An affirmation is  a positive statement that you repeat. Affirmations are intended to change your attitudes and feelings through the power of focused repetition.

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You can’t always easily change your feelings however you can do it indirectly by changing your behaviours.

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For example, when you are feeling insecure about yourself, you can look in the mirror and practice complimenting yourself until it actually changes your attitude or the way you view yourself.

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This is part of Cognitive dissonance: the state of having inconsistent thoughts, beliefs, or attitudes, especially as relating to behavioural decisions and attitude change. Cognitive dissonance is when your beliefs and attitudes aren’t consistent with your behaviours.

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For example, you might hold the belief that interrupting people when they speak is rude yet you might do it when you’re in a rush and want to wrap up the conversation. Most people will feel bad about this inconsistency between their belief and their behaviour and will either change their attitude (justify their inconsiderate action by viewing themselves as more important) or change the behaviour (stop interrupting people).