I also made a long YT video explaining my theory, but it was a long time ago and I haven't watched it in a long time so I can't remember precisely what I was thinking at the time. I think it explains most of the concepts well enough though. It's here if you want to watch it: https://youtu.be/iPPNxc7nApY
It depends. They definitely DO work for some people and do nothing for others, YMMV.
When they work, the carefully chosen words and ideas in the affirmations help to remind us of things and steer us towards more mindfulness.
The "coming to mind" of valuable self-regulating ideas is "mindfulness". Yes. It's subjective. That's OK. And yes, it may not work for everyone. People are different and have different ways of reacting and different levels of self-awareness.
Every time a horrible cringe/guilt memory comes up, instead of expletive Fuuuuuuu (mental or out loud) literally reprogram yourself to immediately say "I love me!" or "Different now" or something else that's positive.
Thoughts and feelings that fire together wire together, so you MUST to break the connection of old shit spiraling into bad mood, paralysis, etc in the moment.
This is daily housekeeping for mental health. No one has endless time to meditate or waste money on therapy
once you have a few of these solid habits, you feel strong enough to do the heavy murky freudian trauma whatever unraveling that lasts a lifetime and releases the tight gordian knots from childhood etc.
But daily tools DO work and are just as important.
in person therapy is a waste of time/money for most people unless you're so wealthy you can afford the wise old superstar in their field (most of the best have already dropped dead of old age).
less charitable: those who knock the easy/free/practical-yet-harmless-woo are kinda just protecting the value of their profession / special modality, consciously or unconsciously imo, like doctors who don't accept basic fasting thats been around a thousand years, eating keto/carn, or benefits of natural immunity... lol
I say don't be loyal to any 'experts', steal whatever works from their cheap books and youtube and other resources across modalities and put together a hodgepodge of stuff for yourself!
Buy their book instead and do it yourself.
more ranty side points----------
therapy is like the 80-20 garbage/quality ratio of all fields, especially the affordable ones most likely a mediocre broken person with their own baggage/desires/ego they'll project onto you.
Good luck being a hot girl, philosophically and politically anything but a very liberal humanist, having any personality type that isn't already a feely crier who understands your emotions, any one with working class common sense, anyone with aggression, bitterness and/or less 'nice' presentations of symptoms or a myriad other demographic factors. These aspects SO OBVIOUSLY influence the undercurrents between mediocre therapists and patient but they swear as professionals do not or are just further 'grist for the mill', eye roll...
You're not gonna magically book an appointment (with or without insurance) and get like Irvin Yalom or some other wise soul, or the smart self-dignified composure of Melfi/Paul HBO fictional therapists that created standards of excellence not realistic in real life....
Most practitioners are kinda weak people seeking status and comfort and easy wins, difficult patients annoy them subconsciously, and do nothing to earn the trust necessary.
(Everyone recommending "get therapy!" on every thread online is just a middle-class reaction formation, now automatic unthinking advice against the uncomfortable pain and grim reality of being an individual in the world.
The costs / risks of trusting important matters to average middling people makes it not worth it.
It's not a horror show, it's just a waste...
The reputation of therapy came from the top/excellent practitioners in the field over several decades.... and now it's a cheapened wonder-bread experience and even app based, lmao
The hype needs extreme push back.
it is about what story you are telling yourself. Its not the affirmations that work or not work. If it works, its the narrative/story that 'I am doing affirmations everyday and these will make me a better person' . If it doesnt work 'I am doing affirmations but hey whats the point this is silly'.
Mental health is mechanical. Most anxiety and suffering within mental health are second order effects from unconscious fears that we have about behaviours we feel are risky to take. For example, if you grow up in a household where your personal distress causes distress in others, you will hide your own personal distress and attempt to appear good all of the time. You will have high levels of anxiety in situations in which you might have to admit distress/dissatisfaction/not be a happy person that makes everyone else happy.
To improve mental health, more behaviours on the spectrum of all possible behaviours need to become calmly accessible. This allows the brain to be calmer in a wider range of situations; previously a situation that might cause distress might have been avoided/cause a spike in anxiety, now the situation can be faced calmly and the newly integrated behaviour allows the individual to say "sorry, I'm finding this too stressful, I need to stop".
Everyone typically has their own unique combination of behaviours which are not easily accessible. In my personal therapy I found that my dreams were a useful way of diagnosing what behaviours I was not comfortable with. I got very interested in this and ultimately completed a Masters in Psychology to write a paper on the topic based on the underlying neurology that occurs during REM sleep.
The paper can be read here: https://psyarxiv.com/k6trz
It was discussed on HN here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19143590