Self-Sabotage #17 ©
It’s something that goes back to when you were actually quite young. The usual is being told you are not good enough. Or, it is trying to make you fit into a particular family/cultural mold in which you did not feel comfortable. Therefore, results in a rather constricting depression, or sense of failure in not being unable to complete something. It is all interwoven with that feeling of non-acceptance no matter what the task, so why bother attempting the job. Even if it just happened one time, and everything else has been a repeat performance. Criticism and judgment may be the expected from teachers and parents, yet everyone seems to feel they can jump on the bandwagon of the insecure child. Bullying does not come to children naturally, like most verbalizations, they are home-brewed and spewed from those who want to cover their own insecurities.
You have to tell yourself absolutely that you have the ability to complete this journey, or work with any project and see it through to completion. When you get to that place that puts you into a depression or questioning space, that’s when you need to go into yourself and release that negative Belief System that says you are not good enough to finish it. You need to say repeatedly, as strong as possible, “I can do this, I can see it through.” It’s a subconscious act that obviously no longer works in your best interest. This is a wall of procrastination that does not want us to take control of our life and successes. As the old systems begin to fall away, we will then be matched up with new supports of who we are and how our New Energy is vibrating. We can no longer utilize and team with energies, thoughts or people that are not in alignment with who we are.
It does help if you choose to accept that the Universal force does exist (name of your choice), as it can support you to be more in the flow of your positive energy.
Once again, only you can stop the flow, whether it is from fear, doubt or shame – questioning yourself – “Who do you think you are?” Its real name is self-sabotage. This may come basically from your parents, “What will people say?” – “What will the neighbors think?” When insecure about anything, we question who we are and what we are doing, which can either stem from, or be a reaction of Past criticism. Critics are sometimes simply a grown up name for the school-yard bully, or the bully-supervisor at work. It may be someone that sees your talent, intelligence, work or whatever, as a threat to them. If you are “too good” at what you’re doing, inept or insecure others will find ways of criticizing or putting you down. Once some people find your Achilles Heel, they never let up until You no longer let it control you. Warning, watch out for that sly, slick passive-aggressive person with the left-handed compliments that only wants to give you “objective” or “just being honest” criticism.
Exercise: Deep breathe what these people have said, releasing their negatives. Be open if it has any valid ideas or suggestions, but let go of the disparaging ridicules, which are only thinly veiled jealousy. Behavior Modification – privately write down and read aloud any words that make you react until they don’t – repeat as frequently as you need. Keep the deep breathing and affirmations also going so you don’t get sucked into someone’s negative vortex. Put the Golden Light around you to buffet away the doubts of who you are or on your way to be. It keeps the negative vibes out.
Creativity in whatever you do is a gift that cannot be denied, but if you stick it on a shelf after the first nay-sayer, it will never have time to grow into what it might have been. It does not have to be other people who are successful – it can be you. Useful criticism doesn’t tear your guts out, it makes you see another approach or way to do something. Everything is a process and there are missteps in all things. Awareness also is important if the criticism or the critic reminds you of anything or one that happened in your Past. You may have found something new to dig up and deal with to let go of for future movement forward. Most importantly you must try again, if we don’t learn from our mistakes we may turn them into avoidances, which quickly become phobias and fears. We’re looking to get rid of these, not add to them in a sabotaging way.
When I was in junior high school, we had cooking one semester and sewing the next. I had no problem with the cooking, I loved it. But my mother was an excellent seamstress and my older sister designed and made clothes – she rarely finished them, but that’s another story. So, I felt I had something to prove and my teacher, as well as my mother, were very critical of my work. I actually didn’t want homemade clothes then, as the other girls had store-bought. I had a real block and barely passed the class because of the blouse we had to make. That summer, through some circumstances, which I don’t remember now, I became more determined in my skills. I bought a Vogue pattern, a type considered more difficult than the Simplicity that we did in school, and the material to make a blouse on my own. My mother was working and my sister married, so I had no one to hover with a critical eye. I made a lovely blouse and proudly wore it, showing them the pattern and my fine work detail. Neither believed that I had made it myself, but I knew I had, and wore it constantly telling everyone with pride. When I felt my point had been made to my emotional satisfaction, I donated it to the church rummage sale and never really sewed anything for myself again. I didn’t need to.
The point being that I passed a personal self-test, where what they thought, at least regarding the blouse, no longer had an affect on me. Those blocks we all create are not just a fear of failure, but also of success. You will have something to live up to and if you tell yourself it was a fluke, then of course repeating the success, or another one, will be difficult. If we fail we have excuses, or people feeling sorry for us, or thinking not to make such demands on us. If we succeed, then we have the responsibility of dong more and better. People don’t ask the slackers or inept ones to take charge and receive praise on projects. The capable people are the ones that are asked to lead, organize or do whatever others have shown that they won’t or cannot do. It can be scary to be in charge. It is the same with happiness. Things that make you happy, or would present you with an opportunity to be happy, say how highly you value yourself. Be aware of an internal dialogue of phrases such as “I don’t deserve this”, “it will never last”, “don’t worry about me” or anything else that puts you down or minimizes your importance. These are all indicators of low self-worth, and signs that you will sabotage happiness or success when it appears. With awareness, you can then actively monitor your speech and rephrase your internal dialogue to maximize your importance, recognizing that you are worthy of experiencing happiness and success.
I wrote this poem satirically feeling I was recovering from being a self-saboteur.
Self-Sabotage – The Poem
One could say that getting to know their subconscious is not a priority.
Why mess with those beliefs that have been incurred since childhood?
Is not that Chatty-Cathy inside voice just a cover-up for a desperate vulnerability?
It holds secret grief that neither confessionals nor their whiskey can assuage.
One might strip off masks, accepting their fate as a perpetually unfulfilled soul,
Where one’s dreams, fears, and many disappointments, are held common to most.
One can give peace and forgiveness to oneself, with the peeling open of their psyches.
There is a suffering, past the fires of a private hell aflame, that leaves nothing but ashes.
But why would we sabotage our desires when we’ve learned that beliefs are not truths?
Beliefs are, more often than not, mistaken ideas that someone or ones have said to us.
What kind of fear stops us from facing our own power? Or how worthy we think we are?
That fear also stops us from seeing how incredibly magical life is now, not just in the future.
The subconscious mind thinks happiness will always be in the future, and so it never comes.
Because things that make you happy, help you discover how highly you value yourself.
And that is not allowed in the subconscious speech pattern of “I don’t deserve this,” “it will never last,” “don’t worry about me,” or anything that puts you down, or minimizes you.
That practiced and preached subconscious sabotages happiness or success as it appears.
Only positive awareness can stop and rephrase the internal dialogue or self-talk.
These conversations we have with ourselves in our heads are every minute of every day.
You can project whatever images onto your mind screen; it’s your movie, anything goes.
Create a self-fulfilling prophecy by believing, even if you feel like you’re lying to yourself. Continue to play the positive new role anyway, don’t be an extra in your own movie.
Trust your real intuition. You will know your truth when you hear it, if you have listened.
Knowing your own heart’s dream and desires are the most important gifts to give yourself.
Once the good stuff starts happening, don’t let your system freak out and not handle it.
Don’t return yourself to a subconscious status quo of the negative “You just don’t deserve . . . ”
Smart or stupid, healthy or toxic, status quo is the familiar/comforting that is bad for us.
Humans’ instinct for survival is usually greater than their desire to change/grow/succeed.
Unfortunately, self-sabotage comes from the subconscious and our fear of success/happiness -
And you thought it was fear of failure, you silly child – what do you deserve?
Tags: Self-Sabotage
