Taking Responsibility Part 6
Today I was reminded about two important parts of my life that I always need to be mindful of and manage.
Self-sabotage.
and
My expectations.
Self-Sabotage
It all began today when I made a simple error. I stalled because I made it and then I let it slow me down, and I did this because that's what I tend to do in these situations. It's a habit. I've grown used to slowing down and halting when this happens.
But then I kept on making that same error! Again and again! :-) Gah. Lol.
And this is another habit of mine. I could compare it to picking a scab (yuk!). I know that I shouldn't do it - I know that it will do me harm. But it's quite interesting actually. And the feel of it is quite addictive. And before I know it I'm picking at it over and over, sometimes quite compulsively. And then the scab is off. It even bleeds sometimes. I knew this would happen. But I still did it. Why?
Curiously, I always regard people who self-harm as different to me somehow. Because they cut themselves or do something similar that I don't, I label them as different and tell myself that I am not a self-harmer. It's nice to accord myself that feeling of relief - well, at least i'm not THAT bad, eh?
But there's not much difference between a scab-picker and a self-harmer.
And so back to what I actually did today - I kept doing something even though it was making me feel worse, and I kept on doing it because it was a habit, and on some level I think that by choosing to keep doing this habituated thing that I knew would harm me - well, that's self-harm, albeit not to the degree of harm that usually gets associated with that label.
I think I kept doing it because it felt like I was in control when I choose to keep doing it.
I wrote about it in The Daily for today just gone, where I routinely summarise how things are going for me:
The error was to slow down and wait for others to react to my actions.
It was partly ego. I was pleased with something that I had written, and I posted it to a forum where I had posted before > and received comments in response quite quickly. I refreshed several times - who am I kidding? dozens of times! - over > the course of the next 24 hours but nobody made a comment. Don't ask me why it bothered me - why I felt the need
for validation. But that's what I wasted a portion of my day waiting for. it wasn't a complete waste - I have learned not > to hang around waiting for others to fit in with my expectations. I have also learned that I don't need to wait for the
approval of others before I shine my light or blaze my trail or whatever it is that I am doing. And I have definitely
learned that I don't have to hide my light in case others might be offended or have an opinion. I hope that I have
learned these lessons deep and well.
But the thing is - why would I choose to do that to myself? Choose an outcome that will make things worse for me, when I could have chosen a better outcome? I create my own reality and I choose to create a non-optimal one?!? What the heck? :-)
I guess the answer is 'FEAR' - and I will address this in an upcoming post. But essentially if my fear of a bad outcome is strong enough, I may choose to create the bad outcome myself so that I am in control of what is happening, rather than leave it as an unknown and risk the emotional drama (because I am so attached to the outcome!) of not knowing if this will go well or badly. Aggh! lol.
So I could obviously ditch my attachments to outcomes and just get on and do things without overthinking them.
Expectations
Having expectations can be the worst thing that I can do in any given situation.
Having expectations is different to having goals or targets, ambitions or hopes.
Expectations are where I am behaving now based on what I believe will happen in the future.
Examples of expectations:
I think someone will call me.
I think I have done something worthy of praise, and I wait for someone to praise it and me.
I think I have done something wrong, and I loiter until I find out if that's what other people think.
etc.
In all of these cases and more, my expectations lead me into having attachments.
Attachments to outcomes; attachments to people, situations, etc.
So today I was attached to my writing. So much so that I kept refreshing where I had posted it on a forum to see what feedback it would get. I was expecting feedback, and hoping for positive feedback (I was attached to an outcome where somebody praised my writing).
When nobody commented for 24 hours, I went through phases of expectation that in my head always turned out to be negative. I began waiting for people to post comments that were critical of my writing. I began to expect that people would react badly to it. I began to doubt my writing.
I began to create my counter-arguments. "It is only a first draft." "I was rushing to get it written so that I could go to bed and sleep." "I deliberately didn't go into detailed descriptions in this draft, I just wanted to get the dialogue down." etc.
Note that all of this is/was going on in my head. None of this was actually taking place in real life. :-)
So I learned that having an active imagination is great when I am writing, and I could work on turning it off when I am trying to engage with real life and work with what is actually happening for real.
I could work on turning off my apparent craving for validation, my need to be liked, whatever you are to call it. And ultimately I could manage my expectations by ditching my attachments to outcomes and just taking whatever I get from life.
Very interesting and honest observations @powerfulwonders - you are the thinker of your thoughts;-) I know this topic of self-sabotage and actually I'm also working on doing my inner work. What I can tell you from my own observation is that awareness is the best place to start and I can read from your post that you are very aware of the harming consequences of your self-sabotage. So you can work on practising more self-compassion as we are all humans and we are not perfect and therefore self-punishment makes no sense at all. After all life is not about becoming the perfect human being but more getting good at life:-) Regarding expectations I learned a lot from Steve Chandler, who proposes to make agreements instead of expectations because as he says expectations always lead to some form of disappointment whereas agreements have a more relaxed and accountable character for both sides;-) Try out what works for you and have fun:-)
Agreements!!!! <3 <3 <3 I love agreements. What a lovely comment, thank you! I am cooking up a post about agreements, I think. I am just thinking about what I actually want to say. Your observations are great - and I will check out Steve Chandler. That name seems familiar but I can't place him right away.
Definitely self-punishment makes little sense, although I guess I can learn something from it too.
The inner journey can be fascinating, right? :-) I understand so little about why I do so many of the things that I do.
Wow! One of your best and most reflective posts, Paul. This spiraling deeper in to discernment and self knowing for increased self loving, happiness and self expression.
Deep, real. Self sabotage and expectations. Fear and attachments. All I want to say right now is again, Thank You/you. For all your honesty and keeping it real and refusing to hide behind politeness and masks and safe separation.
I feel like you were speaking about me. And my self sabotaging process of trying to remain invisible and pretending that I'm serious about mission, purpose, passion, happiness and relationships.
That's why inaction and circling are so comfortable and safe. Once we move in to action, we start stirring the pot and everything resting too deep to see clearly but are always feeling and fearing, come up to bob and weave and test and break or pass us on to the next even more excruciating level of vasting out in to our real selves.
FB/tweeting.