell ourselves what we are? There would be no need to label ourselves with words that describe who we want to be, leaving us thinking that we will reach our goals or get there someday; thinking that if we repeat affirmations many times, perhaps even sticking them to our fridge, we will one day believe it about ourselves in full.
Could it be that our number one and true affirmation is that we are love?
We don’t ever need to teach ourselves this nor try to recall it as knowledge – because we already are love, it’s just a simple fact.
With the choice to stop and to feel who we are, in our own bodies, in this very moment, is it possible that all anyone ever truly wants is to be love and to be loved? If so, there would be many places in our daily life where we would look for this love and one of the most obvious places is in the way we speak to ourselves; including what we tell ourselves about who we are, what we are good at, what we are worth, how we look, what we are capable of and, perhaps, even what our purpose in life really is.
The most common conversations we have daily – if not moment-to-moment – happen within our own heads. Our internal dialogue is where such affirmations happen, driving and striving us to be better or to achieve personal development, growth and success, but does this drive to be greater someday actually work for us and most importantly, does it feel natural, easy or truly loving?
There can be great simplicity in the relationship with ourselves and this begins with knowing who we already are, from the very inside of our own bodies, within our hearts. Our bodies know when something feels hot or cold, good or bad, and so they definitely know when words are just words and are not truly felt or lived in full – when they are not a part of our Livingness.
It is true there are many writers, presenters and courses that one could seek out to support themselves in affirming who they are, and changing how they would like to live. But a true and loving affirmation cannot just be found on a calendar page or a magnet on one’s fridge, or through words spoken at you by another.
When the love we are is simply a fact that already lives inside us, we can then live each day knowing and confirming this as our truth through the choices we make to accept ourselves in full and appreciating the wisdom we hold in our own bodies.
By Cherise Holt, Nurse, 32, Brisbane
Further Reading:
Who Am I?
Appreciation, Appreciation, Appreciation
Appreciation – A Pathway to Love
Livingness
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
“When the love we are is simply a fact that already lives inside us, we can then live each day knowing and confirming this as our truth through the choices we make to accept ourselves in full and appreciating the wisdom we hold in our own bodies”. This truth can be felt in ones body, when we are connected to it. Otherwise as you have already shared it is just words, that the eyes see but the body cannot feel. Confirmations and appreciations are felt through the body. Anything else/less will only be superficial…
When we move the love that we are we can feel the truth.
Mary, when we move the love, others can feel it too. Sometimes they don’t know what to do and sometimes they awaken and realise, that there is more to life than just words.
‘But does telling ourselves we have all these positive, easy-going and highly desirable traits and talents really work? Does it feel real? Does it last? And do we really live it?’ from my experience in the past with using affirmations … No they do not truly work. It is easy to say them similar as it could be easy for someone to say to another person ‘I love you’ but not really mean it. Further from my experience it has been a process of truly connecting with my body more, letting go of ill ideals, beliefs, patterns and behaviours that was in disregard of and to myself, the Esoteric Healing modalities helped massively with this, clearing from my body all I had accumulated in life that was not truly me. In doing this I then had more self-love and self-worth from my body not my mind saying i had this and then when I did feel things from my body, a feeling of loveliness, this was natural true and not forced or false state. Our body really is the marker of all truth and once we clear all from it that is not truly us it has the space to be what it truly is ✨
When we appreciate our essences we are in fact loving who we are and this is the most power-full way to evolve.
The thing is we already have love within us but because we do not feel it or live it we then try to convince ourselves by using thoughts to bolster up our self-worth. When we link to the fact that we are love and we know love from the inside out that’s when things begin to change and the external confirmations are not needed.
We are love, ‘is it possible that all anyone ever truly wants is to be love and to be loved?’
When we feel something in our bodies then we can own it as being true, I can know something but until I feel it, it remains as knowledge outside of me. Allowing me to reconnect back to my body is the greatest gift I can give to myself so worth the struggle to let go and just allow.
‘The most common conversations we have daily – if not moment-to-moment – happen within our own heads.’ This is so true, I’ve never looked at it this way and it makes me wonder what is the qualities of these conversations we have with ourselves. Are they, appreciative, loving and honouring or are they judgemental, negative and abusive?
Affirmations tend to take us further away from who we are because we are asking for something to either fix us or fix a situation, yet when we live from love we know there is nothing to fix.
When we connect to our inner-heart we know who we are.
We know who we are, and we know that we are love, ‘When the love we are is simply a fact that already lives inside us, we can then live each day knowing and confirming this as our truth through the choices we make to accept ourselves in full and appreciating the wisdom we hold in our own bodies.’
When something is known in the body and then lived from the knowing, it is very powerful. I find it more powerful than when you are told something or convinced to believe something, and then try to live it from there.
Affirmations don’t work because it feels like we are trying to convince ourselves of something which we do not believe is true. Feeling the love that we know we are from the body comes with a deeper knowing and the body responds to this. Then it is up to us to develop that relationship with the love that we are.
Affirmations that simply come from the head will not work, our body knows the truth.
I used affirmations when I was younger, of course they didn’t work because I was saying something that didn’t feel true for me. When we learn to build love in our bodies and connect more to our inner hearts we don’t have the need to search for something outside of ourselves, we can then move from the love and connection we feel within.
I actually feel that having a positive outlook on life is important, not that we need chants or affirmations or anything, but just the realisation that the angle of our focus is vital to the place we ultimately end up at.
I remember trying affirmations once, I got a little frustrated because they didn’t seem to work. Now I know that when I live from my heart I have everything I need.
Feel it before we speak it. Live it and we move in it.
Affirmations are like a tip of an iceberg … actually they are not even that. Affirmations are very superficial. Acceptance and honesty along with a willingness to heal will start to get to the root of something (the bottom of the iceberg) including knowing the love that we all are.
Connecting to the feeling of love within the body is naturally confirming of who we are.
If we’re rushed, stressed, over-working and generally completely disconnected from our body, it’s hard to imagine that there’s any love in it, because in those moments we can’t feel it. Taking moments in our day just to stop and feel the body, feel underneath the stress or anxiety or whatever emotion we’re feeling, helps us to start to build a relationship with our bodies where we actually want to be with whatever we’re feeling instead of wanting to run away from it. When we stay with our body, we can start to heal whatever it is that we’d rather not feel, and to want to take care of it and love it.
We have people living in a way that do not truly enjoy life, and we have a lucrative industry addressed to them aimed at picking them up, cheering them up, etc.. Yet, what the industry provides, does not really change anything. You may buy a thousand T-shirts with the word Love but it may not mean a thing. You may decorate all of your house with ‘loving’ phrases but may not do anything for you. The truth is that only healing does something for you. Only a body that heals is able to shift thigs inside and can change the way it moves.
There is a feeling of love within the body that I have connected to via the Gentle Breath Meditation, and that has blown away any ideals of what love is, and instead opened the door to a daily way of love that is always with me.
I remember how hard it used to be for me to even admit that I wanted to love and be loved. It was too much of vulnerability, it was far easier to say that I wanted to be rich or successful or whatever. Now looking back, I can see the ridiculousness of this – wanting to be something while stubbornly resisting my own essence when in fact that was the very thing I most craved. I can feel the insidiousness of the way those affirmations drive us further from our essence.
This blog really describes all the things about mentally-driven affirmations that never felt right or really useful to me. When I tried that ‘reprogramming’ approach of self-affirmations it always felt empty and as if it was coming from someone else, because I was not ready to actually make the self-loving choices that would confirm these positive affirmations at all.
I can so clearly remember the day I decided to start using affirmations, with the first one being “I love myself’.
My response was instant and really stunned me as the words ‘No I don’t!’ emerged loudly from my mouth. Initially I struggled to understand my reaction but I persevered and as I did I started to feel within my body that there were blocks in the way of the natural self-love we all have for ourselves. It has taken a while, and not one more affirmation, to come to a place where I truly love myself and live that love every day.
Personally the fact that I am love, was for me for a long time just another affirmation. I just did not feel that on a constant basis. Now it is there almost constantly, which is the greatest gift I could find.
Great blog Cherise. The only danger being is the fact that we are love should not only be a fact but also felt in the body. Otherwise it is just another affirmation.
I used to do affirmations for many years, nothing ever changed because they were done from my head and had no love in them whatsoever.
A quality that is felt, moved and lived in the body is known. Affirmations feel to come from a lack, or trying to become more in some way without the living of those qualities.
Affirmations are like a bit of plaster we pile on hoping that, if we repeat them often enough, they will stick eventually. Confirmation of what we already are is of a very different quality and supports us more than any affirmation ever could.
Yes, this is a great way to describe the quality of these two words, one confirms that what already is while the other hopes for something that we wish to be.
I cannot but wonder if everyone wants to love and be loved why is the world in the mess that it is today. What are we doing to ourselves.
The fact that we are love will remain a mental fact until it is lived and felt in the body.
Something we are not actively living can maybe temporally feel like the reality with affirmations but it never can be sustained as it does not come from inside ourselves. We need to address why we don’t feel good and treat the root cause for true and lasting change.
When we connect to our divine inner essence we know and feel that we are love, we feel it through our bodies, no need for any affirmations when we are connected.
Affirmations are very much about trying to change ourselves from the outside in, but it’s kind of like painting over a wall with positivity when the house we are living in is always going to feel negative if the source of energy we are aligned to is from our spirit. Aligning to our soul is the true way to feel amazing, not because we tell ourselves so but because we are so.
Affirmations are very much about trying to change ourselves from the outside in, but it’s kind of like painting over a wall with positivity when the house we are living in is always going to feel negative if the source of energy we are aligned to is from our spirit. Aligning to our soul is the true way to feel amazing, not because we tell ourselves so but because we are so.
there are so many things happening in this world that seem to be the answer… Affirmations of course… Mindfulness is another one that seems to be leading so much of humanity down a garden path that just leads to a compost pit… It is only when we truly connect to our bodies that we can stop the old destructive paradigms of our mental processes.
“And do we really live it?” This blog gives deeper meaning to the expression ‘Actions speak louder than words’.
Beautifully expressed Cherise. The simplicity and truth of love that is already within us (always) is far from the complication of using mental affirmations to
fill up with and feel better about ourselves. No external seeking, confirmation or learning knowledge required, only a re-turn to re-connect to the inner wisdom, equally available to all.
“We don’t ever need to teach ourselves this nor try to recall it as knowledge – because we already are love, it’s just a simple fact”.
True the wisdom of our bodies is the real marker of appreciation and no words repeated or written down can be believed by the body, it is not a matter of the mind convincing the body it is the other way around if we feel our body and the love that does reside within, even beyond pain and tension, then our mind can settle and surrender to impulses of love.
This is very beautiful Cherise. In deeply reflecting on the relationship we hold with our bodies, the marker of truth, and how our bodies will always communicate what energy we are aligning to, we are offered the opportunity to deepen our relationship and connection to the love we are so we can live all that we are.
The problem with using words that are devoid of their livingness is that we get used to their emptiness because of our own emptiness. So, we try to fill emptiness with empty words.
Interesting point Eduardo, it does feel like that. How often do we express with a fullness and appreciation?
Spot on Cherise. Affirmations are often coming from our heads, a desire to be something we are not already. When an affirmation is aligned to something we feel in the body, it activates something that is already lived.
When I first tried affirmations in an attempt to change my life I really wanted them to work, as nothing so far had. But it didn’t take too long to realise that this was simply another hope that was not going to give me what I was looking forward. I figured this out when in response to me repeating ‘I love myself’ over and over suddenly from deep inside I heard the question, ‘do you really?’ I was stopped in my tracks and knew that I was being asked for total honesty and the words that I spoke in reply – ‘I don’t think I do’ – were definitely from a place of honesty. Those words made me realise that there was something getting in the way of me loving me and I could feel that what that was I was finally ready to discover.
Beautiful blog, rendering all those aspirational affirmations obsolete in favour of one simple truth : We are Love. Important to realise all the negative self-talk we allow to run amok in our minds throughout the day and remind ourselves through our actions and choices that we have all we need already – we’re born with it; we’ll die with it. So let’s get on with living it.