An affirmation is a statement expressed in the present tense and phrased in the positive. Affirmations focus the mind and clarify not only your attention but your intention. Some examples of very simple (and very effective) affirmations are:

• I am courageous
• I am generous
• I am enough
• I experience joy
• I enjoy meaningful work
• I trust the Universe to provide for my needs and wants

The mind believes what we tell it. If your internal dialogue (that “voice” that’s always talking to “you” in your head) is constantly asking things like “What is wrong with me?” or “Why am I so stupid?” your mind will gladly answer those specific questions. What results is a laundry list of every short coming you have and every failure and mistake you’ve ever experienced.

When we can replace those unproductive questions with more positive affirmations, the mind comes right along and highlights the positive aspects of our life and our personality. By combining affirmations with Story-Beads you add a deeper element to both practices.

By holding your beads and repeating your affirmation, perhaps even meditating on what it means for you, eventually you develop a sense of immediacy, and by that I mean that one touch brings to mind, and to heart, every positive association from all of your musings. The affirmation, triggered by tactile experience, has become second nature. I have only to touch a metal spacer bead and my body will, without conscious thought on my part, take a deep full breath because when I started working with my writer’s set, the metal spacers were a reminder to breathe!

Affirmations are simultaneously an expression of expectation and an expression of gratitude, a kind of magical before and after at the same time. By phrasing them as something already achieved it forces your mind and the Universe to make it so, to bring it into being -- and you can’t help but feel grateful that all these wonderful things are true about you.

Please note: There will be some of you out there who will read this and scoff: “Just saying something doesn’t make it true.” Your intellectual mind will kick in with doubts and want proof. Affirmations need to be experienced. Why not give it a try, and see what comes? If, like my cousin, you read this and your Inner Cynic said “Yeah, right!” I invite you to play with some affirmations.

An affirmation won’t necessarily change a reality. If you live in a small cramped apartment and begin working with an affirmation like “My home is spacious and airy” you won’t wake up the next morning living in a mansion. What may happen (if you can keep that Cynic locked in a closet for a few days) is that your focus can change. You may find the energy you need to clean off your desk or a countertop so that it appears more spacious and airy. You may finally clean out your closet of all the clothes that no longer fit so that it looks more spacious and airy. Looking for proof of this ridiculous statement you may look around and notice a spot on a bookshelf that actually fits that description, and perhaps, in a moment of grace, you will see the sun shine in a window at just such an angle and your heart will be struck with gratitude at the beauty of your living accommodations and your life. No, an affirmation won’t necessarily change reality,* but it will change your focus and remind you to look for evidence that might otherwise have passed you by while you were busy mentally listing all the reasons your living conditions are so awful!

*Or they may change reality and set events in motion – as it did with me - so that a year later you find yourself living unexpectedly in the spacious and airy house of your dreams.

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