lasting changes

Self-sabotage: Why do you do it? And how can you stop?

demolition marian-kroell-dfOnZMEzI4Q-unsplash.jpg

Why do you self-sabotage? Why do you sometimes try to undo all of the hard work that you've put in with your exercise routine, eating habits, lifestyle changes, or other self-improvement goals?

It's a question that I've worked through many times with clients over the years. Very rarely do they understand why they do it. And that's one of the issues. Getting to the root cause of a behaviour, understanding what triggers us to act that way in the first place, allows us to either seek to remove the trigger from our life, or to at least recognise what's going on and come up with a plan for when it does occur.

Let's take a look at some of the most common reasons I've heard from clients over time, and some possible solutions.

Why do I press self-destruct?

1. Issues with self-worth


A number of clients I've worked with over the years have come to the realisation that they don't see themselves in a particularly positive light. This can be for a whole host of reasons but, whatever it is, in many instances it has led them to feel as if they're not worthy of achieving the goals they are after.

They see themselves as undeserving of good health or happiness or career success or whatever it is they're working on.

Action: What can you do about it?

In the first instance, you might find it helpful to talk this through with someone; a friend or family member, your trainer, or, if more appropriate, a counsellor. Understanding how you see yourself, and why, can be the first step towards changing that perception for the better.


2. Fear of, or potential drawbacks to the change


Sometimes, when I work through what went wrong with clients, they discover that they were actually harbouring some fears or concerns over the goal they had put in place.

They hadn't consciously recognised that they had legitimate concerns about the changes that would happen were they to succeed. Instead, they had let their subconscious mind sabotage their efforts so that they wouldn't have to worry about these things. Quite clever, and entirely logical if you think about it.

Action: What can you do about it?

Perform a 'Benefits & Drawbacks Analysis' on your goal. What are the potential positives for you of achieving it? What might be the negatives?

Having done this, you can analyse in more detail which of these things is most important to you and decide if the goal is right for you right now. You may find that a simple tweak is all it takes for it to work much better, or you may want to choose another goal entirely. It really doesn't matter. What matters is that it works for you.

3. Negative self-talk - 'I'll never succeed'


This can happen for many reasons. Maybe it's a self-worth thing. In which case, see Point Number One. But, sometimes it can be far simpler than that. Sometimes it's a belief that has been ingrained into your mindset over time. Let's take Newcastle United fans as an example (sorry to any Magpies amongst you). They probably go into each football season firmly believing that they're not going to win the league. Why? Because year in, year out, they don't. If you imagine their belief that they won't win the league as a tabletop, every time that belief is backed up in reality, a leg is added to the table underneath. If it happens just once, the belief is on shaky foundations and can easily be changed. But, when it happens time after time, that table (belief) has many legs and it becomes much harder to topple over.

Maybe you've tried losing weight a number of times but you haven't succeeded in keeping it off. In this instance, you can start to believe that it's never going to happen, so you say to yourself, 'it doesn't matter if I eat those biscuits, because I won't lose weight anyway.' It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Action: What can you do about it?

  • Try 'I might' instead of 'I will.' Stable beliefs don't always change overnight. They may take time. I could tell you to just simply believe in yourself, tell yourself you can do it and so on and so forth. But you may just look at me and say, 'Why should I?' In this instance, it can help to start with 'I might.' I might lose weight if I didn't have those biscuits, or I might find running easier if I did 1-mile three times a week for a month. Give yourself a timescale that you're going to try it for, and see what happens. You might just notice some progress.

  • Think about times where you have been successful. If you do notice that you feel negative about yourself, think back to times where you have succeeded and it made you feel good. What did you do? How did you do it? Whose help did you enlist to make it happen? What was different about that instance? And how can you use that with this goal?

  • Focus on small wins. Set micro-goals. Rather than saying, I'm not going to eat biscuits this month, focus on just one day, or even just half a day. Every time you succeed with one of these little wins, you saw a negative leg off that belief table of yours and replace it with a positive one.

  • Reframe. I frequently hear words like 'disaster', 'nightmare', 'failure', or 'self-destruct' from clients who struggle to maintain their goals. I even used that last one myself to title this article. But I did it because, if you're someone who experiences this, you probably use that term too. How about we try reframing it though? Maybe 'blip' or 'stumble' or 'minor setback' or 'one of those days.' Call it whatever you like that decreases its importance, because one unhealthy meal, or one day of too much alcohol, or one day of no exercise, or even a few days, or a week, isn't a disaster. It only becomes a disaster when we get ourselves into the cycle of repeating it again and again. If you had no plan to give up alcohol forever, why are you beating yourself up when you had a few drinks one night? Accept it, downplay its importance, and get back to the better habits you've been doing so well with. Do that, and it really won't make a difference at all.


P.S. Newcastle fans, has your belief about winning the league changed this week with new owners at the club? Has it sawn all of those negative legs off of your table???

4. The happiness trap - Celebrating success (a little too much)


Here's an interesting version of self-destruction. It's the one where you work really hard to achieve your goals, get exactly what you're after, and then go back to all the less healthy habits and undo it all. You get fit, then you stop training completely. You reach your weight loss goal, then go back to your comfort foods. You improve your sleep, then you start staying up late binge-watching Netflix series again!

Action: What can you do about it?

  • Remember the pain. Many people come to me when they are in pain. Sometimes physical, but often emotional. The problem is, once you've reached your goal, you're not in pain anymore. You stop doing the exercises the physio gave you to make your shoulder better. You stop preparing your meals for the week and go back to snacking on the go. But, if you can give yourself a constant reminder of what it was like to be in that rubbish place, sometimes you can provide yourself with the motivation you need to not go back there. A photo of you at a weight you hated. An appointment card you had from those oh so painful physio treatment sessions stuck on your computer monitor. Anything that reminds you what it was like.

  • Analyse your happiness habits and plan solutions. It might surprise you to know (or not) that many of my clients find being in a positive mood a dangerous time for them in some ways. When they are happy, they drink more, eat more of the wrong foods, stay up later, or find themselves performing less than healthy habits. If you know this is what you do, then at least you can prepare a plan of action for your danger times. If I feel like this (x)...then I will do this...(y). Preparation puts you back in control.

action jakob-owens-CiUR8zISX60-unsplash.jpg

There are, of course, many more ways that you can find the right balance and discover a way to achieve lasting health, fitness, and happiness.

Here's something for you to think about:

Do I ever press self-destruct? If so, why? And what could be a possible solution to this in future?


Should you need any help at all with this, remember that I'm only an email, phone call, smoke signal, or carrier pigeon message away.

Paul

paul@balancehealthandfitness.co.uk

0775 200 1203

Fuel for thought: What the petrol 'crisis' can teach you about forming healthy habits.

We had to travel quite far to find some petrol last week! ;-)

We had to travel quite far to find some petrol last week! ;-)

Sometimes, things happen during the week that spark my brain to life. (Not very often, I'll admit, but it does happen!) And, when it does, I can instantly see a great connection between whatever it is and the important messages that I try to pass on to you in my newsletters and blogs about how to make your healthy habits stick.

Bizarrely, you might think, this week's fuel 'crisis' was one such moment. Here's how my little grey cells connected a lack of petrol and diesel with lasting weight loss, improved energy levels, better sleep, less stress, increased strength and all-round wellbeing for you.

1. URGENT ACTION REQUIRED!!!!!!!!


We take action when things are urgent. When they need our attention right away. That's why we got on board with the vast changes to life that we felt were required at the start of the virus. That's why people raided petrol station forecourts this week like packs of hungry wolves.

And, it's also why we're often so slow to react when it comes to things like the environment or our own health and wellbeing. These changes happen slowly over time. So slowly, in fact, that we barely notice them. And so, when it comes to taking action, it feels like something we can put off until tomorrow. We have time for that, but there's more urgent stuff that needs attending to first.

How can you use this to your advantage?


In reality, unless you've had a major health scare, it's difficult to make prioritising your wellbeing feel urgent. But, there are some things you can do to help bump it up the priority list:

  • Set frequent short-term goals with fixed timelines/dates in which to achieve them. Yes, the big goal may be some time away, but breaking it down into more bite-size chunks helps to keep it higher on your list of priorities.

  • Be accountable to someone for the progress you're making on these short-term goals. If you have to report in, this creates a sense of urgency, much like projects at work with set dates and the need for weekly updates to your boss. You get these things done!

2. DON'T PANIC BUY!


A message you've heard many times in this past week. But, what do people do? They top up their tanks, just in case. Sometimes because they are very much panic buying. Sometimes because they think, 'well, I best fill up anyway because everyone else is stupid and they definitely will.'

Our brains just don't really compute the word 'don't'.

Whatever you do, don't think about pink elephants. So what did you just do? You imagined Dumbo in a nice shade of candyfloss pink, didn't you? For your brain to process the negative 'don't', it has to imagine the very action it's being told not to perform.

As I heard those messages this week, all it brought to mind for me was Private Jones in Dad's Army saying, 'Don't panic Mr Manewaring' in that increasingly agitated manner of his, working himself up into a lather and a state of absolute panic. The irony wasn't lost on me.

How can you use this to your advantage?


When you're trying to improve your health and fitness, focus on the habits you want to form, rather than those you don't.

Instead of saying, 'I'm not going to eat biscuits', try 'This week, I'm going to snack on fruit, nuts and seeds during my breaks at work.' Rather than saying, 'I don't want to feel tired anymore', try, 'I want to have the energy to get through my day and still have time to do something fun with the kids in the evening.'

3. IT'S REALLY NOT A BIG DEAL. THAT'S WHY WE'RE GOING TO MAKE IT THE FRONT PAGE HEADLINE EVERY DAY AND START EVERY NEWS BULLETIN WITH IT!


Think logically for a second. We're told that it's all fine, that there's plenty of fuel to go around if we all just fill up normally. But, at the same time, we're informed every day that it's a 'crisis'. I don't know about you, but if something is a crisis, then I imagine that it must be pretty bad.

It's always in the news. We're reminded of it constantly. Why would they keep going on about it if it wasn't a problem, right? I'm sure the media knows this, and they also know that they can essentially create a story by reporting it before it's even happened. They talk about it enough, and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

How can you use this to your advantage?


You want to do something. Find a way to remind yourself of it constantly. Keep it in the forefront of your mind and you can make it happen.

Very often, people assume that they fail with their health and fitness goals because they weren't motivated enough. It obviously wasn't that important. But it probably was. It's just that every day their brain got deluged with millions of pieces of information and endless life and work and family tasks that they had to do as well, many of which were 'crises' or needed urgent attention. Their goals simply got pushed to the back of their minds.

In order to keep them at the front, you have to create constant reminders. Alarms on your phone telling you to drink some water. Meetings in your diary for gym sessions. Post-it notes on the kettle or laptop informing you to have a piece of fruit.

You can think like any good media outlet. Keep your health and fitness story front-page news in your life and you'll make the headlines you want to read.