Imagine that you want to go for a promotion, something you have dreamt about for a long time. When the time comes to demonstrate your value you begin to feel uneasy, anxious, or someway uncomfortable. Because of these negative feelings you begin to question whether you are good enough for the position even though you know that you have the competence and experience required.
Because of these negative feelings, thoughts, and the fear you are experiencing, you begin to consider pulling out of the race because you think, that by so doing, you will stop feeling so miserable. For example, you may begin finding excuses like “at the end of the day, it’s not the right job for me” or “it’s way too challenging so I will never succeed”. End result? No bad feelings but no promotion, too.
How many times have you done something that was against your interest?
How many times have you not done something that was in your interest?
Self-sabotage claims more victims than it seems. Many are affected by this behaviour without knowing it because it’s not a behaviour easy to be recognised unless you learn how it works.
So, what is self-sabotage?
Basically, self-sabotage is a combination of thoughts, feelings, and actions that stop you from achieving your goals or succeeding in life. In other words, you may be trapped in patterns that create problems in your life and keep you from doing what you want to do or be what you want to be.
You may ask yourself: Why would I do that?
Well, that’s a very good question. In order to answer it, we need to look into the power of your mind and especially the role of the conscious and the unconscious mind in this process of developing self-sabotage behaviour.
If you imagine an iceberg, the conscious mind is the tip, it accounts for 5% of your daily thoughts. This is the part of your mind responsible for supporting your goals and pushing you to achieve them. The remainder 95% or the part of the iceberg beneath the surface is what the unconscious account for. This part is responsible for all the NOs and DON’Ts you receive on a daily basis. In addition, the unconscious mind has recorded all the negative experiences you have had and the limiting beliefs you have developed which affect each decision you are called to make and each situation you are called to face.
Going back to the example I have shared about going for a promotion, it was your conscious mind that pushed you to put yourself forward and to go for it, finally after waiting for so long. However, your unconscious mind gradually kicked in by putting scary thoughts and bringing to the surface all your fears based on your limiting beliefs which triggered your self-sabotage response.
Can you see how this works? Does it resonate with your experience at all?
Your identity as a human being is the sum of the values and beliefs you have developed during your life about yourself. These beliefs dictate the way you act and behave in your interactions with other people and your perception of your perceived limitations. The reasons behind self-sabotaging are found in these very limiting beliefs that are so strong and rooted in yourself that they maneuver each decision or act in your life-limiting your happiness, well-being, and progress.
Certainly, there is nothing like the fear that can make you withdraw from something important or keep you from something important like your dream job interview. Fear is self-limiting and keeps ultimately keeps you from living a fulfilling life.
To understand the role of fear in self-sabotaging it’s important to clarify the difference between natural and mind fear. Natural fear is experienced when there is a real danger (there is a fire in the house). So, in other words, natural fear is a healthy emotion that protects you from harm. Mind fear instead, is self-created based on previous negative experiences or negative limiting beliefs. Going back to the example of going for a promotion, mind fear will keep you for going forward with your plan by raising the fear bar to the point that you end up sabotaging yourself.
The reality is that, although you may be driven and motivated to achieve success yet the unconscious mind will try to do anything in its power to avoid any kind of change or improvement that you want to see or make in your life. Sometimes it will be more obvious like a tsunami of negative thoughts and fears and sometimes more subtle like a still small voice, images, or thoughts tailored to upset your clear thinking. Its goal is to convince you that you don’t deserve it and that you are not good enough.
So, why trying?
In a few words the role of the unconscious mind is to protect you from experiencing failure and disappointment, but it ends up sabotaging your inner self and keep you in your comfort zone.
Once you realise how your unconscious mind or saboteur plans to overtake your life you can begin to fight back and stop listening to that misleading and deceiving voice.
Yes, how can you stop self-sabotage?
I would suggest at least four things that you can do.
– Identify Self-Sabotage Behavior. Your first objective is to identify the self-sabotaging behaviour that prevents you from moving forward.
– Recreate Your Self-Sabotage Pattern. Having worked through the previous step, you should now be able to recreate the self-sabotaging pattern and associated triggers.
-Identify healthy replacement behavior. To eliminate an old pattern of behavior, we must first replace it with a more positive and helpful pattern.
– Practice the New Behavior Until a habit is formed.
So, are you ready to stop self-sabotage?
Happy to discuss further.
