Personal choices.

Many of us may “quietly” feel we are living in uncertain times, influenced by our lifestyle choices or the environmental impacts we numbingly experience on day-to-day basis. The subsequent outcome is a begrudging sense of impending self-isolation. Perhaps a mirroring of what we experienced and endured during Covid lockdown.

On reflection, maybe our original Plan A hasn’t worked out. Maybe we’re too anxious to explore a Plan B… or Plan C? Are we currently regretting we didn’t create a back-up plan for that proverbial rainy day? On the other hand, and to our credit, we may have indeed established a blue-print plan, which on paper, are robust and full proof, but we’re recognising the sceptre of our very own sense of self-sabotage??

The question is now, will you in fact be the person who subconsciously throws a spanner in the works and allow yourself to fall at the first hurdle? Can you allow yourself to be brutally honest with yourself and acknowledge if you’ve allowed self-imposed hurdles to block your reality? If this is the case, and you’re comfortable with acknowledging this as your reality, is it now a worthwhile consideration to seek the courage to develop and deliver on that long awaited Plan B?

With this in mind, let’s consider if the following have ever acted as stumbling blocks in the past?

Examples of self-sabotage

·      Procrastination - delaying action, insisting other things must take precedence before goals can be progressed.

·      Perfectionism - keep re-doing something because it must be perfect, but in doing so we never seem to move any closer to our goals. 

·      Dreaming - blissfully spending our time dreaming about how wonderful life will be when we achieve our goals. We create wonderful plans, lists and vision boards, but never take any real action. 

·      Laziness - we expect everyone around us to take action for us and won’t take any action ourselves. 

·      Blaming others - we won’t take responsibility and blame everyone else for our past failures or inaction.

·      Being a ‘Scatterbrain’ - being disorganised and running around, never seeming to make progress. Scatterbrains never move closer to their goals because they’re always too busy dealing with one crisis or another.

Ask yourself the following questions

·      Which example of self-sabotage best describes you? 

·      What kind of things do you do when you are self-sabotaging your goals?

·      How does this affect your progress? 

Where’s your head at?

When we are experiencing a ‘Low Quality of Mind’ (as opposed to enjoying a ‘High Quality of Mind’) we have a tendency to wallow in a state of blame and excuses and create drama in our lives. We blame other people: family, friends, work colleagues, etc. We blame circumstances relating to our lives; our job; where we live; lack of money; poor quality of life; inability to form quality relationships; etc. On the other hand, when we are enjoying a ‘High Quality of Mind’, we are more relaxed; more compassionate; more understanding.

Both deliver two very different sets of moods and feelings, yet both quality of minds are a mirror image of ourselves. When we are compassionate with others, we are in fact compassionate with ourselves. However, when we are aggressive with others, we are equally aggressive towards ourselves. It’s as if you’re standing in front of a mirror and shouting at yourself. What we seek, by asking these questions, is an awareness of the effects of our inner critic (our internal Chatterbox) driven self-sabotaging actions. Through awareness, we can have better control over self-sabotage and deliver a more robust Plan B that will allow us not to get distracted with the proverbial hurdles and those spanners in the works. In fact, it will allow us to focus on the highs rather than the lows in our life and ultimately deliver on our heart’s desires.