How to reduce self sabotage

There’s something about self sabotage. As a therapist, that’s been sitting with my patients for almost 10 years it seems that no matter who comes in and out of therapy. There’s always some sort of self sabotage that they are battling. I wonder if self sabotage is what gets us to bounce back-and-forth from the negative behaviors we so desperately want to avoid. the problem with self sabotage is that just when we are doing good just when we start to hit those goals or experience some form of joy and happiness we tend to either mentally or physically invite in behaviors that will ruin or decrease the chances of our success. And so we often have very transient experiences of joy. Soon enough, we learn that there is less joy and more pain and this is the very notion that is the root of self sabotage.

Soon enough, we learn that there is less joy and more pain and this is the very notion that is the root of self sabotage.

Let me explain. I think my biggest realization personally was when I read béarnaise brown book on vulnerability. it’s a book I recommend to each client that comes into therapy wondering why they keep experiencing the roller coaster of self sabotage, and the aftermath of cleaning up the mess that either life or they themselves created. In Bernays book, we learned that vulnerability is the only access point to happiness that we cannot fake happiness by acting tough or suppressing the feelings that we have, and that most often the very things that we are in such as love companionship also require the idea or the experience of potential loss, heart ache and getting hurt. Which brings me back to why we self sabotage . The reason being is that because we know that eventually that feeling of success or happiness might be compromised, and this usually is based on the fact that in our past, we have experience some kind of compromise on happiness. Happiness is not a constant I have yet to meet a person that has a constant flow of joy and happiness, and so we learn as human beings that it can, and it will be taken away whether it is through life circumstances  through time or through whatever happens happiness is fleeting so one of the ways that the brain decides on taking control of this very challenging part of being human is that it decides that you can control happiness, and how much experience you have with it by actually ruining it before it gets ruined for you  now I know this sounds really crazy but I see this in so many of my patients, so I really want you to stay with this idea for a second and see if this rings true to you at least in some parts of your life. So think about it this way, you might finally get to that vacation or get that raise or finally land a role or something that you really wanted in your life . And the way you my sabotage that is by then looking for reasons of why it’s not perfect or it might be missing some things, etc. so that is a part of self sabotage because we cannot just experienced the crowd étude enjoy of the moment we quickly learn to ruin it by wondering where the flaws are evident. 
so many people will come in and ask me what is it, that I do about this problem now that I understand the relationship between self sabotage, and how most of the time I’m ruining it for myself, because happiness involves vulnerability and potential to get her in to have it taken away for me, or the feeling of like not enough, so there’s just so many variables that will affect the stream of happiness. What do we do to keep it longer? What do we do to keep it constant as much as it can be. And answer simple you remove your attachment  from the notion of happiness and replace it with gratitude. When we experience gratitude, we can take joy in the moment, and be thankful that it has arrived rather than measuring how happy the moment is making us usually if you’re checking in to see how happy you are, that you got that raise or finally lost that way or whatever it is that you were thinking that would be your fantasy of true happiness attainment you put yourself at risk for not only experiencing the vulnerability of that moment, but again also having ideas of why it’s not the perfect moment , but if you tune in to the attitude of gratitude, it lands you right into the moment of just saying thank you, and without getting too spiritual about it, I do want to say that you’re actually cultivating more and creating more of that happiness moment, rather than stopping it and it’s tracks and then freaking out about the fact that oh my gosh, I’m happy what do I do with us so when you do get happy, and when you land into it rather than  feeling scattered by what you do in the moment of happiness, and potentially experiencing some fear and vulnerability, because you know that it might be taken away if you tune in to the concept of gratitude, you are taking action towards showing yourself the universe. Whatever it is, that you believe in that you truly are grateful to yourself and to whatever it is that conspired to get you to that moment , so take a deep breath and remember that the next time you get what you want rather than being freaked out by it and ruining it for the fear of losing it all you have to do is just be in the attitude of gratitude.