Christina Metcalf

My father died of lung cancer when I was 18.

He had given up smoking, 19 years before he was diagnosed.

But what I remember him telling me about that was for those 19 years, he woke up every morning and still wanted to smoke. After all, as a smoker, he had a two-pack-a-day habit.

That makes my lungs hurt.

But I appreciate that he shared just how hard it was for him to decide EVERY DAY not to smoke.

He didn’t just quit smoking the year before I was born. He quit smoking every day of his life. He renewed his commitment to it every day. Over and over

I think self-sabotage requires the same kind of commitment.

There are things we do in our lives to keep ourselves small and away from the spotlight.

Sure, our voices may be saying we want to achieve big things and be center stage, but our actions and thoughts keep that from happening.

Committing to Breaking the Self-sabotage Pattern

That’s why when we talk about getting over self-sabotaging behavior, we need to make it a continual commitment.

You must hold every action and thought under a microscope because SS practices can be sneaky. They operate like fleas and rabbits. If you see one (self-sabotaging practice), there are always more.

Every day, you must ask yourself am I making a good decision based on what I’m trying to accomplish—my end goal—or is this decision based on fear and thus, stamped with self-sabotage.

Here are a few ways you could be self-sabotaging that you don’t even recognize:

• Putting everyone else’s needs first.
• Overthinking everything in your life. Even if you don’t overthink your passion, if you’re overthinking everything else, that’s impacting your ability to follow that passion and give it the energy it deserves.
• Giving yourself too many breaks because you’re “too tired.” Rest is good. Binge watching Netflix because you don’t have the energy to follow your dreams is not.
• Not prioritizing rest. If you can’t function, you can’t excel.
• Following your addictions. Addictions usually originate in a place of pain. Even if you hate that pain, you can find comfort in it and hold onto it longer than you should.
• Holding onto a problem client or remaining in a dead-end job because what’s out there could be better, but it also could be worse.

So, yeah, when I think about self-sabotage, I think about the struggle my father shared with me about his own addiction. He beat it in that he no longer smoked, but he wanted to every day.

Even when you commit yourself to giving up the practices that hold you back, you may have some struggles. I am adept at recognizing self-sabotage and there are still times I need to remind myself of how a behavior isn’t serving me.

SS behaviors pull us away from the greatness we have in us. They limit us in ways that are even more powerful than our greatest critics because they come from the organ that drives all of our actions—our brain.

Commit yourself today to recognizing how your decisions may be limiting you and leading you off your path to greatness.

Journal prompt: What limiting self-belief or choice did you turn away from today? Or—if you fell into the pit of SS, which one will you turn away from tomorrow?