The Mindfulness Series: Affirmations in SLP

While attending the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) Convention this past year in Orlando, I participated in a seminar which incorporated mindfulness practices into speech-language therapy. I was immediately drawn to the concept, as someone who “practices” mindfulness in my everyday affairs. Mindfulness was described as: “paying attention purposefully”. I love the simplicity of that statement, and believe it highlights the ease in integrating mindfulness practices into speech, language, feeding, and lactation.

Clinicians and researchers continue to shed wisdom on this particular scope and application of clinical practice. Personally, many of my perceptions were challenged.

Mindfulness Misconceptions 101:

1. Mindfulness is the absence of stress.

2. Mindfulness is the absence of thinking.

3. Mindfulness correlates with always feeling “great”.

4. Mindfulness is synonymous as being complacent.

5. Mindfulness is religiously driven.

6. Mindfulness is an automatic or simplistic process.

I learned that we internally have a negative bias--- meaning, our brains are programmed to highlight negative experiences over positive experiences for survival. As a human instinct, this can be beneficial when remembering that a stick on the ground turned out to be a snake. Mindfulness confronts these types of experiences and attempts to shift the perspective by creating brain-related changes called: experience dependent neuroplasticity. This means, the more we do something, the more our mind builds our brain. In scientific terms, intense, prolonged, and repeated neural activity can change our neural structures (Kandel, 1998). Meditation, a common mindfulness practice, can change our brain (Holzel et al., 2011). Researchers found that MRIs showed significant physical changes in the brain due to meditation. Structures important for learning, memory, self-awareness, compassion, and introspection showed increased gray-matter density (e.g., hippocampus). Structures that play an important role in stress and anxiety showed decreased gray-matter density (e.g., amygdala).

Love Language Therapy partnered with a company called The Salvaged Sawhorse. We interviewed Jennifer Velasquez, the owner, to tell us more about her creative process and personal ritual when incorporating “mindfulness” through her products for self-care and self-love.

The Salvaged Sawhorse, Jennifer Velasquez

What does mindfulness mean to you?

• Mindfulness, the word alone, makes it sound complicated, but I like to think of it simply as being aware. When we’re practicing mindfulness or we’re in a state of awareness, we notice our thoughts, feelings, and sensations. The key to remain in this state of awareness is to notice all those things without any judgment, because once we do that, we’re removed from the present moment.

Tell me a little bit about why you started your business.

• The Salvaged Sawhorse started as a creative outlet to help me cope with my stressful job in finance. In the beginning, I created a whole range of different products but it was a great way to exercise my creativity, find my style, and figure out the ropes of running a business. Things really started to take shape when I decided to create tools that I had been personally using some version of to help me cope with my chronic migraines. There were tools that helped me restore my confidence and sense of worthiness that I had been slowly losing because I was living with chronic pain and all that comes with it. That’s when I felt my calling to create beautiful items that women could use to cultivate a practice of self-love. It was with that intention that my different decks and notepads were born.

What exactly are affirmation cards?

• Our deck of affirmation cards for children and adults are an antidote to the stream of judgmental and negative thoughts that cross our brain several times a day. It’s proven that if we say something enough times our brain will accept it as truth. But how often are we using positive, uplifting, empowered language when we speak to ourselves? Instead we make off-hand comments like, “I’m no good at managing money” or “I have no self-control when it comes to junk food.” Our thoughts are powerful and if we aren’t cognizant of what we are telling ourselves, we start accepting those off-hand statements as truth.

How do you implement your affirmation cards?

• Use this deck of 20-30 positive affirmations to change that inner dialogue. Choose a card, recite the affirmation several times and display it in a place where you will see it throughout the day. Over time your brain will believe that statement, your thoughts will follow and watch your reality change as a result.

What other products do you find applicable to speech, language, and feeding therapy?

• The “Feed Your Soul” deck includes a collection of prompts, rituals, and activities. These are designed to help people connect with themselves and help feed your soul. It's so easy to live our life on automatic and neglect ourselves. This deck will nudge you to practice self-care by introducing easy activities you can practice weekly.

Applying Affirmation Cards Into Therapy:

1. Using language to label, identify, and describe negative emotions

2. Target social-emotional skills development in preschool and school-aged populations, including children with autism

3. Targeting negative environmental factors & self-perceptions in fluency therapy, including stuttering and cluttering

4. Building rapport in patients with co-occuring social/language and mental health disorders.