Every so often I find myself going through stages where day after day I have some negative throughts stuck on repeat. These thoughts come to my mind throughout the day.

Whether I am nervous about the economy, I have fears about events occurring in my life, or I hear negative news, (which I do turn off all the time and try to avoid even when at the gym and it’s playing on the big screens everywhere).

I start to feel like I am almost walking on shaky grounds in life, and I start to have negative views about the future and where my life may be heading.

During these times is when I know I gotta pull out the big guns and do some extra daily mental exercises to help me restrengthen and rewire my brain.

First I recognize that I need to exercise, get adequate sleep, eat a complete healthy diet, and make time for relaxation and to be around meaningful relationships such as friends and family.

But when life gets tough and it’s my thoughts patterns that aren’t healthy I turn to meditation to help me out.

When firth starting I had no idea what I was doing. What was meditation? How do I do it? Do I sit down or lay down? Can I do it while driving? The answer to many of these questions is yes. But our focus at first may be really off. That is where it is perfect to start with a guided meditation. That means a meditation where someone else is talking to you through it. A specialist, not just some random internet guru.

Guided meditation is great for beginners.  Because trying to come up with positive solutions when all you can think about are negative things, can seem often almost impossible. It is then that turning to outside help is so essential.

Guided meditation can be done by  listening to a YouTube video or a series of meditations on apps or programs like this ONE.

I particularly research something I am struggling with. So weather I am having too many fears, or lack of focus, or I need help with being in control or being more grateful, I research a meditation that can help me with that particular issue I am facing.

Because meditating can seem daunting, boring, and too time consuming I often set up a timer so that I can control for how long I will be spending time doing it.

I have learned that 5 minutes is the perfect starting time. I now do guided meditations that are 10 minutes.

When I first started I often asked myself, does daily affirmations work? And the answer is yes. You are just not going to see the fruits of it right away. The new kinder and more positive thought patterns take a little bit to rewire in your brain. It’s a little bit like learning a very long poem for school. When I had to memorize poetry as a kid I would do so by memorizing one paragraph per day. I would each day review the first paragraph and add a new one. Slowly I would memorize more and more paragraphs. Guided mediations and positive affirmations help our brain to start producing kidney, purer, clearer, and more positive thoughts to help us live a calmer and happier life.

But when is life is just on the go all the time… Here is where I have had to do a little bit of homework first and create positive daily affirmations. These ones are particularly designed for women, but a lot of them could work for anyone as well.

I wrote these daily affirmations over a very long period of time. I started compiling them at first by researching them on the web. I also wrote some of these down because I knew I as struggling with a particular fear or challenge in my life. It took me over a year to compile these. Some  came from books I have read. I knew I needed these daily affirmations because when life gets tough sometimes we can’t always remember our mantras and favorite quotes. And during those times I needed reminders from an external source to help me get out of my funk.

I will say that I have also noticed that if I wait too long to do my daily affirmations or if I am not very consistent with them, it takes me a couple of days before I can feel the positive effects of these mental affirmations. The first day in  my brain I have to make the conscious effort  tol replay when needed, some of the affirmations that I read in the morning.

For example lets say I did a guided meditation or read a positive affirmation such as: “ I am doing the best I can.” That same day every time I go through a situation where I feel discouraged or that I am not doing enough, I will now think to repeat that and say that to my own self rather than beating myself down for it. Day 1 I will also notice how many times I was not giving myself graces throughout the day when things were tough. At first believing such a mantra will almost feel like I am cutting myself some slack. My brain will almost shoot back at me and say things such as, “But what if you are not doing your very best?” or “Are you sure you are doing your best?” After a couple of days though, my brain will actually have cemented that belief and will naturally accept it without as much resistance and negativity.

So I am learning to trust more the process of retraining our brain and recognizing that just like an exercise, these mental affirmations will take a little bit to take effect and be accepted by our mind and replace the negative thinking patterns that were starting to be pretty set in there.

Daily affirmations are like a power house of words and powerful vocabulary that are needed to thrive when one cannot come up with the right encouragement and solutions to be my their own best friend. In fact I like  call them “will power affirmations.”

When life feels like a thick fog of darkness and I need a boost of love and hope, I can rely on words of kindness. And because our secular music and tv shows can often be filled with what I call mental pollution and mental distortion, I keep a long list of powerful words and mantras to repeat to myself for when my candle of light and cheerfulness and hope feels dim.

I will say that I pair that particularly with prayer, reading my scriptures, and faith. Our body needs to have three different sides nourished all the time.

OUR BODY

OUR MIND

OUR SPIRIT

These three facets go hand in hand and work together. But today I will cover the mind side of things only.

Our beautiful mind. Made up of all the experiences that we face. Everything that we read, watch, and hear. Everything gets stored inside of our brain. Over time our brain will sift out certain things and keep others. We can’t always choose what it chooses to keep and what it chooses to get rid of.

I’ll give a personal example. This takes getting to know one self and your own personal needs and how your brain functions. Often time a therapist will be needed to help with this.

I have learned over the years that for some reason my brain for example tends to be a magnet for negative thoughts. Things that are negative may enter more easily, stay  and repeat themselves over and over again. Unless I catch those thoughts and consciously put a stop to them. I can’t quire erase them. But I can replace them. 

That is where daily positive affirmations have been extremely helpful. I would tell anyone not to beat themselves up for not doing them everyday, but when practiced at different times, they have made me feel so much more at peace, and capable, and powerful, confident, and ready to conquer the day.

So this how I created my own. I started thinking about a current challenge and a current negative thought that has been recurring in my life. Then I came up with the most positive solution for that problem or words of affirmation. Basically like a genie wish list of how I would like to approach that challenge, how I would like to be and act, and what positive outcome I would like for that situation. I would write down all those words. Even look up synonym on the internet if I felt that the words I came up with were too simple. Sometimes all I can think for a word that represents strength is strong for example. So I looked up synonyms and came up with other words that to me were more powerful such as ANIMAL. I didn’t want to just be strong, I wanted to be beyond powerful and to me the word animal for what I needed in order to confidently overcome some of my life challenges.

Another thing I would do to help me conquer my own will power was to think of an outcome. If  someone had really hurt me and their words were often repeating themselves in my head I would practice over and over again saying, “ So and so I forgive you.”

If I was stressed out while waiting for a medical result, I would often tell myself which outcome I would wish for and repeat that over and over to myself over the days up until the medical appointment or while waiting in the hospital lobby.

When facing a particular fear about the future, I would envision exactly what I would need for things to work out at their best and would repeat to myself everyday the outcome that I wish would happen in order for things to turn out ok.

I know I cannot guarantee that, and I have to be realistic in what I ask, but I like to couple my positive beliefs and words with an element of faith and often think of a miraculous outcome for what I am hoping will happen with what I need in my life. This is the part where I couple my positive affirmations with prayer and I get to practice my faith as I patiently wait for something I am needing in my life. Sometimes this process may take a longer time. Some of the things I may be wishing for sometimes I need to recognize sometimes may take years to achieve.

you may ask yourself, “how many affirmations per day?” The answers is as many as you need and as many as you can consistently get through reading. My list other the years has grown up to 100 sentences and powerful words because I wanted a very vast vocabulary to rely on with very empowering words.

So without further adew, here they all are.

Click this link below to print and download your own:

POSITIVE DAILY AFFIRMATIONS

daily positives

HERE IS A LINK FOR IT TO VIEW IT DIRECTLY AS WELL.

Which one is your favorite?