I’m starting to favor processes over affirmations.
Here’s why – when I write an affirmation like “I am an amazing athlete” and yet I’m overweight, smoke a bunch of cigarettes and drink every night, it just seems like bullshit. It’s actually not congruent with my behavior, and I explicitly think it’s untrue (I think “I wish!”).
On the other hand, when I set up a process to run every day (or every other day), I find that I naturally don’t want to smoke, engage in excessive drinking, excessive eating, etc. I also am on my way to getting fit.
I’ve figured out that if I leave things to will power, they don’t happen.
If, on the other hand, I schedule them, then I just find myself doing them. Why? Because they are scheduled.
For instance – if I had a job (I don’t right now, but if I did) – I’d schedule going to work every day so that I show up at 9 or 10AM. And every day I’d show up to work around that time.
If I set a goal to run a 5k and I’ve got a plan and I set a reminder on the days I want to run – guess what – I’m going to run the 5k!
Does this mean I’m perfect and run every day I plan to? Of course not.
Does this mean I show up at 9AM every day to work, right on time? Of course not.
Sometimes I’m late; sometimes I don’t run. But I do my best and find that for the most part, I achieve my goals.
The win is in the grind – every day doing something, not in wishing to do something.
So I’m starting to think of my affirmations as really more of a list of goals.
Today I’m transforming them from “I am [fill in the blank – something I am not]”, to “I am becoming [something I am not], with [fill in the blank routine]”