In Defense of Self: Why Do We Sabotage Happiness & Change?

Tell me if any of these situations apply to you. You have a dream or goal, or some project you want to pursue. You want to build a company, get a degree, begin speaking publicly, learn to dance, open a store, or any other thing you can think of. Then for some reason, you don’t pursue it. You might even actively sabotage it. You spend money on other things, occupy your free time with other things.

Or you create barriers, making up reasons and excuses why whatever it is you want to do isn’t possible. You think about starting to do something that would be a step toward what you want to do…and then instead, choose to do something totally unrelated, or worse, something that takes you a step further away from it.

Or lastly, you have made progress toward this goal. You may have even achieved a few milestones. Then, you start making life decisions that stop you in your tracks, or cause all that progress to be erased.

Take a moment. Be introspective. Does any of this sound familiar? Even a little bit? Me, too. Let’s talk about it.

What About History?

I’m going to mix my personal story into this. If you look at my history, I am a BSN-RN, with several certifications to complement that. I’m very intelligent, well-spoken, calm, cool, and collected. I’m a critical thinker, an artist, singer, and fitness enthusiast. I have integrity, character, compassion, empathy, and I’m very independent and driven. If you look at that same history, I’m also a recovering alcoholic and a multi-time failed businessman. I’m codependent and an anxious wreck. I’m self-serving, detached, absorbed, and lazy.

These two sides are both part of my history. I’ve been there. Now I’m a lot more of the former, and a lot less of the latter. That guy was a starter, not a finisher. Resistant to accomplishment, to change, and sabotaging of change. Let’s talk about all of this, about being both of those. Let’s start with the last one I mentioned.

The Psyche and Evolution

One of the biggest, and I would say possibly the biggest thing that keeps us from changing and succeeding in becoming better, happier people has to do with hardwired evolution and the way the human brain conditions action. You see, neanderthal-brain is still doing everything it can to ensure survival. Dopamine and reward systems have been conditioned for that single purpose. It’s why we are creatures of habit, why routine is comfortable, and why it is so hard to break out of. From an evolutionary standpoint, if you have survived up to 20, 30, 50 years of age by doing certain things, it makes sense that you would continue to do those things.

We all have a self-image that has been built from early childhood. Conscious and subconscious mind; Id (instinct), Ego (reality), and Superego (morality). A lot of who we are, and who we see ourselves as in those areas, has to do with core beliefs that were formed from childhood. These beliefs shape our political beliefs, our values, and what we perceive as being appropriate, successful, right, wrong, etc.

Now, here’s the kicker: these things combined make us resistant to even positive change. You see, when you have managed to survive for your entire lifetime, your basic psyche feels that your actions and habits are, at their core, successful. You haven’t died, after all. Therefore, your evolutionary mind can treat any possibility of altering those patterns as a threat to survival. It resists, fights against it, because it says “DANGER!…or at least, it might be dangerous, we don’t know, so best to stay away”). In fighting to survive, your psyche wants to avoid anything that could change the track record of not dying so far.

The second part has to do with self-image. As I said, our established self-image comes from things that were ingrained in us to be true before we really had any understanding. And evolutionary drive applies here, too. Even if you have low-self esteem, your self-esteem still exists; you still have things you inherently believe. Evolution does not like change, and it does not want that self-image to be degraded or taken away from. With any change – and this is especially true for growth and positive change – things that we believe to be true about ourselves will come into question. We’ll have to re-examine our beliefs, and they often have to change. Even if it is for our improvement, it is still an alteration of that self-image. It’s a hit to our ego, a change in our reality. So, evolution brain kicks in and avoids it like the plague. For true growth, we’ve got to fight back against this.

Past Sins and Self-Worth

As I said, I’m a recovering alcoholic. In the years after I became sober, and to this day, I struggle with that. I sabotaged relationships or got into ones I knew were doomed; I didn’t go after the opportunities I wanted. I avoided bettering myself and pursuing improvement. And that had to do, at least in part, with the fact that I didn’t feel I deserved those things. Because of who I had been, I felt undeserving of who I could be. I felt as though I was unworthy of love, of success, and of happiness.

As human beings, we tend to have a much longer memory for our failures than our successes. Also, we attach more weight to them. Again, that is evolution and the self-protecting psyche. Failures are a reminder of when we weren’t good enough, or when we were unworthy. They bring up the possibility in our psyche of failing again, of damaging our self-image and beliefs further. In this regard, practicing acceptance of the past while realizing that we do not have to let our previous failures define our present selves is paramount.

You may have been an addict, or destructive of your previous relationships. You may have been a bad student, or lacking ambition, or any number of things. But I urge you to cut yourself a break, and tell yourself that letting something dictate what you do now because of who you were is like putting on a raincoat now because it rained yesterday. It serves no purpose, and will only make you feel foolish in the end.

Your Own Worst Critic

I grew up with a father who was exceptionally critical of everything I did, even my successes; especially my successes, it seemed. If you grew up in a critical or abusive environment, it is highly likely that you are a perfectionist, or very hard-driven. You might be these things for other reasons, but upbringing is usually a factor. After quite a bit of therapy and examination, I now realize there were other reasons for my father’s criticism that had nothing to do with me (we’ll talk about that elsewhere), but it definitely created a perfectionist. Almost inexplicably, that thing can be a huge part of why we feel we don’t deserve the things we want. It can lead us to self-sabotage, and here’s why:

If happiness is based on who we are, and who we are is largely based on what we do, and if everything has to be perfect, then what we consider successes are very rare. This can create a hell of a demon in our heads with a very loud voice. It tells us that we’re never good enough, that we always screw up, that we’re losers – all because we fall a little short of our own impossible standards. That will drive you straight down into a pit of unhappiness and a constant feeling that you don’t deserve anything.

Relax. Give yourself a break. Success is almost never perfect. Tell yourself this until you internalize it and it becomes a mantra. How many shots did Michael Jordan miss? How many times did we fail to get a rocket off the ground before going to the moon? The New England Patriots had a perfect record – how did they lose in the Superbowl? Success isn’t always hitting the bullseye – it is putting yourself in a position where hitting the bullseye is a likely outcome. It’s persisting, and overcoming obstacles. For one last sports analogy: I don’t think Tiger Woods has hit the fairway twice in a row since he started golfing, and he’s come up short of a championship many times…but he still has a room full of trophies and a history full of wins.

The Magic Bullet

So, what’s the answer? What’s the cure-all pill, the one solution that we can take and fix any or all of these problems?

It doesn’t exist. At least, not in that easy-to-swallow capsule.

It’s touching on all of the things I said above. It’s introspection, self-examination, probably some therapy, and conscious decisions that we make from the results of those things. It will take work, some hits to our ego and self-image, and almost certainly a good bit of failure. Is it worth it? I think so. Are you worth it? I absolutely believe that you are. You are worthy of happiness, and love, and success…and you deserve to give yourself those things. Tell yourself those things once a day or so for me, will you?

Leave your thoughts in the comments. I love you all.