Yesterday I wrote about the importance of believing in yourself, believing in your ability to accomplish your weight loss goals.

After all, if you do not believe that you can lose weight and keep it off for the rest of your life, how could you expect to be motivated to begin the process of change? Why would you even attempt it, if all you saw was failure ahead of you?

I’m sure that you’ve heard this before many times: “just believe in yourself”, or “if you don’t believe in yourself, no one else will”. But what if you don’t believe in yourself, and you don’t have a clue as to how to start?

One of the best ways to start changing your attitude towards yourself is with the use of affirmations. Affirmations are statements that you say, think, and write repeatedly. Actually, you already use them, you just probably have not called them affirmations, and they may not be positive statements.

For example, if you repeatedly tell yourself that “I am doomed to be overweight”, “it’s in my family”, “I can’t fight it, it’s just how it is”, these are negative affirmations. They affect what you believe about yourself; in this case, your beliefs are limiting and negative.

You can effect great changes though, by consciously using positive affirmations. One of the simplest to start with is “I can do it“. You can start by writing this affirmation at minimum 10 times a day. Additionally, you can do what Louise L. Hay calls “mirror work”. This is powerful work done by looking yourself in the eyes in a mirror and saying your affirmation(s) out loud. With mirror work, it works best to use the “you” pronoun, rather than the “I” pronoun you use when writing your affirmations.

If others have told you negatives throughout your life, you most often received them by looking at that person, especially as children receiving negatives from adults. When you are doing mirror work, you are giving yourself powerful, positive messages, right in the eye. You can change those negative thoughts that others told you (and you believed), so that you can move on to effect positive changes in your life, such as losing weight! 🙂

Some other positive affirmations that you can start with to build up your belief in yourself, release self-doubt, and gain motivation to lose weight are:

• I can lose weight!
• I am now losing weight.
• I now weigh (insert your healthy goal weight).
• My body is on my side.
• My body wants to lose weight and get fit.
• I lose weight easily!
• I enjoy physical exercise.
• I now release all negativity and self-doubt.

One point to note is that it is important to construct all of your affirmations in the present tense, rather than the future tense. Choose to affirm “I now weigh 130 pounds” instead of “I will weigh 130 pounds”. The latter will always keep that goal in the future and out of your grasp.

Additionally it is important to note that when I suggest “writing” your affirmations, I mean using a pen or pencil and paper, not typing them on the keyboard. There is something about the act of writing that integrates your affirmations for you that typing on a keyboard cannot duplicate.

You can also monitor your thoughts and catch yourself in the act of telling yourself negatives. When this happens, you can repeat your positive affirmations to replace those negative thoughts. I do find though, that the act of writing affirmations and mirror work are most effective for integrating the new, positive thoughts, rather than only thinking them.

I love Louise L. Hay’s work, which focuses on affirmations. She offers a beautiful affirmation kit (I own one) that contains a CD, a CD sized magnetic board stand with magnets to create affirmations, daily affirmation cards, and an affirmations guidebook. All are beautifully illustrated.

Along with the affirmation kit, I also highly recommend her book “You Can Heal Your Life”. You can find both on Amazon:

For more information on affirmations and how you can write them to uncover unconscious, negative beliefs that have been holding your back from successful weight loss (and maintenance!), please read my post How To Use Your Brain to Lose Weight.

The stronger your belief in yourself, the higher your motivation will be to accomplish your weight loss and fitness goals. You can do it! 😀