Can I Please Stop Second-Guessing and Self-Sabotaging Myself?

I would very much like to be done second-guessing and self-sabotaging.

Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash

Despite the effort I have been making for over a decade to live life on my own terms, choosing my own paths — there is an ongoing challenge I can never seem to shake.

Every path I choose, every approach I take, even when I am being super-mindful — I am second-guessing and self-sabotaging.

Having just finished reading Gary John Bishop’s Stop Doing that Sh*t: End Self-Sabotage and Demand Your Life Back, I have a much clearer view of the how and why of my self-sabotaging behaviors.

That clarity is great. Now it’s up to me to apply it.

I am going to share this with you now because I believe that might be the best means by which I can stop doing it.

How am I second-guessing and self-sabotaging?

According to Mr. Bishop, self-sabotage comes from conclusions that were made long ago that embed themselves into your subconscious. There, they are rooted — and jam up the works when said conclusions are challenged.

Mr. Bishop asserts that there are three conclusions we draw that becomes the root of self-sabotage.

Conclusion one — the self

Is the root of my self-sabotage based on the long-ago made conclusion that I am unworthy? Do I keep sabotaging myself because what I have concluded about myself is that I’m not worth it? Is that why I sabotage my jobs, my relationships, my health, my everything? Does it all, when it comes to me, boil down to a conclusion made long ago that I am not worthy?

When and why did I conclude that? Probably when dad and mom divorced? That’s the most logical point of origin.

Conclusion two — other people

Okay, other people conclusion. Have I concluded that people are capricious? Judgmental? Volatile? Unreliable? Some combination of all the above? When it comes to my family it is definitely judgmental. But what about the likes of that infuriating acquaintance? Is it more that people are inconsistent?