SIX STEPS TO ELIMINATE SELF SABOTAGE

Why is it that we set goals? You may think it is simply so that you can change some area your life or get something new. But what if there were more to it than that? What if the real meaning behind setting goals was actually to grow and expand your self, and to overcome the inner blocks that sit between where you are and where you want to be.

I recently decided that unless I am setting goals that make me 'uncomfortable' then they are not big enough. So, I have now set some new ones. These ones scare me and challenge me and are causing me to have to do things that I would not normally do in order to achieve them. But that is why they are awesome! Through the achievement of these goals, not only will I create some amazing results in my life, but I will also have to go through a huge amount of inner growth.

How Big Goals Create Self-Sabotage
The only problem with setting big goals, is you then have to deal with all of the "stuff" that comes up. This "stuff" is what has been holding you back. When you set a new, big goal you then activate and bring to the surface your negative "stuff" so it can be healed. When you start thinking about your big goal, you may encounter fear, anxiety, doubt or feelings of unworthiness. You may feel that your goals are un-achievable or worry that you may fail. This is a good sign! It means you have picked a great goal that will create amazing opportunities for learning and growth.

Rather than freaking out and running away from these negative thoughts, embrace them and learn from them. If you decide to let these blocks stop you, you fall prey to self sabotage, but if you decide to move past them, your results you be phenomenal.

What Exactly Is Self Sabotage?
Self sabotage involves thoughts, feelings and behaviours that go against what you want and take you in the opposite direction to where you actually want to be heading.

Unfortunately, we all sabotage our dreams constantly. We set forth these wonderful desires, but then we turn around and allow our mind to become our enemy. Creating what you want in life is a mind game. Unless your mind is on your side, action is a waste of time! Until you believe and support yourself with your thoughts, your actions will never be successful.

Thinking in opposition to what you want is called resistance. You are resisting the natural flow of the Universe which wants to  give you everything you desire. You have to stop mentally resisting what you want. You have to line your thoughts up with your desire.

What Are Some Forms Of Self Sabotage?

• Doubt: By doubting whether or not what you want will happen, you are diluting your power. Doubt is an energy that is opposite to belief and without belief you your goal means nothing. You get what you expect and unless you expect success there is a high chance you will not get it.
• Negative and Disempowering Self Talk: Eg: I can't do it... It is too hard... I will never succeed etc.. These types of phrases make you feel crap and tear you down. You will not feel at all inspired to take action toward your goal with this type of stuff in your head.
• Lack of Self-Belief: Not only do you need to believe in your goal, but you must believe in your self. Not believing in your own abilities, talents and passions will hold you back from your dreams.You have to know that you are capable of doing anything you want and you have to be willing to back your self 100%.
• Poor Focus: In life, you get what you focus on. If you're not focusing on where you want to go, you are never going to get there. You also must do your best to focus in a positive way. If all you do is focus on the negatives, what is not working and what you do not have you will have no chance of moving forward. It is extremely important to have a laser-like focus towards your goal and to not let anything else stray you from where you are going.
• Living Unconsciously: You need to make your decisions consciously and clearly. If you simply react unconsciously or just act out old habits you are likely to self sabotage without even realising you are doing it. And if you continue to live life on autopilot just going with the flow, it is likely that you will just continue to create the same thing over and over again.
• Comparison to Others: You are unique and your dreams and goals are your own. Hold them close to your heart and cherish them. Do not worry about other people are doing or where they are in their life. This is a waste of energy and it pulls your mind off course from your own dreams
• Procrastination: It is very easy to do what is easy. But it is hard to do what is hard. If you are not willing to challenge yourself and get uncomfortable, then you will continue to procrastinate and put off the hard things. Unless you are willing to step up and do the challenging tasks, you will never make the progress that you really want too.

6 Steps To Eliminate Self Sabotage

1. Pin Point the Problem
You have to start by identifying what your self-sabotaging behaviours are. In what ways do you think negatively about your dreams? Listen to your self talk - what do you say to yourself? Try writing down a big goal of something you really want to achieve and then underneath list all the negative feelings or thoughts that arise in you. Do you feel fear? Are there certain phrases or beliefs that pop in to your head about whether or not you can do it? Get really clear on how it is that you are stopping yourself


2. Commit to Change
If you want to achieve your goals, you are going to have to do the work to get there. A lot of this may be inner work. You may have to change they way you are thinking and doing things. You may have to create new habits and behaviours. You may have to dedicate time to working through your self sabotaging patterns so you can heal them. You may need to change negative thoughts in to positives and to start to think in ways that you are not used to. Simply start by being willing. Be willing to change who you are and how you have been living. Be willing to be scared and to not know what you are doing. Just be curious about yourself and be open to learning more about who you really are.n class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">

3. Fix your Focus
You have to put your focus in the right place. Focus on your strengths and all the reasons why you can do what you want. Focus on what is already great in your life. You must keep a positive mind to support your new dreams. Think back through your past for memories of times that you have succeeded and have achieved what you want. Keep your mind on the end goal and do not become too distracted by your sabotaging patterns. Simply recognise them, work to heal them and then re-focus on your your desired outcome.

4. Embrace Opportunities

The biggest way we sabotage ourselves is by missing opportunities to move towards our goal because we are scared. Do not back away from opportunities. As soon as you set your goal, you will start having openings to take action. You must make sure you do not then turn around and run! We may feel unworthy or incapable of what we are being given and we may be too scared to do what it takes to achieve the goal. You must catch yourself when this happens and be willing to act even when it is totally out of your comfort zone.

5. Watch your words
Your words create your world. Be aware of your self talk and what goes on in your head. When you are faced with a challenge is your self talk positive and empowering or negative and debilitating? Your words put you in a self-hypnotic trance and tell you what you can or cannot do. Catch yourself when you recognise that you are thinking something disempowering and turn yourself around. Love yourself enough to say beautiful and supportive statements to your self. Be your own cheerleader. Coach yourself through the tough times. Tell yourself you can do it enough times, and pretty soon you will star to believe it.

6. Commit to your goal
If you are not 100% committed you will easily be swayed and deterred by your self sabotaging patterns. However when you are completely committed you will not let anything stop you. Decide on a course of action and then consciously choose the thoughts you need to think to support you to get there. Commit to the outcome and be willing to do whatever it takes. You must be willing to grow and change and feel uncomfortable to get there. Decide on your outcome and then stick to it and allow nothing to stand in your way.

RELEASE YOUR INNER CONTROL FREAK

Since starting my 100 day project, one of the main things I have been focusing on has been creating a calm, balanced and relaxed emotional state. Easier said than done. Especially for me.

I have been feeling the need to slow down and reconnect with a spiritual practice that is grounding and calming. To do this, I began implementing new daily practices to support my change. These included reducing my caffeine intake, meditating morning and night, practicing deep breathing and 'letting go' when I felt overwhelmed and re-connecting with my yoga practice. However when I first began with my new strategy, I almost felt like I was going backwards. It seems like the more that I tried to be calm, the more anxious I became. The more I tried to relax my breathing the more shallow and tense it felt. The more that I tried to slow my thoughts with meditation, the crazier they seemed to get.

This inner rebellion to my new lifestyle approach caused me to start to reflect on what the actual cause of my crazy thoughts and anxious feelings were. The more that I journeyed in to my self-inquiry, the more I  realised what the problem was. I was a control freak.

My control-freak nature
The challenges I experienced in attempting to become more peaceful are a perfect example of my control freak nature. Although I was doing my best to be relaxed and detached, my controlling mind could not let go. It was stubborn and determined to remain fixated on my to do list, my outer world results and what was going on around me. I had such a desire to control everything, that the mere thought of letting go of my control sent me in to a tailspin of anxiety. That is a sure fire way to know you have a control problem - think about the idea of completely letting go of all control, and see what reaction arises in you...

As I inquired more, I discovered that the main cause of my un-rest was the need of my mind to over think, over analyse and try to future plan everything in advance. I was trying to mentally plan and control everything, even when I was sitting in a meditation. While I was trying my very best to focus on my inner emotional state, all my mind wanted to do was think about what was going on outside of me. My mind didn't care whether or not I was getting any better at achieving zen, it only cared about whether or not I was on track with my outer world goals.

Does control = happiness?
I then suddenly realised what the problem was. At the end of the day, all I really wanted was happiness. Yet, I did not value my inner state as an important factor in my happiness. Rather, I realised that I thought the most important contributor to my happiness was what I had achieved in the outer world, what I had got,  and what I was doing.  My top priority in each moment seemed to be simply whether or not I was getting what I needed from the outside world to make me happy.

The other problem I identified was that very often I was more than willing to compromise a peaceful, calm, balanced inner state in order to reach my outer results. I simply valued outside results more than feeling good inside myself. Eg: I would push my self to go to the gym, even though my body was telling me it needed rest, or I would drink coffee so that I could be motivated at work, even though it wired me up and made me tense. I never stopped to pay attention to what I was feeling inside, I simply pushed on forward with action so that I could get the results I wanted.

I also found that it was during times of change and upheaval (which I have been experiencing a lot of lately) that my controlling nature was most expressed. The more unstable my outer world was and the more unreliable it was in bringing me happiness, the more I would try and try to control what was happening. I thought that if I could just get all these situations 'under control' then I will be able to relax and be happy. But it does not work like that.

Are you a control freak too?
What I have been experiencing, is commonplace in today's society. These days we place much of happiness on outside circumstances. The reason this then leads to a control freak personality, is because with this attitude we then feel we need to control the outer world to ensure it makes us happy. When feeling good is dependent on outer world situations we become anxious and stressed about making everything around us perfect. Unless the outer world looks the way that we want it to we cannot be happy.

When our happiness is dependent on the outer world, we feel that we must force things to go our way. We fret about outcomes. We rely on the outer world to make us feel good and when it does not deliver we become angry and upset. When we do this, we are giving away our power and our ability to be truly happy. We must realise that we can simply not control everything that happens in the world. We cannot control every event or circumstance. We can only control our internal reaction to it.

Why should you tame your inner control freak?

Attempting the control the outside world is futile and will only lead to stress, anxiety and exhaustion. Our problem is that we do not know how to create these good feelings in ourselves without external stimulation! You will never be at ease if your happiness is dependent on things outside of you.

You need to realise that the problem with having your happiness dependent on outside circumstances, is that you can never be truly happy and that happiness can never really last. The world is impermanent and changeable. So you are left like a cork in the ocean, bobbing along with the waves, with your happiness and internal well being being pushed and swayed depending on what is happening around you. You can never be stable, calm, at ease or relaxed. You are like an animal on the verge of the fight or flight reaction, who's emotional response then triggered by circumstances and events as they occur.

The challenge...

So here is the challenge. Here is the lesson to be learned. Can you find a way to be at peace, at ease, relaxed, going with the flow and be completely detached from outcomes even when everything around you is in chaos? This is the trick. Your anxiety is showing you that there is something that needs some inner attention and work, and this is what it is. It all comes back to mastery of your inner state.

You can enjoy everything in life more when you are not reliant on it to give you something. You can just let it be what it is. You do not have to control or change it or manipulate it to make you happy. You can simply just enjoy it. You can be relaxed about life because no matter what happens you are always ok and you know how to find happiness. You must know that YOU are the source of your happiness. When you learn this, you will then discover that this is where your true power lies.

Ask yourself what makes you happy. Is it all external stuff? Stuff that is material, fragile and impermanent? Stuff that could be taken away at any time? Why does this stuff make you happy? How does it make you feel? How can you find those feelings inside you without the stuff?!

Quit depending on the outer world. Release it. Detach from the outcomes. Find new ways to feel good. Find ways that nourish and support you. Find ways to create happiness inside of you, without expecting it to come to you through outer sources. Live without expectation or pressure. Just experience every moment for what it is. Learn how to feel good from the inside out and the outer world with then naturally shift.

Implement practices that calm you and nuture you. Before you take action check in with how you are feeling. Listen to how you are feeling inside and see if what you are about to do is really right for you. Begin to place a value on how you feel inside. Make feeling good your number one priority, more so than achieving, doing or getting.

I am still working on this practice, but this new found awareness of my controlling habits is helping me become much more conscious of them and much more able to release them. I challenge you to start the process of self-inquiry and see if you too have an inner control-freak. Awareness is the first step. It is only then that you can begin to change.