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Episode 25- Influence Starts in Your Own Mind
Many people look for influence outside of themselves first when all along that influence starts with one’s self. You have to believe in the possibilities and the ability to make things happen before you can share ideas and opportunities with others so they see the vision that you do. Far too many people, feel that they have no control over their situation to they fail to take action. Pastor Joel Osteen has a book called, The Power of I Am. These two little words can transform your day, your thoughts, and the actions that you take. Osteen states, “Whatever follows the words “I am” will always come looking for you.
So, when you go through your day saying:
I am blessed blessings pursue you
I am talented talent follows you
I am healthy health heads your way
I am strong strength tracks you down.”
“I am…” is often referred to as an affirmation or what some call autosuggestion. Emile Coue, a French psychologist introduced this concept the beginning of the 20th century. In my co-authored book entitled GPS Your Best Life: Charting Your Destination and Getting There in Style, Charmaine Hammond and I talked about the importance of using positive words and statements and “I am” in conjunction with the use of vision boards. A vision board is a visual display of your goals and things you would like to achieve. It is not meant to be a pretty picture it is meant to be a tool to keep you focused and take intentional actions toward achieving what you say you want. Affirmations do work if they’re applied with action. Here’s the catch, you need to believe it because if you don’t find it believable you are not going to put in the efforts.
At one of our vision board workshops, I was walking by a participant cutting out a wedding dress and she was hesitant about putting that picture on the vision board. She looked at this picture stated out loud “I don’t know why I’m even putting this on the board.” I happen to be near her table as she said this and I asked her “Do you not believe you deserve it?” She paused and she looked at me, “You’re right.” She sat there in deep thought for the next 5 minutes and then she proceeded to paste it on her board. I don’t know she’s married or not, I hope someday I will hear that what she wanted became a reality.
Affirmations need to be positive statements and believable. If you find it difficult to make a statement with I am you may add in the words in progress. For some people this helps to become more believable, we are always in progress evolving into who we are. There needs to be an emotional connection where when you make a statement that it either pulls your heartstrings or it gets you excited and personally drives you to achieve it. This is your why it helps you stay focused on the right things.
Write out your affirmations. Spend time visualizing them and feeling as if you’ve already achieved it. Your subconscious mind does not know the difference between what is real and what is not. Integrate this visualize nation so that you can have the feeling of that achievement and start taking steps that outline with what you want to achieve. You may meditate on it. You may choose to record it and play it when you go for a morning run or before you go to sleep. Some people put sticky notes on the bathroom mirror so they repeated whether brushing their teeth. Other people may spend their time journaling focused on their affirmation to set the tone for their day or reflect on their day.
You may have heard the adage, “Fake until you make it”. As you align your actions with your thoughts, what you want can become reality. But some people will tell you that affirmations don’t work! And the reason for this is that people do not affirm themselves and say these statements consistently to integrate them into who they are, they may not believe in the process of doing, or they learn that they’re not really emotionally connected to what they say they want to achieve. Their “why” is not strong enough.
Your mind may play tricks on you so you need to stay focused. Speak only positive words to yourself and when you catch yourself shifting into negative thoughts and hearing, “Who do you think you are?” stopped that thought immediately and state your affirmation. You are in progress of becoming exactly who you need to be. And you are currently where you need to be so that you can learn the lessons that you need to in order to move forward.
Noah St. John, the author of The Book of Afformations, shifts affirmations into afformations. And he states that, “If human thought is the process of asking and searching for answers to questions, why are we going around making statements that we don’t believe?” The reason for this is that people don’t believe the statements that they say. He realized that people were asking the wrong questions and if they ask the right questions everything would change. Noah St. John believes that you” create your life in two ways: by the statements to say to yourself and others and by the questions you ask yourselves and others.”
You need to ask yourself in powering questions and not questions about why you don’t have this or that or they are not good enough because these are disempowering. Remember you get what you focus on. So shift your question to a positive question that empowers you to take action. Start asking yourself about some of the assumptions that you are making and how you are unconsciously holding yourself back from taking that action toward what you say you want. For example, you might say “Why am I so broke?” Noah St. John says that what shows up in your life is” you find a way to not have money even when it comes in.” The same technique could be used regarding a promotion are getting a raise.
“Why am I so worthy of the promotion?”
“Why was it so easy to get the raise?”
You may start brainstorming what actions you need to start taking to get the promotion or get the raise. What actions do you need to take to get the results you want? Do you need to take a course? Volunteer? Get experience in a certain area? How are you holding yourself back? Are you taking the actions you need to?
You must change the question to empower yourself, “Why do I have enough money?”
When you ask this question your mind will start searching for an answer and as you have answers you will start contemplating taking the actions to make that your reality. It all comes down to whether or not your “why” for what you want is strong enough.
It doesn’t matter if you choose to use affirmations or afformations to help you start influencing your mind. What matters is that you start using these positive statements and questions to empower you so that you can share your ideas with others. You need to believe at first before you can enroll others into your vision. Believe in yourself and trust in your knowledge, skills, and abilities. It all starts with what you say you are… I am. Get out there and take the actions you need to take!
I would love to hear about how using affirmations or afformations has impacted your life. E-mail me at Debra@DebraKasowski.com. Thank you for listening to The Millionaire Woman Show where we talk about leadership, business, and human potential to help you live rich from the inside out. Subscribe to The Millionaire Woman Show. Give us a 5-star rating! Sign up for our Newsletter www.debrakasowski.com
DEBRA KASOWSKI, BScN CEC is an award-winning best-selling author, transformational speaker, blogger, and Certified Executive Coach. She has a heart of a teacher and is certified in Appreciative Inquiry and Emotional Intelligence. Her writing has been published in a variety of print and online magazines. Debra Kasowski International helps executives, entrepreneurs, and organizations boost their productivity, performance, and profits. It all starts with people and passion. Sign up the Success Secrets Newsletter and get your free mp3 download today! www.debrakasowski.com
Time: 10:46 min
Keywords: I am, affirmations, afformations, power of the mind, influence, persuasion, belief, believe, positive self-talk, negative thinking, thought, thinking, affirm, visualization, meditation, journaling, reminders, asking questions, asking the right question, vision board, Joel Osteen, Noah St. John, Charmaine Hammond, GPS your best life
Don’t let the fear of asking questions hold you back from getting the answers you need to make a decision. People naturally want to help others and your questions may even help them think about better solutions and different actions that can be taken.
This statement makes me think of the movie, “Groundhog Day” (1993) starring Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell where Bill Murray is continually taking the same actions and attending the same events, repeating each day over and over.
World-class executive coach Marshall Goldsmith states: “correcting the behavior, you will discover, does not require polished skills elaborate training, arduous practice or supernatural creativity. All that’s required is the faint imagination to stop what you been doing in the past-in effect-to do nothing at all.” What Goldsmith means “by doing nothing at all” is stopping behaviors like passing judgments, making excuses, hanging onto the past, negative thinking, adding our two cents to every discussion, and always having to win at all costs. How does it impact you or others? Sometimes the best thing you can do or say is nothing at all.
