Hi Blog, we are back! This week I decided to investigate how affirmations promote mindfulness and well-being. My investigation into this mindfulness cultivation was inspired by my Instagram algorithm which showed me the following video of an “Affirmation Station!”

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What are Self-Affirmations?

“The act of affirming one’s own worthiness and value as an individual for beneficial effect (such as increasing one’s confidence or raising self-esteem).”

Merriam Webster Dictionary

According to MentalHealth.com, an affirmation practice entails creating positively framed self-statements and saying them repeatedly inside your head or out loud. The statements are individualistic and should reflect personal goals, interests, and values of importance. To create an authentic and effective affirmation practice follow these helpful tips below from MentalHealth.com:

Benefits of Affirmations:

Below I have listed some benefits regarding affirmation practices found on Positive Psychology:

How do Affirmations Work?

MentalHealth.com highlights that self-affirmation theory and neuroscience connect affirmation practices to meaningful change and benefits. Self-affirmation theory theory suggests that people strive to maintain positive self-views of adaptability, competence, morality, and stability. When these self-views are challenged by conflicting thoughts or experiences, people may either change their self-perception to include this new contradicting information or reaffirm other positive aspects of themselves to restore their self-perception. The neuroscience suggests that by repeating affirmations, individuals form new pathways in the brain connected with their thoughts. As these pathways are strengthened, people can readily rely on their positive statements and thinking patterns during times of adversity more effectively. Affirmations promote mindfulness because they encourage individuals to focus on positive thoughts in the hear and now. Additionally, through repeating affirmations and making them a daily routine, individuals can cultivate more positive overall mindsets by increasing their self-awareness and compassion. These are directly linked to the goals of mindfulness – being present and non-judgmental of one’s thoughts and feelings!

My Affirmation Practice:

For my affirmation practice I decided to write down positive and specific “I am,” “I have,” and “I choose” statements. I wrote three affirmations out on sticky notes, saying them aloud three times each morning in front of the mirror, and stuck them directly to my bathroom mirror. I decided it would be most effective if I had them somewhere I would see them every morning and evening. Initially, it felt a bit uncomfortable – I tend to be my own harshest critic, so speaking kindly to myself first thing in the morning was quite the change of tone. By the end of the week, I noticed an improvement in by ability to be more compassionate and understanding towards myself. However, my main takeaway from my affirmation practice is that I need to continue implementing this strategy into my daily routine. I want to cultivate a positive mindset and support myself in order to be an exceptional teacher and role model to my students. If I want to inspire my students to practice positive self-talk and make it the bottom-line standard in our classroom, modeling this behavior is essential.

My Future Classroom:

I intend to use affirmations in my classroom in a similar fashion to the previously highlighted video. Rather than creating the affirmation station for my students, I would like to involve them in the creation process by collaborating with them.

Supplies needed:

For younger students I would introduce affirmations and positive self-talk by using the picture book, Have You Filled a Bucket Today?: A Guide to Daily Happiness for Kids, by Carol McCloud, illustrated by David Messing. I would discuss that just like dipping and filling others’ buckets we can do the same to ourselves through our language. If we are kind to ourselves and use positive language we can fill our buckets, whereas if we use negative and mean language towards ourselves, we are dipping out of our bucket. For younger students, I think it would be best to either scribe for the students or create affirmation statements as a class. With older students, I would explain the positive-self talk feedback loop and how it can impact and benefit our health and well-being. Then for older students, I would have them write a daily or weekly affirmation, collecting the students’ responses. After compiling enough student affirmations, I would use Canva to create cute graphics of the affirmation statements, then use those to create our affirmation station by laminating and taping the affirmations to the class mirror. By using personal affirmations, I believe it will resonate more with each of the students and give them more meaningful positive statements to repeat, reflect on, and connect with throughout their day!