Truth Tool - Affirm

While finishing my undergraduate work, I had the same Spanish professor almost every quarter so I got to know him quite well. He had once been a member of the Church but had decided the Church was not for him. This had come about because of a philosophy professor that had influenced him during his undergraduate education. During one quarter on the final day of class he showed us a movie in Spanish that was about drug lords, and kidnapping, and slavery—almost every bad in the world was represented in the movie. I left and later he asked me about it and I told him my feelings about the movie. He replied, “But that’s reality!”

At that point I felt so sorry for him. That wasn’t my reality—not even close to my reality. Just because something happens someplace in time doesn’t make it “The Reality.” What he didn’t realize is that we all create our own reality. We choose how we will look at things and when we choose to look at everything negatively, everything is negative.

But we can choose to look at things positively and that positive outlook will spill over into other things. So the Truth Tool Affirm works in many ways to help us create a positive reality. Instead of saying, “I’m so stupid” when we make a mistake we say, “I made a mistake. What can I learn from it?” Instead of saying, “The gospel is too hard to live.” We say, “The Savior will help me live the gospel.” Instead of saying, “Don’t eat that donut” when dieting, we say, “Eat healthy.”

In other words, to use the Tool Affirm, we state everything in the positive and we speak to ourselves and set our goals in the affirmative. We also speak to others in the affirmative. A friend who was a lifeguard related to me how she was taught to say to the children, “Please walk” instead of “Don’t run.” The reason for this is that the mind cannot picture “Don’t run,” but it can picture, “Please walk.”

When we use the Truth Tool Affirmed, we create a reality that is positive and empowering. We affirm ourselves with our self-talk, we affirm the situations we encounter, and we affirm other people. But most importantly, we change negative feelings to positive feelings.

Affirmative Thinking

When trying to overcome negative feelings we need to understand how the mind works. The mind does not compute “don’t.” When we tell ourselves things like, “Don’t hurt!” or “Don’t eat that!” or “Don’t hold this grudge!” it doesn’t work because the mind only calculates “do.” Try imagining not eating that donut. Just my mentioning this made you see yourself eating the donut. You may have imagined setting it down after a bit, but you first imagine eating it. You simply can’t imagine not doing something. A wise friend once told me never to say to a newly licensed, teenage driver as she backs out of the driveway, “Don’t hit the mailbox” because as soon as you say it, the mental picture of hitting the mailbox pops into her head, and the next thing you know a dented car hovers over a fallen mailbox while you try to console the hysterical driver.

So as we try to redirect our behavior or to overcome negative feelings, the most important thing we can do is replace the negative thought with a positive thought. “I eat healthy foods.” “I feel good.” “I forgive him.” As we come to understand this principle we realize that our negative and positive thoughts and feelings are powerful. But the most important thing to realize is that when given enough time, the positives always have power over the negatives. The prime example of that is the Atonement, the most positive event of all time which will eventually overcome all negatives. But remember, positive encouragement takes time. A forceful, manipulative, negative approach to get someone to do what you want them to do may intimidate them into doing it faster, but it will always generate negative feelings in the other person that can fester and cause more problems—usually worse problems. On the other hand, a positive, loving approach may take more time, but it will last and generate positive feelings in the other person and in yourself.

Keeping your self-talk positive can help you conquer and avoid unnecessary pain, and being affirmative with others can strengthen relationships.