Affirmation Challenge Day 1 [New Beginning]: “Today is a brand new day. My past does not define me. My future is mine to create.”

Re-published from http://personalexcellence.co/blog/affirmation-day-1-new-beginning/

This is Day 1 of the 15-Day Affirmation Challenge where hundreds of participants around the world gather to practice positive affirmations for 15 days in July 2014. The challenge is now over, but you can do the tasks in your own time. Visit the overview page for all Affirmation Challenge tasks and posts.

Dearest everyone, welcome to Day 1 of our 15-Day Affirmation Challenge, where we’ll be practising positive affirmations for 15 days! Are you ready? Because I sure am! 

Blog About Your Journey!

If you have a blog and you’ve signed up, consider blogging about your affirmation journey!! Not only is it a great way to add accountability to yourself, it’s also a great place to document your revelations throughout this challenge. I recommend the following process:

1. Do each day’s task and blog about your results on your blog. Remember to post a link to that day’s task on PE so that others can reference to the task too, if they don’t already know about PE.
2. Copy/paste your results (or a summary of your results) in the comments section of that day’s blog post on PE
3. Paste the link for your blog post entry for that day *below* your copy/pasted results, then post the comment on PE

By doing so, the readers on PE will be able to read your task results directly in the comments section, and easily click over your blog to read more if they are interested.

Don’t post a general link to your blog as participants will continue to read the comments even several months after the challenge; by then they will only be able to see the latest entry on your blog (as opposed to your results for the challenge task).

Before We Start…

For the next 15 days, you’ll find that the affirmation blog posts will be titled as: Day X, [XXX]: [Affirmation for that day]. [XXX] stands for the theme of that day’s affirmation. Since there are 15 days, I’ve personally created 15 affirmations covering 15 themes of personal growth. This will create a more targeted growth experience for you, rather than throwing you with 15 random affirmations which may have little (if any) meaning to you!

While this challenge is an affirmation challenge, your task for each day isn’t just to practise that day’s affirmation. Rather, there’ll be specified tasks that come along with that day’s affirmation, such as self-reflection questions and action-step planning — your task is topractise the affirmation and do the specified tasks.

Know that just saying affirmations alone is no different from hopping around with a wooden staff in a circle and singing Kumbaya (i.e. self-delusion). While chanting an affirmation over and over may give you a boost in confidence, it merely creates a feel-good factor which will no sooner end when the challenge is over.

Singing Kumbaya. And no, this is NOT what we’re doing in this challenge.

We are here to create real change in our lives, and this requires being ready to take the steps to make change happen. You’ve already done that first step if you have signed up for the challenge!

With that said, let us now kick off our 15-day affirmation journey! Today’s affirmation is about….

Day 1: [New Beginning]

Today’s affirmation: “”Today is a brand new day. My past does not define me. My future is mine to create.”

How many of us often define ourselves or our future based on our past?

Consider the following statements:

I’m a good-for-nothing — I’ve not accomplished much in my life, so I’m not going to accomplish much in my future too.

I’ve not had great relationships in the past, so I’m likely to continue to attract bad men/women into my life. I’m doomed not to meet someone I will love and who will truly love me too.

I was never a straight-A student, so I’m simply not cut out for success, whether in my studies or other things in the future.

I’ve not faced much success in [XXX] goal, so I shouldn’t pursue [XXX] any further since I’m probably going to continue failing in it.

My dad/mom/teacher once scolded me for being lazy/lousy/slow/stupid/incompetent/idiotic/a disgrace of the family/[insert negative adjective], so I’m indeed lazy/lousy/slow/stupid/incompetent/idiotic/a disgrace of the family/[insert negative adjective].

My brother/sister/friend has always been better/faster/stronger than me when we were young, so they will continue to be better/faster/stronger than me in the future.

My relationship with [XXX] has been declining, so it’ll likely continue to decline and I shouldn’t put any effort in it.

While it is important that we learn from the past to create a better future, the extent to which our past limits us is when we use it as a determinant or predictor of the future. For example, just because we made a mistake in the past doesn’t mean we’ll continue to make the same mistake or another mistake in the future. Just because we are unable to achieve success in X goal in the past doesn’t mean we’ll continue to face limited success in it to the future.

You see, the danger here is that given that our thoughts directly impact our actions which directly impact our results, by thinking within the confines of our past results, we’ll continue to act in a way that attract those results, hence attracting said results in real life. We’ll then box ourselves into the archetype of “I’m not one who is able to attract love” (if you’re currently facing a blockage in this area” or “I’m not cut out for entrepreneurship” (if you’ve been meaning to set up your own business but hasn’t been able to), hence… being our own self-fulfilling prophecy.

So how do we break out of this vicious cycle? Well, by first changing our thoughts. But beyond changing our thoughts, we need to also identify the action steps to take to make things different. Because while having positive thoughts is important, we need to follow them up with the right, positive actions to make a real change in our life.

Hence, today your task is to do exactly that — change your thoughts and identify action steps in an area where you’ve been limiting yourself or that you feel limited in. Let’s get started! 

Your Task Today

1. What are ONE area of your life where you’ve been limiting yourself or that you feel limited in? It can be anything, from studies, to work projects, to romantic relationships, to health, to friendships, to familial relationships. (You are welcome to identify more than an area if you like!)
   • For example, say you have an interest to start your business but you are holding yourself back from doing so. Perhaps you tried to set up a business before and failed. So, you give up on entrepreneurship altogether and decide to settle for a simple day job. Or, perhaps you have never set up any businesses before, so you (for some warped reason) conclude that you will fail in entrepreneurship and decide not to try at all!
2. What is the belief statement you’ve been harboring in this area? And is it serving/helping you to accomplish your goal? Continuing from the example above,
   • “Since I’ve tried and failed to set up a business, I’m not cut out for entrepreneurship. I’m better off sticking to a day job.” or “Since I’ve never tried setting up a business, I’m not cut out for entrepreneurship. I’m better off sticking to what I know.”
   • Clearly, either of these statements do NOT serve you in your entrepreneurship goal, because they are self-limiting failures (i.e. assumption of continual failure just because of one failure / lack of experience, and hence prematurely giving up on the goal)!
3. Change this belief(s). Given that the belief from #2 is limiting, what empowering belief(s) can you change it to? Continuing from above,
   • “I may have tried and failed in setting up a business before, but so have many successful entrepreneurs today! All of us make mistakes, and it’s the mistakes that make us stronger and wiser. I shall learn from my past failure so I’ll be more successful in my next endeavor!” or
   • “I’ve never tried setting up a business before, but everyone starts from somewhere. I’m going to learn by reading books and consulting people who have set up businesses before, so that I can get the right knowledge and skills to succeed in any endeavor!
4. Identify your action step(s) to make the change! What is ONE action (or more if you desire) that you’re going to make to make this new belief come true? Commit this action to a deadline, and get working on it!
5. Say your new belief out loud, along with today’s affirmation:
   

   “Today is a brand new day.
   My past does not define me.
   My future is mine to create.”

   (If you think it’s silly to say them out loud, you can say them silently in your heart.)

I encourage you to write down your new belief(s) and today’s affirmation so that you can always see them and commit them to your heart. Repeat them every day to yourself, for as many times and as long as needed, until they become part of your default thinking.

Affirmation Wallpaper: [New Beginning]

To further help you in this challenge, I’ve specially created wallpapers based on the daily affirmations. Each wallpaper will be shared in that day’s task, and is available in the most common computer resolutions of 1920×1080, 1600×900, and 1366×768. If your monitor is a different size, simply pick the size that’s closest to your resolution and resize it in your favorite graphic editor.

Today’s affirmation wallpaper, for download:

Download (right click and save): [1920×1080] | [1600×900] | [1366×768]

Share Your Results!

Share your results, check out other participants’ responses, and interact with each other in the comments section! Remember, this challenge is a community effort: by openly engaging in the discussion, not only will you help others, you’ll also help yourself.

If you think today’s affirmation has benefited you, do share it with your friends and family via Facebook, Twitter, G+, or e-mail.

Once you’re done, proceed to Day 2 here: Affirmation Challenge, Day 2 [Self-Love]

Images: Flower, Kumbaya, Mountain and Sun