Affirmations

In chapter 24 of Scott Adams' book How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big he talks about the idea of "affirmations," where he takes a moment each day to remind himself of what lofty, "impossible" goal that he's going to accomplish, write it down a bunch of times, and picture the goal being actualized in real life. On of his affirmations was "I, Scott Adams, will be a famous cartoonist." Well, he certainly achieved that! Even he admits there's no rational reason for why simply chanting or writing some words should yield results, but it just seems to work for him.

I began my affirmations with "I, Artie Duncanson, will live in Argentina for all of 2024" because I just want to make sure I don't ever come back to working on these boats again because each year that I do is an admission of failure. But Scott Adams used them for "impossible" achievements. He said he'd become a famous cartoonist long before it came true (in a field where very few people can succeed). And before he published his first book, he said that he'd become a best-selling author, which he did. After a recent call I did with my girlfriend (which I'll get into in the next blog), I have chosen the following affirmation to write on a daily basis, "I, Artie Duncanson, will create the MOST respected language program in the world." (capitalizations and underlines included)

It's certainly a lofty goal, especially for someone who has only experienced failure and is on his 5th attempt at Viglo. (my god!) But affirmations cost nothing to try, so why not use this psychological trick? What would you state as your affirmation each day if you were to try this?