🤔WHY you Self Sabotage and HOW to 🛑STOP the cycle

TIME TO READ: 8 mins

WHAT’S INSIDE?

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• Quote

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Intensity, discipline, focus and drive helped me to overcome big obstacles and setbacks in my life. But what happens when we become the architects of our own demise? 

In my case, my saboteur lurked in the relentless pursuit of "X," coupled with a touch of perfectionism. X symbolized that pivotal accomplishment or path destined to change my life—a purpose, a reinvention. Whenever I threw myself into a pursuit, hoping it would lead me to X, and it didn't pan out, frustration, depression, and anxiety took over. The equation was simple in my mind: Not finding X equaled a life of misery. I had a rigid vision of how things should be, and it had to be perfect or not at all. For years, my X was discovering my purpose, and I invested all my time, money, and resources into this singular mission.

My path to be a successful lawyer had to look a specific way. My path in high school and college to be a successful opera singer had to look a specific way. The way that I did projects at work had to be done a specific way. The way I managed my mental health had to be a certain way. Even the way that I constantly struggled to find my life’s purpose and vision for myself had to look a certain way or I quickly discarded it as not for me. 

The irony? Despite my efforts, I never found what I was looking for. It chipped away at me, leaving me to confront the possibility of a fate worse than death—mere existence.

The problem was that I didn’t understand how I was playing out a program loop, why it was happening in my life and how I could change it. Life reinvention or any change to your health, wealth, spirit, relationships may trigger self sabotage.

Self sabotage are a set of behaviors that play out to block a person from a desired goal or action. They are multi faceted and can be complex. There are both internal and external forces that create self sabotaging behaviors. Each of these could be a newsletter edition in itself (don’t worry they will be😊)

On the the Feel Good Live Better podcast, Dr. Ramani Durvasula who is a licensed clinical psychologist in Los Angeles, CA breaks down the following key behaviors. 

Social Comparison: Measuring self against external standards,  and then shaping your own identity and behavior to mirror or meet what you see.

Procrastination: A byproduct of anxiety and perfectionism, driven by the desire for tasks that bring pleasure or lead to desired outcomes,  and avoiding discomfort in one’s that we believe bring us pain or lack pleasure in comparison to others.

Negative Thoughts (your inner critical voice): A shield against deep, painful experiences, designed to minimize exposure to potential harm and ensure safety. It creates it’s own messaging aligned with the core beliefs about who you are and feeds them to you.

Toxic Relationships: Surrounding yourself with individuals who devalue, criticize. They consciously or unconsciously strive to keep you down. You spend your time trying to change them instead of creating positive changes in your life.

Perfectionism: Tied to the search for love or acceptance. Your beliefs, goals and capabilities are based on external standards.

Overly Invested in a Specific Outcome or Pathologizing Your Own Needs: You link self-worth to external outcomes, establishing rigid expectations for self and others.

What's interesting is the hidden motivation behind these behaviors, to maintain a baseline comfort. At its core, self-sabotage aims to keep us within a land of comfort, shielding us from pain and steering us toward pleasure. Consider hitting the snooze button 10 times when you wake up—it's our body's way to maintain balance rather than face the potential discomfort of early mornings and tasks.

Behind the scenes, our core beliefs, identity and past truamas, fueled by fear, worry, shame, and doubt, contribute to this program. These emotions, though painful, become the brain's priority go to. It tries to protect us, even if it means enduring negative consequences.

In my life, this manifested as an obsessive focus on one specific outcome—finding my purpose. I believed by unlocking each accomplishment, I would magically transform into the person I was destined to be.

Now that we know why, let's talk about how to deal with it. How do you spot self-sabotage, and more importantly, how do you stop it from messing up your progress?

I personally think of self-sabotage as a program that runs based on input.

I had to disrupt the program

How did I do that?

• First I had to identify the program

• Build a different path

• Re-route the program to it

• Asses, reflect and adjust as needed

IDENTIFY THE PROGRAM

To begin with, figuring out the self-sabotage program is like understanding a secret code - it's all about spotting patterns. Self-awareness is crucial, and this is going to take practice. On the outside, you may have a certain belief that you have adopted, about who you are and how you move through the world. But under the surface, the real story of who you are when no one is paying attention is entirely different. That is the part that runs the program and it will self correct your outside behaviors to align with it…to keep you safe…and keep you stuck. You have to look at what is keeping this belief alive…it could be an external story you picked up long ago it could be something you picked up and made true about yourself last week. 

You have to understand how these core programs (beliefs, identity and past trauma) show up for YOU in your day-to-day behaviors. You may not have past traumas but struggle with core identity…what matters is that you understand you “why”. This is the bedrock that shapes the disruption. It could be feeling tired before a project you don't like or getting anxious about things not being perfect. Understanding these triggers is the key to shaking things up.

You may not see what is happening until it has passed and that’s ok. You will get better and better. With time and practice tuning in you will begin to understand the situations, emotions or triggers that would set off the program.

BUILD A DIFFERENT PATH

Building a different path is possible.

Challenging your core beliefs, showing yourself compassion, and taking action on purpose will help get you there.

Challenging Your Core Beliefs:

Your beliefs shape how you see yourself and the world. Do you think you're not good enough or have to be perfect? Digging into this means asking some hard questions about what you believe about yourself and your life. Are your beliefs built upon the expectations of outside forces that you have adopted as your own? 

An example that comes to mind is the challenge of pefectionsim are the challenges faced by many in the profession of law. As a lawyer, I know first hand the energy that goes into "making it" to get into the field and then "keeping it" during your career. Lawyers strive for an exhausting and unattainable goal to be perfect for clients, the business, partners and even other lawyers. The profession plays a hand in furthering this within the profession. When you are not perfect, bad things happen. You ARE being chased by that lion or tiger. Your work can protect or destroy someone's freedom, their business, their legacy, their property... and this morphs into lawyers adopting this as a core belief about who they “must be” to survive. The pressure to be anything else but perfect leads to anxiety, burnout, heartache, depression and worse. You don’t know where your belif about who you are starts and where external forces begin. 

Self-Compassion:

Tackling those deep-rooted beliefs requires you to learn self-compassion. Facing hard truths means being kind to yourself, knowing it's okay to mess up, and celebrating the effort to change from moment to moment. It’s about offering the same kindness and understanding that you would to a dear friend.

Tap into self-compassion to peel back and challenge the core beliefs held as strongholds. There will be times where you do your best but things happen. This work may also uncover core beliefs that are difficult and uncomfortable to face. Self compassion in the face of discomfort can help you move through those times. 

Self compassion may be difficult for many of you reading this. You excel at showing grace and compassion to others but rarely do this for yourself. I will dive into the topic of self compassion in future editions but for now I will leave you with this. Give yourself the space to get it wrong, to figure this out the best way that you can without beating yourself up over it not going a certain way. You reading this and taking one step in the direction is a celebration.

RE-ROUTE TO CREATE A NEW PROGRAM

Take Intentional Action:

Your old path is well defined and so you will have to create grooves in your new path through consistent use. Consistency is the building block to shifting your behaviors and even your identity.

One tip is to create a toolkit of actions and thoughts that you can pull from to mitigate self sabotaging behaviors to shift your energy. You build these before so that you can draw from them later when you need them.

This is done by action. Even if you don’t catch the behavior until after the event occurs, play it back in your head, this time visualizing your behavior being different. This is another way to reinforce this pathway both in outward actions and internal through visual.

Never stop there. Reflect and assess on what is working and what could be improved and make adjustments along the way.

EXAMPLES

Now let’s use that big picture framework in the context of specific types of behaviors.

Social comparison- If something is making you feel bad about who you are, and you can remove it, do it. Change starts with challenging your core beliefs about your identity. You have to understand what is important to you in becoming the best version of yourself. It is different for everyone. Reshaping your core beliefs about who you are and how that person shows up in the world without the barrage of outside influences is key to moving with authenticity.

Procrastination- Action can be your best friend here. Take intentional action by creating small sub tasks or starting in small increments to propel motion. You can set a timer for 5 mins or more and then stop when the task is done.

Surrounding yourself with toxic people- You have to set realistic expectations and take a radical acceptance from you being the bad person, to you seeing who they are clearly. You have to decide how to proceed in this relationship if THEY will not change”. This might be letting these relationships evolve out of your life or taking intentional and swift actions to remove yourself from them. It could also mean staying. It’s up to you. If you decide to stay then you need to understand “What do you need in life?”to give yourself the care and compassion you need. 

Negative thoughts- Self-compassion is the key to not getting over-identified with your feelings. Give yourself grace. You have to be the grownup to the inner critic. This can be replacing the messeging in your head with a new one. Reminding yourself that this critic is there to keep you safe but you are going to move forward and do X anyway.

Perfectionism- You must challenge your beliefs and take small steps to be in the discomfort of imperfection. Your thoughts and beliefs must shift to create a space where imperfection does not equal dancing with dangerous lions, tigers and bears. This can be replacing the messeging in your head with a new one. Taking imperfect action in small steps, feeling the discomfort (you didn't die) and then doing it again. With time and consistent, intentional practice your tolerance will increase. 

Overly Invested in a Specific Outcome + Pathologizing Your Own Needs- Challenge your core beliefs around a single plan. What if you have a plan b? What if you can be more open and flexible on how you get there?  

CONCLUSION

As I look back on my personal journey, my ability to understand how these behaviors played out in my life through self-awareness was the first big shift. Then learning how to create solutions was the next key pillar to my personal transformation and growth. Over the past 12 to 18 months my identity shifted and the results manifested in all areas- my health, wealth, relationships, career and business.

My goal is to help get you there much faster.

Challenge a Core Belief (8 mins):

• Pick one core belief about yourself or your abilities.

• Ask yourself why you hold this belief and if it's based on external expectations.

• Consider an alternative perspective and jot down a more positive and realistic belief.

• Revisit what you noted (keep it on a sticky note or somewhere where you can see it as a reminder) to reinforce your new belief until it becomes part of who you are.

Create a Toolkit (10 mins):

• List three actions or thoughts that can take or say in 60 seconds or less that can help you shift from a self-sabotage behavior.

• For example, a short breathing exercise, a positive affirmation, saying to yourself why you are doing the action you want to take, doing the first step in the sequence of the task that takes 1 minute to complete, or a quick walk.

• Keep this toolkit accessible, so you can draw from it when needed.

Self-Compassion Check-In (7 mins):

• Take a moment to acknowledge a recent mistake or challenge you faced.

• Practice self-compassion by reminding yourself that everyone makes mistakes.

• Write down the opposite of your negative thoughts or create a positive affirmation to counter any negative self-talk.

Visualize a Different Outcome (10 mins):

• Replay a recent situation where self-sabotage occurred in your mind.

• Imagine how you could react differently to achieve a more positive outcome.

• Visualize the alternative path and commit to taking that approach next time.

Set a Timer for Small Tasks (5 mins):

• When faced with a task you tend to procrastinate, set a timer for just 5 minutes to start.

• Commit to working on the task for that short duration.

• Often, getting started is the hardest part.

Identify Trigger Patterns (5 mins):

• Take a moment to reflect on recent moments of frustration or anxiety.

• Jot down key details: where you were, what you were doing, and how you felt.

• Look for patterns in these triggers to start understanding your self-sabotage program.