I used to use affirmations a lot without fully believing them 100% and I got mediocre results. What helped me the most with understanding how belief works was to understand what reality actually is and the truth that
what we believe we will perceive.

It can be difficult to grasp this truth because to utilize it to effectively change your beliefs, it must be fully believed. We can’t install new beliefs until and unless we believe we can.

The thing that helped me the most with grasping the truth about reality was the realization that there’s no primary reality that’s more real than any other reality. Don’t confuse reality with what’s real. All realities are illusional in nature, but our experience of any particular reality is real.

Reality is created by our definitions and beliefs concerning how we want and expect our reality to be. Once a person really ‘gets’ this, they can start using its power to enable them to create the life of their dreams by defining and creating the reality they prefer.

Once you really grasp this, it’ll be easier for you to define and believe in the reality of your preference and make your belief stick; then you’ll more easily allow your definitional belief to be your new experiential reality.

Therefore, please understand that the only reality there is, is any reality that you believe to be true. By understanding that there is no reality other than any reality that you define and then believe to be reality, you’re free to define and believe in any reality you prefer :)

It’s not that there’s one fixed version of reality that you can compare any other reality to, but rather that any and all realities are fluid and fleeting by nature and thus, over time, any and all realities can be bent to your preference, as long as your belief is strong enough.

As a practical example:

Let’s say that before this realization you lived an experiential reality of being poor because you convinced yourself and believed you’d never be wealthy. With your new understanding that your own belief is the only thing keeping wealth from you, it’ll be much easier to believe and move into the reality of being wealthy if that’s what you desire.

Now when you create and use new affirmations, you already know that the reality you’re defining is true, because you say it is. And your affirmation can serve to remind you that that’s where you’re heading. And in turn you’ll be excited by the idea of your new reality and the excitement will bring that reality to you even faster, providing you get out of your own way and allow it to be.

Truth really is stranger than fiction, eh :)

One key way to install a strong belief about any Topic, is to hear it over and over and over again...in a meditative state.

You can create an mp3 of your voice with the strong belief spoken in a positive fashion. "I am now expecting "abc" to occur in my life in a graceful way because I deserve it" etc, etc. Whatever the belief is that you are trying to install, create a 15 min audio that can play over and over again in a loop. Play it while you are sleeping or meditating :)

stronger then belief is faith. but you need to be born again. experience and enjoy.

The only beliefs worth believing are truths. If your belief is a truth it is alot easier to believe. You are an amazing expression of life, and you can believe that.

Love and Light

I am going to come from a practical point of view. You cannot neutralize a negative. It will exist just as much as a positive. We give our power and energy to these choices that give them the ILLUSION of power. But they need energy to exist. You supply the energy. You have been given the power of creation without a road map. Sometimes we have to step on a few landmines to find our path of best choice. Claim your power. Create, and you will not have to respond to the world. Acknowledge that you have progressed, but give no power to any one concept. How you see yourself is the the key. If you see yourself as successful, you will be. If you see yourself as needy, you will be. You are the common denominator. This requires risk taking with yourself, and that is one of the hardest things to do for some of us. It requires a change of ACTIONS. Believe in your imagination to lead you to a solution, and then apply the (action) ingredients.

I have found the only method to be truly effective is self-hypnosis - as described by streetsanto above. I've tried others such as EFT before but nothing comes close. Of course you can also purchase self-hypnosis tapes and they may be more effective since you do have to have knowledge of how the subconscious works in order to be able to alter it effectively.