Hello, Friends – This email is the third week of something new – a once-a-week email on Friday written by regular participants in our Fillmore Wings Study Program. I'm the writer for this week's conversation. If you do not wish to receive these Friday emails, scroll down to the bottom of this email and click on “Change your subscriptions to our newsletters.” That will open a box where you can change Subscribe/Unsubscribe to the Fillmore Wings Newsletter and other newsletters we send out. – Mark

What Are Negative Affirmations?

Dictionaries (and Artificial Intelligence) define a negative affirmation as a statement of self-doubt that acts as a self-fulfilling prophecy, leading to defeat, despair, and depression. That is so. We are often limited not by our ability, but by our own words.

But there is another form of negative affirmation, one that is not an expression of self-doubt at all; rather an expression of over-confidence; a statement so sure of our own point-of-view that it acts as statement of superiority and leads everyone around us walking on eggshells. It’s called judgment. Self-doubt may destroy us, but judgment destroys others. They are both forms of negative affirmation.

Fillmore Wings Lesson 11, about Denials and Affirmations, has 46 paragraphs. Paragraphs 1-25 cover self-talk, paragraphs 27-46 cover judgments. Paragraph 26 says the following:

26. A dominating personal will (i.e., use of the will faculty in a limited way) is a form of negative affirmation, producing in mind and body a tense, rigid condition. Where the “no” phase of mind is too much in evidence, the consciousness becomes negative and relaxes to such an extent that weakness and ills of a “letting go” and wasting character result.

I want to suggest that “a dominating personal will” refers to our own consciousness and that “producing in mind and body a tense, rigid condition” refers to the consciousness of others whom we judge. That is to say that my own dominating personal will that judges others produces in others a tense, rigid condition where others feel they are not accepted and need to walk on eggshells.

My evidence for this interpretation is that the statment in paragraph 26 does not make sense when interpreted any other way. People who lack confidence have a personal will that is weak, not a personal will that is dominating.

Further, the interpretation that I’m suggesting is the only way to explain the central place of this paragraph in the lesson. Paragraphs 1-25 tell us to address our self-doubt, but paragraphs 27-46 tell us to let go of our judgements. We need paragraph 26 to bridge the use of affirmations and denials in our inner and outer life.

So what should we make of this? Self-confidence is important, no doubt about that. But my sense is that self-confidence won’t last long if we are not authentically affirming others. It just may be that the ability to release judgement and to affirm others is the primary metric for effective ministry.

–Mark Hicks
Friday, July 10, 2026

Return to Fillmore Wings Newsletters

Hello, again, one more thing – Right now we have four ongoing Fillmore Wings groups meeting. THERE IS NO PREREQUESITE for entering a class. YOU ARE NOT REQUIRED TO PARTICIPATE, but we ask you to identify your name in the Zoom session and try to turn on video if possible. To join in, go the Events page for days and times; look for these classes:

• Sundays–Unity Correspondence Course with Marty Keller and Capital City Unity
• Mondays (starting July 13)–Fillmore Correspondence School Christ, The Only Begotten of the Father with Dara Bermick, LUT
• Tuesdays–Fillmore Wings Study Program with Rev. Mark Hicks
• Fridays (on hiatus July 24 and 31))–Fillmore Fridays with Rev. Melissa Hill Greenbaum