Wash Your Own Damn Brain

The first time I heard of an affirmation was from Al Franken's character Stewart Smalley on Saturday Night Live. "I'm Good Enough, I'm Smart Enough, and Doggone It, People Like Me!" Obviously, I thought affirmations were funny but didn't take them seriously.

Years later I was studying propaganda in totalitarian societies and had a realization. Human behaviour can be modified, and even completely changed, by repeating stripped down, catchy, messages over and over . Corporate advertisers figured this out decades ago and are effectively using the same techniques that dictators use to control entire populations to sell crap and make billions in profits. They have very successfully created a bottomless pit of need, want, and desire that will never (and can never) be satisfied. Our very economy depends on it.

Since this realization I have been a believer in affirmations. I have never used them on myself as consistently and effectively as corporations do, but I still consider them a potentially powerful form of rebellious, grassroots, reprogramming. I firmly believe that all of us have as much power to shape our own desires and behaviour as the ads formulated by high paid business executives. The real challenge is figuring out what our real needs are versus what we have been brain washed to think we need.

I wouldn't be surprised if second rate comedian turned Senator, Al Frankin, has an affirmation or two up his sleeve.