Warning: You Are Sabotaging Yourself. Do You Recognize The Signs?

Vacancy by Anita363

You have goals. You have hopes and dreams. You have something you want to change: bad habits, jobs, location, relationships. Somehow nothing ever changes. You promise yourself you’ll figure it out, but not today. Maybe tomorrow. It’s just not a good time. Guess what. It’s never a good time. So why can’t you start? Here’s the revelation:

YOU ARE YOUR OWN WORST ENEMY. IT’S YOUR FAULT.

You have nobody to blame but yourself. Ouch. That hurts a little. It’s an uncomfortable truth. One that few of us want to hear, and even fewer will accept. It’s true regardless of how you feel when you hear it. Accepting this revelation will put you in a more productive mindset. This blog is evidence.

I wanted to write and inspire people for years. I would mess around with blogger and wordpress free sites. It was so easy to register a quick site name, tinker around with the settings a bit, and stare at the dashboard and the blinking cursor. Now what? Nothing was stopping me. Not physically. The doubts would creep in. Laziness would take over. I would convince myself that the concept was too weak or controversial before I even wrote a single word. I would imagine the hate mail. I would worry about what friends and family might think. Allow me to remind you, not one word was written. I bet I have more than a dozen false starts stacked up. This has gone on for almost ten long years. I sabotaged myself from ever beginning. I was my own worst enemy.

It wasn’t until I recognized the signs and took specific strategies to overcome my primitive brain that I started creating real content and sharing it with you, dear reader.

Hats Off To (Piero) Moschi by cyberuly

SIGNS OF SELF SABOTAGE

Doubting Yourself:

You have a plan. You know the next step. Then you start questioning your own ability. Are you good enough? Are you qualified? What will the neighbors think? Will this get me fired from my job? Will I ever meet someone new?

Slowly excuses to stop take root. You’ve been killed in action as soon as you step onto the field of battle. Do not pass go. No dreams for you.

Giving In To Fear:

Making changes are scary. Fear can be fuel or it can be a wall. You subconsciously decide that any deviation from your current path is dangerous. As far as your mind is concerned everything you do now keeps you alive. It’s too risky to change. That’s your lizard brain talking. It’s good for dealing with saber tooth tigers, bear attacks, and the apocalypse.  The problems of the modern world don’t need the fight or flight response, but that’s exactly what our body does when we are scared. You’ll retreat into safety more often than not.

You may be afraid to fail. Failure could mean you wasted your time. Everyone might laugh at you. You might have to start all over again at square one.

What’s worse? You  might be afraid to succeed. You start worrying about how this will change your relationships. The weight of responsibility starts to haunt you. What if it doesn’t live up to your expectations? This is when the same worries of failure turn into the worries of success.

Negative Self Talk:

You’re a failure. Nobody likes you. Nobody will read this anyway. You’re just a nobody in a small town from a poor family. You have no right to tell other people what to do.

The voice living inside your head deserves a good beating. You wouldn’t spend two minutes of your life with a person talking to you like that. So why would you listen to the worst drivel in your own mind?

Waiting For Permission:

The world used to be guarded by the gatekeepers. You had to know somebody. You had to have degrees. You required experience and references if you wanted to lead.

Are you waiting for someone to tell you to go? This way we can put responsibility on someone else. You don’t want it to be your fault. You’re not even sure you want the praise. It just won’t work in the world we live in today.

2011 LAAFF 28 © by anoldent

HOW YOU CAN TAKE CONTROL OF YOURSELF

It seems strange to suggest you need to take control of yourself. Who else would be in control? You, of course. You just need to promote a more positive “you” into the captain’s seat. Here’s how you do it.

Accountability:

I’ve been a Professional Hypnotist and Mindfulness Coach for a few years. I kept thinking a website sharing my services, skills, tips and tricks would be great. I found myself collecting a couple of those freebie blogs again. I knew something had to change so I turned to some of the advice I give clients. I set up accountability.

I knew the free blogs would just sit and digitally rot. So I compiled a list of possible domain names while checking the availability of each one. Once I settled on TribeAwakened.com, I bought the domain. I collected reviews on hosting services and bought hosting. I spent the next couple months teaching myself how to use wordpress.

How was all of this different? I was spending money.

I have children. Every dollar matters. Spending money on hosting the site and the domain meant I had to make it happen. I had to make it real. I’m accountable to the legitimate use of the money in accordance with my own values.

Find a way to hold yourself on the path. Enlist a friend, make it about money, values, or all the above. It has to be meaningful to you.

Challenge Your Inner Critic:

Your inner voice thinks you’re stupid. Your inner voice is wrong.

Get in the habit of questioning your own thoughts. Ask yourself if the thought is helping or hurting you as it arises. You’ll quickly discover that many of these thoughts don’t even belong to you. They may be left over remnants from a childhood punishment or a screaming coach. It doesn’t matter. The important thing is realizing that you grew up in a world of rules and ideas that were forced on you. It’s up to you to start questioning them.

You’ll begin unraveling where your intention starts and outside influence begins. You’ll gain more control over your inner voice. Start being nicer to yourself.

Remove The Illusion of Self Doubt:

You’re being forgetful when you allow doubt to rule your decision. You haven’t achieved your goal yet. That’s a large part of the doubt. However, you’ve probably accomplished certain elements of your mission in the past.

Do you want to start a blog? You’ve written articles and stories before. They’ve even been reviewed. That was school.

Are you trying to change relationships, a job, or location? You’ve made new friends before. You’ve probably switched jobs, even if it was merely chores around the house. You’ve probably even enjoyed the exploration of new places.

Find what excites you about the change and stay focused on the positive. This will help melt away the doubts.

Baby Steps:

Fear gains traction when we try to go from start to finish in one leap. It gets overwhelming and you stall.

Sit down and examine the path to success. Reverse engineer if you find that easier. What’s the first thing you need to do? What comes after that? It seems obvious, but it’s easy to forget. You don’t have to do everything all at once. Just start somewhere. Build upon each previous step. Every small success along the way will fuel the next and push you forward. You’ll arrive at the finish line in no time.

Permission Granted:

The gatekeepers are gone. That world is over. The internet has enabled you to learn just about anything from anywhere from any time in the history of the world. Knowledge has never been so free and available in history. You don’t need permission. You need passion and drive. You need a desire to learn. You need a willingness to share.

I would love to see what you have to share with the world.

Are you still waiting for permission? Very well.

Permission granted. Go now. Start. We’re all waiting.

Dream by Quentin Xerxes Zamfir

The Choice Belongs To You

We can’t control all the events of our lives. We can control our reaction to those events. There is a wide world of connections and knowledge out there. You can be an active part of it. Resist the sleepwalking urge of the masses. This is your life. This is your moment.

Choose action. Reach out to people who are doing what you want to do. Volunteer. Always choose action.

It’s nice to awaken to the possibilities surrounding you. Now what will you do with them?