Do you reach for things you know aren’t good for you, in order to escape reality? Are you aware of the things that no longer serve you (certain foods, people, situations)?
It’s much easier to shut away reality in a dark corner than to face it head on and feel all the feels. Caring about ourselves and being compassionate is paramount to facing the struggles we will face in life. Exercise, self care, nutrition; these pursuits are all made better when we have a healthy attitude toward ourselves first and foremost. It is not selfish, it is 100% necessary.
In part 1 of this post we’re exploring the art of self sabotage; why we do it and why it feels like we can’t stop.
Feeling Too Comfortable
What is your ultimate goal? Is it to be confident, reach and your weight loss goals and feel better? It might feel really scary and unattainable, like you’re reaching for it and almost reach the summit, but feel a twinge of “what if” right before the finish line.
What happens if I don’t know how to sustain my results?
What if my life changes when I’m suddenly not in my unhealthy but familiar routine?
What if my friends and family don’t understand? What will people think of me?
What if I can’t do this? This feels so difficult!
Changing habits that are built up over years and years means your life will shift in a very noticeable way. Many people favor feeling comfortable with their routine versus uprooting all the bad habits and replacing them. Everything worth having in life takes work, and instead of doing the work to feel amazing, they tell themselves it’s much easier to not “disrupt” their life with change. Funny thing, though: it is very challenging to deal with the gradual decline in quality of life.
Taking time for doctor visits, missing out on memories because we don’t feel well, dealing with constant inner turmoil. The cycle perpetuates itself and we don’t even realize we’ve been running in a hamster wheel. Many people live on autopilot and even positive change starts to feel like a burden. But there’s a reason they are tired and fed up. It’s not just because. They’ve been doing a lot of work to sustain a lifestyle that’s not serving them, and that is really tiring. They simply don’t notice because it’s all been on autopilot.
Giving Up Before You Start
Do you tend to push hard the first few days of every week and fall apart by the end of the week because, well, life happened? And when you prove the inner critic right, do you do a secret happy dance? Like, “See! Told you it wasn’t going to work!”. Back to regularly scheduled programming.
It’s no secret that if you believe something won’t work then … it probably won’t. This scarcity mindset is a defense mechanism so we don’t have to feel rejection and defeat. This continues until we actually start to fear success and worry about what it will feel like. As with anything we fear, we tend to avoid it. Crazy how that happens, right? Fearing our own potential? Our inner critic gets stronger with every perceived “defeat”, until it essentially runs our life and dictates our subconscious thoughts.
This process starts very early in life. We are influenced by and internalize the attitudes hurled our way from a young age. This is turn starts to shape the way we feel about ourselves. Then as we get older, we are force fed all the ways in which we will never be good enough; be it the media or the people we surround ourselves with – and while some people have seemingly untouchable armor, ready to deflect at a moment’s notice, others have a hard time not believing these underlying messages as truth.
Breaking Free
Take time to identify negative behaviors and patterns in your daily life. Do you:
Speak meanly to yourself?
Have a hard time accepting a compliment?
Think negative thoughts about yourself?
Think negative thoughts about others?
Always think about the worst case scenario instead of the best?
A good first step is to work on changing the internal, critical dialogue. This will make you very anxious, as you’ll be uprooting years of something familiar, even if it’s not good for you. Slowly over time you will notice a shift in your ability to discern and recognize when they negativity starts creeping back in to your mind.
Self awareness is a very fulfilling journey. It allows us to make decisions with intention and observe ourselves from the outside looking in. It forces us to get out of auto pilot and live mindfully. Just like any thought, you can learn to give the inner critic attention or simply let it pass.
Over time you will develop a new way of thinking about yourself and your potential; you will form fresh beliefs, ideals and values that align with your newly formed thought process.
And if you’re feeling like you need to go even deeper, therapy is always an option. We are big fans of an objective viewpoint for our sometimes frightening inner turmoil. Never feel ashamed; there is nothing shameful about doing everything possible to live your best life.
Day by day, habit by habit, we can peel back the fierce layers of faulty protection. We can learn to care for and appreciate ourselves unconditionally so our inner critic becomes a distant acquaintance we used to know, but don’t care to engage with anymore.
Start small and set bit sized goals. Create mini victories. Don’t try to change 20 things all at once. Focus on 1 or 2 wins, get those under your belt and then keep moving forward.
Make sure to check back next week for 5 actionable steps you can take NOW to stop sabotaging your goals and start living the life you deserve!
About Inspired Wellness
We are a wellness movement aimed at cultivating greatness in all areas of life. We believe that everything is connected and that having the body of your dreams shouldn’t come at the price of your mental and emotional health. You can catch us locally in sunny Sacramento CA inspiring lives at our wellness center with fitness, nutrition and lifestyle programs, or online doing the same thing with our new online training site + community coming soon!
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Free Wellness Group: facebook.com/groups/iwagaccgroup
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