Self-sabotage is when one part of your personality acts in conflict with another part of your personality. When you engage in self sabotaging behaviours it’s because there is a conflict in your personality. One side of you wants one thing; the other side of you wants something completely different.
Behaviour is said to be self-sabotaging when it creates problems and interferes with long-standing goals. The most common self-sabotaging behaviours are procrastination, self-medication with drugs or alcohol, comfort eating and forms of self-injury such as cutting. These acts may seem helpful in the moment, but are ultimately undermine us, especially when we engage in them repeatedly.
What did I do that for?
The Familiarity of Failure- maybe were so used to situations not working out or being around dysfunctional people that is feels easier to ‘put a spanner in the works’ by behaving in some way that either worsens or destroys something promising- a kind of ‘better the devil you know’.
An Unconscious need to be in Control- If we feel something is bound to fail because its ‘too good to last’, we might engineer its failure somehow so as to maintain a sense that we are still in control (because we caused it to fail).
Feeling Unworthy- Low self-esteem may drive people to feel they ‘don’t deserve’ success or happiness.
Bad Habits- Such as excessive drinking, smoking, or uncontrolled anger.
Need for Excitement- It might be an otherwise perfect sunny afternoon and seemingly out of the blue, Joe picks a fight, goes into a silent mood, or drags up some unrelated contentious issue from the past. Suddenly, the afternoon turns into a battleground. The desire for excitement can take different forms, not all of them constructive.
How can I begin to break the cycle?
Identify Self Sabotage behaviours First we must identify the behaviour that is preventing us from moving forward. To do this, we must become consciously aware of our daily decisions and actions and the resulting consequences. Once identified, it’s important to pinpoint specific triggers that may be causing this behaviour to come through to the surface. These triggers could include people, objects, specific times, events, locations etc. Next, we must ask ourselves whether we can avoid these trigger altogether? By simply removing these triggers from our lives we will be better prepared to take conscious control of our thoughts, feelings and actions. However, there is yet another factor that we must take into consideration, which are the limiting beliefs we have associated with each particular self-sabotage pattern. The key is to identify these limiting beliefs, then work on transforming them into positive empowering beliefs that work for us rather than against us. One of the simplest ways to do this is to question the validity of your belief. Ask yourself: - What is it I believe in this situation? - What is it that I believe about myself and my own abilities? - How did my belief about this trigger this self-sabotage pattern? - How is this belief ridiculous and impractical? - What would others say about this belief? - What is another more helpful perspective I could take of this situation? - These questions are a good starting point and will get you focused in the right direction.
Recreate Self Sabotage Patterns from the Beginning Having completed step 1, you can now consciously recreate the self-sabotage pattern by outlining al the triggers and the association behaviours that manifest as a result of these triggers. It’s important that you are clear how this behaviour manifests in your life before moving onto the next step.
Identify Healthy Replacement Behaviour In order to eliminate an old pattern of behaviour we often must replace it with a new pattern of behaviour that’s more practical and helpful. This is important because often we simply can’t avoid certain triggers such a people, objects of circumstances that cause us to react in limiting ways. As such, we must take time to identify a new, different and appropriate way of responding that will help us to achieve our goals and objectives. Ask yourself: - How could I respond in a more appropriate and proactive manner that would help me get what I want? - How is this a better way to respond? - What are some reasons for making this change? - What could be the long term benefits of transforming how I respond in this situation? - What are the key advantages of this new behaviour?
Practice new behaviours until habit is formed Once you have identified your new behaviour, you must now take the time to practice implementing it as often as possible over the next four weeks until a habit if formed. First begin by running you response to the situation in your imagination, seeing every detail, and feeling the positive energy churning through your body as you overcome this self-sabotage pattern. Now that your imagination has been primed, you are now ready to put yourself in situation that will naturally trigger you old patterns of behaviour, however this time, you are primed with a new response mechanism that you will continue to practice over the next four weeks until a new habit is finally formed.
BPD sufferers Blog, her experience of Self Sabotage and other comments!- https://showard76.wordpress.com/2013/05/06/recovering-from-bpd-self-sabotage-and-heading-for-another-crisis/