How To Break Free From Your Inner Saboteurs
We all have moments of self-doubt, procrastination, or hesitation in our work and personal lives.
When these moments become regular habits that derail your progress and goals, deeper self-sabotaging patterns are more than likely operating unconsciously.
It feels like an invisible force throwing obstacles in your way, keeping you stuck, frustrated, or even tempted to give up.
You may know what you should be doing to reach your goals, but despite your efforts, your feelings and actions aren’t matching up, making it hard to stay on track.
Our inner saboteurs influence our thoughts, emotions, and actions, affecting every part of our lives and well-being. They can shake our confidence and disrupt our progress towards our dreams.
Even though they feel like enemies, your mind creates your inner saboteurs to protect you from negative emotions and experiences based on the past.
The trouble is, you’re trying to uplevel your life with this outdated blueprint. They’ve served their purpose, but they don’t disappear by themselves. To move forward in your life, you need intentional attention and guidance to upgrade your operating blueprint so that it empowers you instead of keeping you stuck.
“Your mind is your best friend, but it is also your very worst enemy,-
The best-friend part - the voice of authenticity, calm, and positive emotion.
The Saboteurs — undermine you by triggering anger, anxiety, shame, regret, and other negative emotions.
Pretty much all your suffering in life is self-generated by your Saboteurs,” -Shirzad Chamine- Positive Intelligence
Common Inner Saboteurs
One or more inner saboteurs might be showing up in your life, relationships or career, especially if you're trying to make positive changes or up-level your life. These patterns can intensify because of deep-seated fears or the need to step out of your comfort zone. They can fuel each other like a ripple effect.
Here are some common ones suggested by psychologists that you might relate to. You might also see these behaviours in people around you.
THE INNER CRITIC
Do you have a harsh inner voice that constantly evaluates and judges your thoughts, actions, and abilities? This voice can make you worry excessively and focus only on negativity. Our Harsh inner critic is the strongest inner saboteur that fuels the others. ( More about how to upgrade the Inner Critic Here)
THE PROCRASTINATOR
Do you delay or postpone tasks or responsibilities to focus on more enjoyable or less demanding activities? As deadlines approach, this can lead to guilt, stress, or anxiety.
THE PERFECTIONIST
Do you set impossibly high standards for yourself and others? This can lead to a constant pursuit of flawlessness, focusing on tiny details, and judging others or yourself for perceived failures or faults.
THE ACHIEVER
Do you get validation from constantly striving for success and achievement? This can come at the expense of balance, well-being, and fulfilment. Underneath, you might feel a constant sense of inadequacy and fear of failure.
THE PLEASER
Do you prioritise others' needs and expectations over your own? This can be driven by a need for validation and approval from others at the expense of your well-being and authenticity.
THE AVOIDER
Do you intentionally ignore or deny tasks, problems, or situations to avoid uncomfortable or challenging emotions or thoughts? This can lead to only focussing on the pleasant, positive comfort and routine.
THE IMPOSTER
Do you feel inadequate, unqualified, and doubt yourself despite evidence of success or competency? You might fear being exposed as a fraud or that your achievements are based on luck, not your abilities and hard work.
THE CONTROLLER
Do you need to control every aspect of your life, environment, and others to avoid chaos and failure? This can lead to struggling to delegate and adapt to changes.
THE DEFEATIST
Do you have a pessimistic or resigned outlook, believing that any effort to change or improve yourself or your life is a waste of time? This can lead to giving up too soon or not taking any action at all, often because of feeling overwhelmed or past negative experiences.
THE VICTIM
Do you avoid taking responsibility for your actions and blame external circumstances for your perceived failures? This can result in feeling powerless, resigned, and struggling to solve problems.
THE RESTLESS
Are you constantly seeking new experiences, excitement and stimulation, or ways to add more joy to life? This enthusiasm is positive, but the restlessness can lead to acting on impulses rather than focusing on consistent focussed action to achieve long-term goals
How your Inner Saboteurs obstruct your Success and Happiness.
As we know, our Inner Saboteurs have a powerful impact on one or several different parts of our lives. They operate without us realising it, affecting our progress and making us unhappy by:
Holding Back Goals and Dreams:
They stop you from reaching your goals and dreams, which can make you feel frustrated, disappointed, and like you're not reaching your full potential.
Causing Doubt and Insecurity:
They make you doubt yourself and feel insecure. The voice inside your head that questions your abilities can make you feel less confident and lower your self-esteem.
Perpetuating Negative Thoughts:
They keep negative thoughts and beliefs like "I'm not good enough" or "I don't deserve to be happy" going. These beliefs can stick around, shaping how you see yourself and the world.
Creating a Cycle of Feeling Defeated:
They make you feel defeated and stuck in a cycle of disappointment, leading to a sense of hopelessness.
Getting in the Way of Relationships:
They affect your relationships with others, making it hard to be close, trust, and communicate. This can leave you feeling lonely, isolated, and unhappy.
Stopping Personal Growth:
They hold you back from growing and trying new things, keeping you stuck in your comfort zone. This can lead to feeling bored, dissatisfied, and like you're not reaching your potential.
Causing Stress and Anxiety:
They bring on stress and anxiety, which can lead to harmful coping habits to numb out difficult emotions, like emotional eating or drinking, or other addictive habits for escapism and relief.
Blocking Kindness to Yourself:
They make it hard to be kind to yourself by being overly critical and judgmental, adding to your anxiety and stress.
Fulfilling Negative Expectations:
They can make your negative beliefs about yourself come true. For instance, if you believe you'll fail, you might unconsciously act in ways that ensure you do, reinforcing your negative self-image.
Settling for Less Than You Deserve:
They can hold you back from achieving your full earning potential and financial security by causing fear of taking risks or doubting yourself in your business and career.
I believe achieving Authentic Inner Confidence and the Happiness, Success, and Fulfillment you want and deserve, needs a strong foundation.
It needs to be built on Supportive Core Beliefs, Healthy Emotional Regulation, and Unwavering Self-Worth- these also create an Empowered Mindset.
All other tools, techniques and strategies can maintain your progress after your foundation is strong. Otherwise, it’s an uphill struggle.
How do our Inner Saboteurs develop?
The root reason behind our Inner Saboteurs is our Core Beliefs, especially the limiting and negative ones. These beliefs deeply shape how we see the world and how we feel about ourselves; they influence our interactions with others and impact our success and happiness in life and relationships.
These beliefs live in our unconscious mind and body, which work to keep us safe. They don't differentiate between good or bad beliefs; they simply do what they think is necessary to protect us based on past experiences. You can read more about this in my blog post titled (Are your core beliefs helping or hindering you here.)
Our beliefs about our abilities, potential, or worthiness are the main barriers to our happiness, success and confidence. For example, thinking "I'll never succeed," "I can't change," or "I'm flawed" can lower our confidence and motivation to reach our goals.
Here are some examples of how these beliefs show up. Do these resonate with you?
Feeling Not Good Enough:
Believing "I'm not worthy of success," "I don't deserve happiness," or "I'm not good enough" can lead to behaviours that reinforce these negative thoughts or make us avoid challenges.
Fear of Making Mistakes:
Thinking, "I'm a failure if I make mistakes," "I can't accept failure," or "My worth is defined by failure" can stop us from taking risks or pursuing goals because we fear failing.
Fear of Achieving Success:
Beliefs like "Success will bring unwanted attention," "I can't handle success," or "Success is out of reach" can also hinder us by creating barriers to achieving success.
The Surprising "Benefits" of Self-Sabotage
While self-sabotage is harmful, it can also offer hidden "benefits" that we may not realise. For example, it can maintain the status quo if your desire for change doesn't outweigh the comfort and security of staying the same, even if it's harmful. It can also bring validation, attention, and sympathy from others when we struggle to achieve our goals.
The Unconscious Addiction to “Struggle”
This hidden addiction to struggle can affect all areas of life, from relationships to career or personal goals. It's a tendency to unconsciously find or create challenges, obstacles, or difficulties in life, even when opportunities for ease or success are available. This addiction can stem from past trauma, learned behaviour, or a subconscious belief that life must be difficult to be meaningful, rewarding, or worthwhile or to deserve happiness and success.
Struggle can also act as a defence mechanism against vulnerability. For example, focusing on external challenges or hardships can be a way to avoid uncomfortable underlying emotions or insecurities, such as fear of failure, rejection, or inadequacy.
Root Cause Resolution for Lasting Change
Overcoming our inner saboteurs is an emotion-management issue, not a logical symptom-management one. It’s the difference between temporary short-term fixes and long-term transformative resolutions and emotional freedom.
Two things are needed to transform them: Your nervous system needs to feel safe and calm before you move forward, and the root causes, not the symptoms, need to be resolved in the unconscious mind.
Self-sabotage patterns can be a result of your Body’s Stress responses.
Our emotions are influenced by how our bodies feel and how our nervous system works. Sometimes, we may not even realise that we are living in a fear, trauma, or stress response because so many of us ae disconnected from our bodies.
Even if we know logically that we’re safe, our bodies may still be on high alert, causing symptoms like anxiety and leading to unhealthy ways of coping with problems.
When we have a negative thought or experience, our body feels these sensations with physical feelings like tension, tightness, or discomfort before our mind catches up.
Your brain is wired to respond quickly to emotions, even before you think logically. This means that your body can react to stress before you even realise what's happening. Many of us are disconnected from our bodies, so we might not notice this is happening.
For example, our bodies react in different ways when we feel stressed or face a real or perceived threat.
The "freeze response" occurs when we feel stuck and can't take action because of stress or a threat. This might manifest as procrastination, avoiding things, or difficulty making decisions. When faced with a challenge or opportunity, fear or uncertainty can make us freeze up and stop us from taking positive steps.
Another way is the "fawn response," where we try to please others to avoid conflict or to be liked. Self-sabotage could mean putting aside your goals to keep things smooth in relationships or avoid disapproval or rejection.
Then there's the "flight response," where we try to escape or avoid something that feels threatening or stressful. This might look like avoiding responsibilities, doing things that harm us, or getting lost in distractions like social media, shopping, or eating for comfort. It's a way of avoiding uncomfortable feelings or situations.
The "fight response" can also lead to self-sabotage, such as being hard on ourselves or always finding flaws. Negative self-talk, self-doubt, or a need for perfection can make it hard to feel confident and stay motivated to reach your goals.
Understanding how these patterns of self-sabotage connect to stress responses can help you feel comfortable knowing that you’re not doing anything wrong. Your body is just doing everything it’s been programmed to do to keep you safe. Incorporating the nervous system and somatic tools into your life will help bring safety and calm back to your body, which is vital to begin to move forward faster.
Rewiring the Root Causes with Hypnotherapy. A Science-Backed Holistic approach for overcoming Self-Sabotage
The second part, closely connected to rewiring the nervous system, is to rewire the deeply entrenched negative core beliefs stored in the unconscious mind. These core beliefs, which influence our body and conscious mind, are the root causes of our self-sabotaging patterns.
The process of getting to these self-sabotage triggers is a bit like going to the attic or basement of your house and digging through all the old, dusty boxes.
Although you may not have looked inside for a while, the items stored inside can bring up memories you hadn’t thought of in years—events that may have had, and continue to have, a profound impact on your life. -Judy Ho Ph.D., ABPP, ABPdN
An effortless way to communicate directly with the subconscious mind is Hypnotherapy. I use Rapid Transformational Hypnotherapy with my clients.
The wonderful thing about this method is that it doesn’t require hours of talking or analysis. We can get straight to the core issues and resolve them faster.
Rapid Transformational Hypnotherapy was a game changer for me personally. It helped me overcome my inner saboteurs after years of struggling to change with other “logical” strategies. I use RTT Hypnotherapy as a stand-alone solution or integrated into my holistic coaching programs, and the transformations are deeper and faster than traditional coaching.
Rapid Transformational Hypnotherapy can help by
Uncovering Hidden Patterns:
It helps you identify the experiences or beliefs that may hold you back. By understanding these patterns, you can start making positive changes.
Empowering New Perspectives:
It helps you replace limiting beliefs with empowering ones, using techniques like hypnosis and visualization to boost your confidence and inner strength.
Rewiring Your Brain:
The relaxed state induced during Hypnotherapy enhances your brain's ability to reorganise and form new neural pathways and connections associated with self-sabotage, leading to more positive patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving.
Finding Inner Harmony:
It helps you align your thoughts and goals, resolve internal conflicts, and free you to pursue your dreams.
Discovering Your True Self:
It encourages you to explore your thoughts and feelings, helping you develop a deeper understanding of yourself and break free from negative patterns.
Lasting Change:
By targeting the root causes of self-sabotage, RTT Hypnotherapy sets you up for lasting success. You'll be able to overcome limitations and live a more authentic, purpose-driven life.
RTT Hypnotherapy can also help in regulating your nervous system by:
Reducing Anxiety:
It helps you relax deeply, which triggers your parasympathetic nervous system (your "rest-and-digest" response). This counters the effects of stress and anxiety that can lead to self-sabotage, promoting relaxation, calmness, and overall well-being.
Balancing Your Nervous System:
By reducing stress, RTT helps balance your autonomic nervous system, which controls your body's automatic functions. This balance helps you respond to stress more healthily, reducing the likelihood of self-sabotaging behaviours.
Regulating Your Emotions:
RTT Hypnotherapy uses techniques like visualisation and reframing to help you manage your emotions during hypnotherapy. Doing this allows you to regulate your emotional responses, become more resilient, and reduce impulsivity and emotional turmoil often linked to self-sabotage.
Connecting Body and Mind:
RTT Hypnotherapy, coupled with my additional somatic tools, helps you become more aware of your body's responses, allowing you to regulate them better. By focusing on your breathing, sensations, and relaxation cues during hypnosis, you can achieve balance and harmony within your nervous system.
Releasing Tension and Unhealed Wounds:
It helps you release physical tension and process unresolved emotional wounds that may contribute to self-sabotage. Through guided imagery and regression techniques, you can reframe past experiences, reducing their emotional impact and promoting healing.
Breaking Free from Your Inner Saboteurs is non-negotiable for achieving the level of confidence, happiness, and emotional wellness you deserve.
Transforming your Inner Supporters helps you significantly shorten the time and struggle it would normally take to
Cultivate a positive self-identity and foster elevated self-confidence, self-compassion, and self-acceptance.
Nurture genuine connections and happy, meaningful relationships.
Overcome financial challenges and create a more prosperous and financially secure future.
Operate from an empowered and resilient mindset.
Feel more happiness, fulfilment, and well-being in life.
I believe tools, techniques, and strategies can help you maintain your progress after your foundation is strong. Otherwise, it feels like an uphill struggle. This has been true in my own life and is a consistent theme in my clients’ lives regardless of the main issue they want support with.
If you’re ready to break free from your inner saboteurs, I’m here to help.
I support women in overcoming their inner saboteurs and finding their authentic inner confidence through my Rapid Transformational Hypnotherapy services and Holistic Integrated Hypnotherapy and Coaching programs. If you'd like to partner with me, feel free to book an introductory call here.
