Dangerous Affirmations

With some psychological interventions they are a foundation of how the intervention is taught and practised. And many testify that they can be useful.

However, based on the clients I see in my clinical practise, and the science I have found so far. I came to the point where I asked: "Can affirmations be detrimental, even dangerous?"

There is a research Article titled: Positive Self-StatementsPower for Some, Peril for Others from the Universities of Waterloo and New Brunswick.

The Abstract starts with "Positive self-statements are widely believed to boost mood and self-esteem, yet their effectiveness has not been demonstrated. We examined the contrary prediction that positive self-statements can be ineffective or even harmful."

It is based on the simple fact that lying about something will not make it so.

If, for example, you are struggling with low self esteem, telling yourself "I love myself" every day, is not going to change that feeling unless you adress the underlying beliefs, experiences and situations that believe otherwise.

Emotions are often treated as something "uncomfortable" that we want to "make go away". In my opinion and experience this is a fundamental misunderstanding of what it is to be human. We have emotions for a reason - to help us make decisions and avoid dying or being abused. When they are uncomfortable, it is for a reason. They are messengers knocking on the door of our rational slow thinking logical mind that tries to make sense of the world saying "hey, there is something you need to take care of, and it seems like you don't know how, yet."

Anger can tell us that we believe we, or someone we care about, has been wronged, or denied something. That we have not yet found a way to resolve that, and it is urgent.

Restlessness can tell us that what we currently are doing may not be what we need to be doing and we haven't figured out how to be doing that.

Sadness can tell us that we are looking for a way to cope with something we believe we have lost socially, materially or emotionally.

Anxiety, or fear, tells us there is something in the future, that has not happened yet, but if it does, we will not want that to have happened, and we currently don't have the information, resources, skill or state to face it safely.

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Don't shoot the messenger

Medicating emotions is metaphorically shooting the messenger. It will not make the message go away.

Seeking to dissolve them with an intervention can provide a temporary relief, but hasn't addressed what needed to be resolved, so they will come back at a later point.

In some cases, the message is no longer relevant, like when an URGENT WARNING letter get's stuck in the mail and shows up long after the situation is resolved. It still reads URGENT though, and gets us all jumpy. This is called post-traumatic stress. These emotion can be resolved by depotentiating the message, which is a reconditioning process that takes 1-3 sessions with psychosensory therapies.

So. Lets get back to the affirmations - if there is an uncomfortable emotion like anxiety or fear, affirming it and accepting it by saying "despite this anxiety I accept myself fully" is like saying "despite my house being on fire, I still love my house". It will not address the fire. Only affirm that the house is great.

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Avoid nominalization

A nominalization is for example when we turn an emotion into an object, creating the illusion that it

a. exists

b. can be aquired

One example of this is happiness. "I want to be happy" is an affirmation looking for this, but what is it looking for? Happy is not something you can put in a wheelbarrow or "have" 24/7. If would be detrimental and dangerous if you were happy in burning house.

Goin to the Tao Teh Chi and converting any emotion to a verb, something we don't "have" but "do" can change everything:

I am happying

I am depressing

I am anxieting

I am loving

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Safe affirming is a process

A safe affirmation is one that is possible and can increment in whatever steps possible endlessly.

Instead of the rigid and binary on/off "I love myself" you can say

"I would like to love something about myself just a bit more"

Another variant is using questions as in "What if's"

"What if I would love myself a bit more every day?"

Or Nofirmations:

"Would it be mad if I found a new way to love myself a little more every day?"

"Woulf it be detrimental if I find a solution for this anxiety?"

"would it be bad if I understand and can relieve the cause of this pain"

Regardless of variation, anything that can be affirmed as something 100% possible and that "feels" right is far more possible to have effect than just wishing like hell.

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And...

We are all different. Let me say that again: we are all different. What worked for you at one point, does not make it something that will work for anyone else, or even for you, again.

So, if an affirmation that is constructed in all the ways I advice against seemed to work, doesn't mean anything - in the same way that driving drunk and getting home safe doesn't prove that drunk driving is safe.

I have helped a lot of people from dark places they were affirmed into. If you care to think about the above and construct your affirmations safely and incrementally from now on, you may notice the difference. If you advice others to affirm, please calibrate the difference.

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Would it be mad for you to give this a spin?

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Scientific Rabbit Holes

Let's go a bit science oriented on this, for the nerds, sceptics and analytically inclined:

Self affirmations light up reward circuits of brain:

• affirmations may increase focus on sources of positive value to individuals.
• affirmations could also work by focusing people on sources of positive self-worth, such as personal successes.
• self-affirmations may allow for more efficient use of psychological resources needed to deal with an incoming threat

STUDY: Self-affirmation activates brain systems associated with self-related processing and reward and is reinforced by future orientation, Link >>

IMPLICATION: Affirmations can make us feel good, but the affirmation itself can be irrelevant and misconstrued, leading us to "feel safe" while walking into danger. Affirmations need to be relevant to the context.

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Can optimistic affirmations give a dangerous map of the future?

• There is abundant evidence that most people hold positive views of themselves and their future and are more willing to consider information that bolsters this conception than information that contradicts it (Leary, 2007; Taylor and Brown, 1988).

STUDY: Neural correlates of envisioning emotional events in the near and far future, Link >>

IMPLICATION: Buying into some kind of "Law of Attraction" or "I know everything happens for a reason" or "Everything is going to be ok" can make us stay in the fire as the house burns down.

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Can we study the efficacy of affirmations as in prayers?

Prayer is a form of affirmation, seeking the benevolence of a higher other. Prayer has been shown to have positive effect on health and well being and also been disproven. This says little about the power of prayer.  

STUDY: Prayer and healing: A medical and scientific perspective on randomized controlled trials, Link >>

IMPLICATION: The result, efficacy and safety of an affirmation, be it in the form of a prayer or any other form, may vary 100% from one situation and individual to another, and is hard to measure. Therefore, as long as safely crafted, there is nothing to be lost in exploring. The only judge of the result is the affirmator.

Ad so forth, until you reach a sign saying "It Depends"