The Science Behind Why Visualizations and Affirmations Actually Work

Have you noticed your left foot right now?

Can you sense the floor beneath it… the warmth from your sock or shoe… maybe even the pressure against your toes?

Before I asked, you probably weren’t aware of your left foot at all.
Yet it was there the whole time—sending signals to your brain nonstop.

Your body is always doing this. Every part of you—your skin, muscles, eyes, ears, nose—constantly streams information to your brain.
But you don’t consciously notice most of it.
Not until you deliberately focus your attention on it.

And that’s the point.
This is exactly why visualizations and affirmations work.

Here’s the science:
Only a tiny fraction—around 5%—of your brain activity is conscious. The other 95% hums along beneath the surface, outside of your awareness.
The “gatekeeper” that decides what makes it into that 5% is called the reticular activating system, or RAS.

Your RAS is a network of nerves in your brainstem that acts like an attention filter. It protects you from overload by letting in only what it thinks is relevant.

But here’s the game-changing part:
You can train your RAS on purpose.
You can tell it exactly what to look for—just like you did with your left foot a moment ago.

Ever decided you wanted a certain car, and suddenly you see it everywhere?
Those cars were always there—you just weren’t tuned in to them until your RAS decided they mattered.

And when you use visualization or affirmations, you’re essentially feeding instructions to your RAS.
Tell it to focus on gratitude, and you’ll begin spotting more and more things to be grateful for—not because they magically appeared, but because they were always there, hidden in the background.
This shift changes your mindset, which changes your behavior, which changes your results.

When your RAS is dialed in on what you want—your goals, opportunities, solutions—you naturally start making choices that align with achieving them.

That’s why visualizations and affirmations aren’t just “positive thinking.” They’re brain training.

To learn more tips like this, make sure to check out the rest of the journal entries here: https://sober-reset.beehiiv.com/