Learning to live from authenticity is the journey we are all traveling whether we know it or not. If you have seen Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, then you know that self-actualization is the ultimate goal.
As a Board-Certified Hypnotherapist, I utilize many tools within the modality of Rapid Transformational Therapy (RTT) to tap into the subconscious mind to find one of the greatest wounds that insidiously sabotages lives—the wound of self-betrayal.
“Self-betrayal is sneaky and promotes self-sabotage.”
How self-betrayal shows up in your life can give you clues as to how or why you are knowingly or unknowingly choosing to ignore your soul’s nudges and whispers. Continuously ignoring your soul can lead to negative or disempowering patterns, breakdowns in communication and relationships or physically manifesting as a full-blown illness or disease.
There are clues to your patterns all around you. Here are 9 ways the that the self-betrayal wound can show up in your life:
- You are in a job or career that drains you. You know, on a soul level, that you are unhappy, yet you begrudgingly drag yourself to work, day after day allowing pieces of your heart and soul to wither.
- Say Yes when your entire being wants to say No. You have a pattern of saying yes to everyone’s requests even when your body and mind are giving you signals (sometimes physical) letting you know you are out of alignment with your truth.
- A pattern of procrastination. You’re in an avoidance pattern and find yourself consistently putting off things that make you uncomfortable, stretch you out of your comfort zone, ask you to take your head out of the sand or you’re consistently waiting for someone to do it for you.
- A pattern of time management issues. You hear, over and over again, from friends, family and coworkers, about how your lack of time management skills is affecting them—yet you continue the pattern. This causes a respect issue in my lives.
- A pattern of victimhood and blaming others. This is a tough one to face, but if you are constantly blaming others or the world for the repetitive challenges in your life it’s time to recognize that you are the common denominator in every challenge. (Ouch!)
- A pattern of worry and negativity. You find you are on the ‘worry’ train more than the ‘inner peace’ train and feel as if the negative script playing on loop is so fast and furious there doesn’t seem to be a way off.
- A pattern of complaining. As you become aware you realize that you are caught up in a pattern of complaining (about everything) and have created a secondary gain of self-pity which has now become your comfort zone.
- A pattern of tolerating bad behavior from others or yourself. Continually allowing this behavior even when you know deep inside that you deserve better is a common self-sabotaging behavior.
- A pattern of consuming and/ or addiction. You have an inner pull to feed what feels like an endless void within you with excess food, shopping, gambling, smoking, or some other self-destructive habit.
Do you see yourself in any, some, or all these scenarios?
It doesn’t have to stay that way. You can break the cycle and patterns of self-sabotage.
First, let’s explore what self-sabotage really is. When fear, doubt, blame and overwhelm are wreaking havoc on your life, you can be sure that something is amiss, and its name is self-betrayal and it often wears the cloak of self-sabotage. We are taught at an early age to have short and long-term goals and to gauge where we are in life by our achievements.
When life, as we know it, presents constant challenges or obstacles and we feel like we should be farther along than we are, we can be sure that self-sabotage is being reflected outward as a direct result of our self-betrayal.
Why we ‘choose’ to betray ourselves.
Is it conscious or are we unknowingly creating these issues for ourselves? Are we living based on the expectations of ourselves or the expectations of others?
We are all like absorbent sponges from the time we are born until about 8–years–old. During this time, we are observing anything and everything in our waking life through each of our senses. We do not have the capacity to analyze things at such a young age as we are not equipped to fully understand what we are observing. Thus, we are just taking it all in and in many cases, we are mimicking our learned experiences as our subconscious mind develops patterns of behavior based on what we think and feel through our observations.
These patterns of thoughts, feelings and reactions then become our behavior and habits and throughout life we begin to accept that ‘that’s just who I am’ or ‘that’s my nature’ or ‘I’m just built that way’ – can you relate? Or worse yet, we believe what others tell us about ourselves which can be just as damaging to our self-esteem.
Through working with clients on issues of self-betrayal, I have found that the disempowering beliefs typically revolve around thoughts of “I am not ____ enough” (good, smart, skinny, pretty, etc), “______ is not available to me” (money, a loving relationship, confidence, etc.) or “I am not like everyone else”; feeling different, unworthy or not accepted. These are some of the lies that we tell ourselves and that is where self-betrayal begins, whether we are conscious of the belief we have formed or not.
Everything is changeable!
Awareness is the key. Becoming aware that there is a belief or behavior that needs to change is the first step. It requires us to be honest with ourselves. A few of the best ways I have found to develop this practice of self-honesty are journaling, meditation, and self or guided hypnosis. If you have never tried any of these, I highly encourage you to try each of them out and see what works best for you. Being able to sit with yourself and dig deep into the silence is the best way to tap into your inner wisdom to effect change in your life.
The question that begins your journey!
Through any of modalities shared above, it begins with asking yourself one simple question. Take a moment to ground yourself and take several deep cleansing breaths to get present.
Next, ask yourself, “How am I betraying myself?”.
Once you’ve asked the question, allow yourself time to sit in silence so the answers can rise to the surface. You can choose to journal about what shows up for you or remain in silence and quietly contemplate your findings. What rises to the surface may be a past event, a symbol, a word, a feeling or maybe just an inner knowing. Either way, you are giving yourself the gift of quality time and presence.
Next, being able to understand how what shows up has negatively affected you and then to make a decision that will move you forward is key to changing self-sabotage. What needs to be released, to be changed or to be improved upon? You get to decide the trajectory of your life – no one else has your best interest at heart and the sooner you decide what is best for you – the sooner you can take action and allow it to show up for you. Getting clear on what you need or want will allow you to take inspired action.
Trade love for fear, doubt, and uncertainty. Yes, love is the antidote to all those negative feelings. When we make decisions based on fear, they often come back to bite us, right?! Make a vow to take time to consciously make every decision going forward from a place of love. What advice would you give your best friend if they had the same issue or challenge? Your advice would come from love, so be your own best friend and decide everything from love – you are worth it!
Get a new perspective by telling yourself the words or phrases you have always wanted to hear. What did you long to hear as a child? Perhaps it was – you are so creative, or I love that you are in my life or you sing so beautifully, or you can do or be anything you want – you are amazing! No matter what those words or phrases are, tell them to yourself every day. Don’t wait to hear those words from someone else. You deserve to be praised now, so go on and tell yourself all the wonderful things you have longed to hear. In fact, right them in your journal, too! Give yourself a rampage of love.
Believe in yourself.
Think back to a time in your life when someone believed in you – how did that make you feel? Get that same feeling back today by taking time to reflect on that joyous time and feeling. It often only takes one person believing in us for us to achieve our heart’s desire. If you can’t find that one memory, let me be your memory. Know right here, right now that I BELIEVE IN YOU AND YOUR HEART’S DESIRE!
This is your life, your chance to shine and to express what is in your heart. Be aware of what it is you want by asking yourself questions, digging deeper each day and making decisions based on the answers you uncover. Always come from love, including the way you talk to yourself and believe in yourself – you’ve got this and it’s time to take inspired action and live your best life right now.
I BELIEVE IN YOU!
Colleen Elaine <3
