Generalizations give us the comfort of predictability. To the subconscious mind a generalization promises a predictable outcome. A predictable outcome (even if negative) gives us peace of mind. For the subconscious mind it is better to have a negative known than a positive unknown.

Do you know somebody decided to start a business that didn't work out the way he planned? It is very easy for that person to make the generalization "I don´t have a head for business".

I had a client, she is terrified of men, she gets harassed a lot, at work, in social events, etc. Therefore, she makes a suitable generalization: Why am I always the one who gets harassed?

I met her sister, they went together everywhere, they worked in the same company, same social life. The sister even confessed to me that she didn´t know why her sister was the one "always" getting harassed, (even sexually abused twice) while guys always respected her.

After I discovered the power of generalizations I was sharing my findings with a colleague. So, what´s your generalization? I asked.

Well, I don´t know, she said. What I do know is that this city is so dangerous. People are robbed all the time. First she watched it in the news, then she made the generalization. Before she knows it she starts getting robbed FOUR TIMES A YEAR!

Right after her first boyfriend left her, my friend started saying: Why am I always so unlucky with men? Then she becomes prone to be abandoned again and again.

If you choose to say the word "always" or "all the time" in a sentence, make sure the overall feeling you get from that sentence is a positive one.

Every time you hear yourself express a generalization that takes you in the opposite direction than you´d like your life to be, stop it right there and state the complete opposite.
If you are a woman and were rejected for a promotion the wrong approach is:
Women get (always) promoted much less often than men.
Is that the end result you want to see in your life? Is that your ideal reality? No. But if you make the generalization you are conditioning your life, your subconscious mind, your environment and ultimately your life.

Please change your generalization to:
I didn´t get it this time, but I´m getting it next time for sure.

Now, some parenting tips regarding generalizations,
. Suppose your child gets frustrated because he just knocked his blocks down.
He may say something like this:

Why am I so clumsy? (children tend to be black and white)
Many parenting books will tell you to comfort him and say
You are very frustrated because your blocks fell,

That is a good approach to let the child vent. But what books don´t tell you is that a statement like that, said with anger can be very powerful and detrimental to the child's self-image.

When the child calms down it is a good idea to reverse the statement.

You dropped the blocks, but you are very coordinated.
No I am not.
If at this point you don´t remember any story that reinforces a positive statement. Make one up. You can tell him. "You may don´t remember this, but when you were 6 months old no other baby could play with the rattles the way you did. Other babies banged their heads but you always knew where your head was. So you are coordinated, you just had a little accident"

The same applies to you. If you catch yourself saying: All the food that I eat makes me fat. Believe me even the water will make you fat. If on the other hand you make the opposite generalization. Something like: I am so slim no matter what, at first your mind will reject it, but after repeating it you will eventually believe it. And then you can make the right generalization.

Speaking about generalizations a client of mine told me that every time she went to a certain restaurant, she was the only one who would get a hair in her soup.
The second time she went to that restaurant, she got a hair in the soup again. So she stated:
I always get hair in my soup in this restaurant.

She decided to stop going to that restaurant, to only find out that in other restaurants she was also the one getting the hair in the soup. What did her generalization say? "I always get a hair in the soup in this restaurant" It didn´t matter what restaurant she went to, she´d always be the one to get the hair. So she laughed when she found out that life was sending her a hair in the soup… until she stopped complaining and instead enjoyed the soup no matter how "hairy" it was.

It is so amazing how our generalizations change the results we get. I know someone who likes to complain just about anything, and when we go out, the funniest things happen to her, either the food that she orders is disgusting or the glasses are dirty. One day she even sat on a chair and the chair broke making her fall down in the restaurant. She has sent the message to the universe that she likes the complaining pattern, then the universe rewards her with the best events for her to complain about.

Now all of the other friends know that "something" will happen to her when we go out. It always happens. Now it is not only her expecting it, but the rest of the group too.

If you focus your life in nice and pleasant events, life will reward you with more of those, especially if you make a generalization out of it.