Stop Quitting When You Are Ahead

Ahh self-sabotaging. Something I think we all have experienced at one point or another in our lives. For those who don’t know, self-sabotaging is the thoughts or behaviours that hold you back and prevent you from doing what you want to do. 

Some examples may include:

·      Unrealistic expectations of results without defining any time or mental space to accomplishing them

·      Being a perfectionist and only admitting you succeed if you were 100% perfect

·      Being too busy to self-reflect or set up the systems needed to move your needle forward

These are just a few examples of many ways we may self-sabotage. Today, let’s go over why we are doing this and what we can do to break this cycle. 

I never have really experienced self-sabotage before. It wasn’t until I caught myself having a self-sabotaging moment a couple of weeks again.

For those who don’t know, I am currently dieting for a bodybuilding competition in May. My diet has been going well, where each week I have been right on schedule with my weekly targeted goals. Each day, I have been extremely consistent with my nutrition, training, and cardio.

However, a couple of weeks ago now, I was ahead of schedule with my goals. I hit a new low weigh much earlier than I was expecting and my initial reaction was to take it easy for the day and skip my cardio. That was the first time (that I can recall anyways) I have ever experienced anything like this. And while I didn’t end up skipping my cardio, this initial thought process left me feeling curious. Curious as to why that was my initial instinctive reaction? Curious if I would have skipped my cardio if I didn’t catch myself like this?

I honestly think this initial reaction was my way of celebrating the low weigh in. And I think others go through the same thing, but in their own way. Perhaps they are celebrating their low weigh in by taking the day off from tracking their food or perhaps skipping a workout or even having some extra untracked treats for the day.

You can see though how what we revert to, as our way of celebrating, can often lead to self-sabotage. Why would we stop doing the things that allowed us to achieve the results in the first place? Often, we have these thoughts that we can relax once we’ve made some progress and it’s from my experience that people lose momentum from this kind of mentality and often go backwards.

We must catch ourselves when we have this type of thought process and not let our progress slow us down. Instead, let your progress be your motivator to keep going and to remember that it’s a sign you are on the right path. So, keep implementing the habits every single day that got you there in the first place.

This has been a very informative experience for me because I think people go through this all the time. More often that I may have even realized. 

So, how can we catch ourselves in these moments and redirect our path, so we don’t end up down this constant self-sabotaging cycle and are forever spinning our wheels from achieving true progress.

Well, I think it’s worth noting that this is not going to be easy. If you are no stranger to self-sabotage, then we must understand that this is a learned behaviour and probably stems from a habit that was developed at a very young age. And as we all know, changing our habits for better one’s doesn’t just happen overnight. So, you must be whiling to put in the work to end this cycle. 

So, where does self-sabotage come from? 

Like I said, it often is a learned behaviour. And to some if may be a lack of self-esteem. Often the emotions that lead to the act of sabotage are feelings of insignificance, and the belief that you don't deserve success. Some people self-sabotage to make them feel in control of the situation. They might receive a short-term increase to their self-confidence. However, these rewards turn out to be damaging later on.

If this sounds like you, don’t be hard on yourself. Like I mentioned, I have caught myself doing this too. I think we all do to some degree. But what can we do to break the cycle? Since this is a fitness podcast, I am going to use fitness related examples. However, you can apply the same strategies here to other area of your life such as work, family, or relationships.

Firstly, we must audit our behaviours. Self-sabotage looks differently for everyone. Are you struggling with making decisions of what to eat, lack of motivation to hit the gym, or being consistent with eating foods you know are healthy for you?

Once you’ve identified which behaviours may be contributing to your self-sabotage, ask yourself why do you think this is happening? What thoughts and emotions are you having prior to your self-sabotage? Perhaps “you aren’t good enough, what’s the point,” which leads to frustration, anger, impatience, anxiety.

If we understand the typical thoughts we have prior to our self-sabotage, it’s in those moments we can catch ourselves before we act on those thoughts. Chances are that the emotion that led to your negative behavior was caused by irrational thoughts. So, prior to acting on these negative thoughts, I recommend writing them down and then follow that with a logical reason to still follow through versus self-sabotaging. For example, if you are having negative thoughts and that is leading you to wanting to skip the gym, prior to acting on that decision, write down the thoughts you are having, followed by three logical and positive reasons to still go to the gym. You may end up with reasons such as:

1.    I’ll feel good afterwards

2.    It’s good for my health

3.    It’s a way to set a positive example for my kids

And then let your actions be decided from these reasons versus your initial negative thoughts.

When you know what your negative thoughts are, it’s at this point where you can start to redirect them into more logical and positive ones. Ask yourself, are these negative beliefs rational? Are they based on facts? Often, the answer is no.

As you become aware of these negative thoughts, emotions, and behaviors that trigger self-sabotage, you can begin to confront them. And the best way to confront these negative thoughts is with logical, and positive ones. Then, you can begin to associate these positive thoughts to what you can accomplish. When your skills, beliefs and behaviors are aligned, you can create the mental, emotional, and physical states necessary to move your needle forward. 

Going back to our example, if you are battling with negative thoughts that are always leading you to want to skip the gym, write those negative thoughts down and then write out your three reasons as to why you should still go to the gym. I don’t care if these are the same or new reasons each time. If you follow through and still go to the gym despite the initial negative thoughts, eventually your brain will start to reprogram itself to believe these positive reasons as to why you should still go it the gym. You know you feel good afterwards, you know it’s good for your health and you know it sets that positive example for your kids. And because you know all these things, you will continue to show up and eventually self-sabotaging in this area of your life will be a thing of the past. It may take you a month, it may take you a year, but keep writing those negative thoughts out followed by your reasons for still showing up. Repetition of replacing your negative thoughts with logical ones is the name of the game here to change those self-sabotaging behaviours.

Now if you are dealing with self-sabotage in multiple ways, it may be best to address one at a time. There’s a lot of power in taking things one step at a time. You don’t need to defeat all your self-sabotage tendencies all at once. It’s best to focus on small changes first so you can build momentum from there. When you are building a campfire, you don’t start off by lighting the firewood, you start off with a base layer and use a piece of paper or newspaper. Once the kindling has started to burn, you place larger pieces of wood over it. After the fire has started to catch the larger pieces of kindling, you then add the larger logs/chopped wood to fuel your fire. The same concept needs to be applied if you are having to tackle multiple forms of self-sabotage. Going back to our example, once you notice you are starting to have fewer negative thoughts and skipping the gym isn’t really an option for you anymore, it’s at that point you probably are ready to tackle another area of self-sabotage, where the same strategy should be applied. 

But while you are tackling these different areas, I do think it’s important to address what is the root of the problem when it comes to self-sabotage, which is often a lack of self-esteem.

Let’s finish off today’s discussion by talking about building up your self-esteem. Self-esteem is the belief you have of yourself. It doesn’t just make you feel more in control and better about yourself, it also helps you take risks to make improvements to your life. 

So, how can you improve your self-esteem, which in turn, should help reduce the frequency at which you self-sabotage. I think it’s important to understand that.

The first strategy may be obvious, but it’s often most effective and important and that’s exercising. Exercising not only will help you feel more accomplished, but there’s lots of research to show that it helps combat anxiety and depression. 

Next, we want to pay attention to our self-talk. If we are constantly talking down on ourselves, how can we expect to have any self-esteem? Take the time to write down positive things about yourself. When you start to feel low, look back at these things, and remind yourself that there is plenty of good about you. In general, positive internal dialogue is a big part of improving your self-esteem.

If you catch yourself saying things like ‘I’m not good enough’ or ‘I’m a failure’, you can start to turn things around by saying ‘I can overcome this’ and ‘I can become more confident.’

Next, we want to pay attention to who we are spending our time with. It’s extremely difficult to be positive if we are constantly surrounded by others who are negative or putting other people down.

I, like many people, used to deal with this when I worked in an office. It was so stressful, and I really found it negatively impacting my self-esteem at the time. I got to the point where I had to distance myself at work from all the drama to prioritize my own well-being. 

If there are people who make you feel bad about yourself, try to avoid them. Build relationships with people who make you feel good about yourself and avoid the relationships that drag you down.

The last strategy and probably the most important one is to give yourself a break. 

We put so much pressure on ourselves to be perfect every second of everyday and it’s just not realistic. As adults, we often forget one of the most important lessons we learned as a kid and that is that perfection doesn’t exist. And yet we expect perfection for ourselves. The key is not to be too hard on yourself. Be kind to yourself, and not too critical. Avoid criticizing yourself to others because this can reinforce your negative views.

Your ability to defeat self-sabotage comes from the beliefs you have of yourself. Show up each day, focus on being your best self and remember that the whole point of this game of life is to construct the person we want to one day be. None of us are just born in a way where we have everything figured out. We are all adjusting, tweaking, and progressing towards this future vision we have of ourselves. And yes, it takes work, a lot of work! But embrace the obstacles, go easy on yourself, try to have some fun along the way and remember that no matter how challenging some days may feel, quitting on that future vision you have of yourself is never the answer.

Hope this was helpful! 

Coach Krysten