How To STOP Self Sabotage
SELF SABOTAGE - WILLPOWER - HABITS - SELF AWARENESS
These 4 topics are all interlinked and either serve you on a daily basis or they are the exact reason you are stuck.
Do you have poor habits so struggle with low willpower and self sabotage yourself regularly but lack self awareness to actually pinpoint the habits you need to replace??
Newsflash - the vast majority of people will answer yes to that sentence, if you said No then you probably wouldn't be here reading this
You see when I usually say to people “you need to improve your self awareness” or “you need to work on identifying and eliminating your excuses” they get very triggered, they get very defensive as if there is something negative about that
Looking at yourself HONESTLY and really identifying where YOU are standing in your own way is one of the most POSITIVE things you will ever do for yourself!! We are human, we are not designed to be perfect, we will never be perfect!! EVERYONE creates ‘excuses’ because its easier to say “im too busy” than to really look at yourself and admit that you are not using your time effectively, that you have low willpower, that you prioritise things that are serving you, that you scroll social media more than you workout
But once you realise the aim of the game is not to become someone who has an “easy” life and has zero challenges and can say “Im perfect, i work hard every single day and always give 100% effort” because thats NOT realistic - you will never be able to do that
The aim of the game is to identify what YOUR best effort is with the time YOU have and become comfortable with admitting to yourself when you are falling short on what YOU can achieve within YOUR life and then working on THAT instead of just always blaming something external and just remaining stuck
Because YOU are the captain of your own ship - not anyone else!! You are exactly where you are right now because of YOUR own actions! Some will become defensive at that statement and some will find power in knowing they are in complete control of where they are now heading!!
Identifying Triggers
So lets first identify your triggers - what is making you fall off track. If you don’t know why you keep falling off track (like specific reasons, not “i struggle to remain consistent”) then its going to be very hard to know where you need to work on
- How long have you been working towards your goal?
- How many times have you fallen off track?
- Side note - If you answered more than 3 to the above then your issue is CONSISTENCY - STOP looking for another fad diet, thats NOT your problem!!! You need something that will teach you how to create habits and not lose weight via a restrictive method (ie cut carbs, do shakes, fasting etc etc) Think back over those times, WHY did you fall off track? What was the triggers? A social event? Stressful day at work? Vacation? Lack of willpower to keep going? Life got busy so you couldnt stick to the plan? Etc etc
The more you can write here the more you can help yourself
4. So above you now have a list of TRIGGERS - these will fall into the below categories, write the category that relates to your trigger the most
TIME MANAGEMENT (busy at work, busy with kids, general busy life)
STRESS MANAGEMENT (comfort eating, anxiety, stressful day at work, life stressors etc)
MOTIVATION (lack of willpower, skipping workouts, unable to keep yourself accountability when no one is watching etc)
SELF BELIEF (someone says you cant do something so you believe them and give up, you tell yourself your results are slow so whats the point and give up, low self confidence etc)
SOCIALISING (vacation, weekend activities with kids, catch up with friends, work dinner etc)
What category does the most of YOUR triggers fall into? THAT is what you need to start working on first, then the second category and so on
You can't change everything at once. Each category will involve in creating HABITS to overcome the triggers. Each trigger involves a different habit - something that hopefully overtime you can learn more in the group (this is something we work 1-1 on with our clients to ensure all habits are covered in THEIR own life before they leave our programme) but for now I am going to talk about MORNING ROUTINES that will help with both time management and stress management. This will also save you A LOT of willpower which in turn will reduce likelihood of self sabotage
A morning routine is pretty important eh?!
Morning Routine
Write down your current routine (everyone has a routine, even if its a ‘bad’ one)
Write down what you would LIKE to do in the morning
A morning routine is about two things - getting you in the correct headspace for the day ahead (start the day strong and you will end the day strong) and ensuring you are ready for the day (this is the time management aspect)
So many of us REACT to our lives, we just wake up and go straight to reacting to everything around us, hence why our days can get away from us, we can procrastinate, we can allow life stressors to get on top of us, we can end up feeling burnt out etc
Headspace
Some things you should NOT do in the morning
- Check your phone (texts, emails) first thing. This is going straight in to reaction mode and will start your day on an anxious note thinking about all the things you need to do that day
- Check social media. For most instances social media isn’t exactly positive, its full of comparing our lives to others, negative news, even toxic people. Starting your day on that note is obviously not ideal
- Reach for caffeine first thing. Drinking caffeine as soon as you wake will do nothing for your energy levels throughout the day as your body is trying to regulate itself after being in sleep mode for so long, dumping caffeine in your body first thing will result in shorter energy levels throughout the day. There are lots of studies around this concept, delaying caffeine for 90mins has been proven for teh best energy levels throyghoyt the day
Some things you should do
- Get OUT OF BED on time (stop hitting snooze). Each night you set an alarm to get yourself up at a certain time, when you hit snooze you are starting the day on a ‘failure’, that sub conscious action will be the tone for the day ahead. Set your alarm at the other side of the room so you have to actually get up, go to bed earlier so you can wake up refreshed and not feel like hitting snooze, work on your sleep quality
- Journal, can’t stress the importance of journaling enough. 99% of people go through life having zero idea of who they actually are, what's actually going on in their heads, even stopping to really look at their lives and hence they simply react to everything around them. Journaling helps us stop and assess ourselves on a daily basis. It also helps rewires our negative self talk and how we even assess ‘challenges’ - its powerful beyond words
- Plan your day. A recent study showed that 75% of people don’t plan their day, that is crazy. No wonder so many people are ‘busy’ and never have time to do anything because they simply aren’t planning how to use their time and again reacting to what their day presents them. Planning your day has also been show to radically reduce procrastination
There is no ‘perfect’ morning routine. It can be as long or as short as you want. The more time you have the more you can do with it. Some of our clients do a lot of personal development in the mornings (they read, they do affirmation work to break through limiting beliefs, they simply use the morning to have some quiet alone time before the craziness of the day begins) while other clients have very limited time so their morning routine could consist of listening to a podcast while getting ready for work (to help with their headspace for day ahead) and planning their day ahead in the few minutes while waiting for their breakfast to heat up etc
Again its ALL about what time YOU have and how to use that more effectively instead of saying “I don’t have time” - thats where the lack of self awareness comes back
If YOU want help with YOUR habits, your time, your schedules in order to create consistency to a healthy lifestyle then lets chat. Simply book a call below to speak with me or one of my breakthrough coaches directly to see how we can help YOU because every single woman deserves to be the best version of HER and that begins with working on YOU!!