Affirmations Don't Work! and you know they don't. (But how can they?)

You probably noticed and been confused by the Affirmation Ban sticked in the top of this subreddit.

Here is a clarifying Q&A exchange from a question asker (Q) and Abraham-Hicks (Ab):

Q: Question: Are repeated affirmations of value to perform?

Ab: Well, let us ask you a question. If you ask for something and you believe that when you ask, it is given—is there a reason to ask again?

Q: No, because you already know that it’s in place.

Ab. So, if you’re asking over and over and over again, what does that say about what you believe?

Q: You don’t really believe it’s going to happen.

Ab: So, can it happen under those conditions?

Q: No.

Ab: And will continuing to ask change anything?

Q: I don’t think so. Okay. So then, why are affirmations even something...

Ab: Because an affirmation is a practicing of what you want. So for us to say that an affirmation doesn’t work, wouldn’t be accurate. For us to say an affirmation does work, wouldn’t be accurate... What would be accurate is to say, if the affirmation makes you feel better in saying it than you felt before you said it, then the affirmation is helping you to close the vibrational gap.

And many think that asking for it is what creates it. And we say, asking for it does create it, in the sense that you ask and Source actualizes around it—but it is the finding vibrational alignment with it that lets it in. So, your creation is two parts for you: asking and allowing, asking and allowing, wanting and believing. When you want something and you doubt it, your doubt is keeping it from being. When you want something and you believe it, your belief is letting it be.

Isn't affirmations how LOA works? Not really. It's not a primary doctrine in any of LOA's teachings.

And come on now, let's be honest with ourselves, affirmations don't work as described (by the New Age movement). If affirmations did always work EVERYONE would have EVERYTHING they wanted. And they clearly don't.

But the problem is, they sort of do work sometimes for some people, yet, they don't work most of the time, and sometimes it makes it worse, and if you ask if anyone can give clarity about why and why not, the New Age movement has lots of Mental Gymnastics answers:

• Not divine time table
• It wasn't a NEED it was a WANT
• The stars weren't aligned
• You did something in a past life (you were rich/thin/married/healthy then, so you have to be poor/fat/lonely/sick now)
• You didn't do it long enough
• You just didn't do it "right"
• etc.

Smells a lot like organized religion, right?

Luckily LOA isn't New Age and we (followers of LOA) have more light and knowledge about how affirmations work and don't work:

From Abraham-Hicks

Every subject is two subjects, wanted and lack of wanted, if we were standing in your physical shoes, we would be certain we were on the good feeling end of the stick before we would become more specific as in visualization or more specific as in affirmations. Do your affirming from your state of alignment and do you visualization from the state of alignment

#"DON'T use either one to try and get into a state of alignment because it will backfire on you."

And yet that's EXACTLY what people do. (It's what I did too.) I see it here Every. Single. Day. They feel bad, or lack, so they hear about Affirmations, they try them, for days, weeks or even months. And nothing happens. Or the problem gets worse. That's because they were trying affirmations from their state of misalignment.

#You can't feel bad and try to use affirmations to feel better.

You have to get in alignment first:

(You have to start a fire FIRST before you dump gas on it. You have to plug in the vacuum FIRST before you start to vacuum.)

In simple terms, you could call it just trying to hard. Trying to compensate for how I really feel with words and action.

#"NEVER take any action from a place of lack. It will backfire on you."

BEFORE you do any affirming, you FIRST MUST connect up to your Source Energy, otherwise, your affirmations will be ineffective at best, and will make the problem worse than if you hadn't affirmed.

So this is why affirmations often don't really work, and luckily with LOA's teachings, we have MUCH better methods to release the resistance that actually work.