Improve the Quality of Your Life
by Do you often feel as though you are your own worst enemy? How to stop sabotaging yourself.
No one judges you as harshly as you judge yourself. Have you ever heard that? It seems that human beings, as a species, are programmed to beat ourselves to oblivion for every mistake that we make. It doesn’t have to be that way.
Self-Defeating Principles:
Self-defeating principles are the things we do, habitually, to sabotage our own success in life. These principles are based loosely on beliefs that we hold about ourselves, and our own innate abilities to get things done. If you have a big test coming up and you are nervous about it, you might tell yourself that you suck in that subject and that you are going to fail.
In that belief alone, you are rooted and stuck. You give up before you start the race. You decide not to study, and then you do fail, thus proving yourself correct. But what has being right done for you in that case? You now have an F on a test, and have to study that much harder in the subject that you obviously dislike, in order to make it up, and have made your job and your attitude, that much more difficult to change.
Instead, think to yourself: You know what? I am really nervous about that test. I need to really focus on this right now, and put everything else aside until I get this done. By this new attitude of focus and concentration, you have made an agreement with yourself to put a conscious effort into something even though you are unsure of the end result.
Unresolved Guilt or Regret:
We’ve all had those toe curlingly uncomfortable moments where we relive our worst mistakes, as if on a loop. Whether you lost your temper at an inopportune moment, or stuck your foot so far in your mouth it came out the other side, realize that it was one moment in your life. One moment. Why torture yourself with it continuously?
The best way that I have found to resolve guilt or regret from past mistakes is to remember the moment twice or three times. The first time, relive the moment exactly as it was, mistake intact, with all the feelings that came with it, underlying your initial knee jerk reaction. This will enable you to see why it was you reacted to the situation the way you did.
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Post CommentTy
On October 22, 2008 at 10:49 pm
I believe everyone can get a little insight from this article. It is true that we can not control those things in life that challenge us. However we can change how we react to those things and slowly mold our reactions into a better response and outlook. I suggest looking at a mistake a third time a month or so later. You will then find two things. First, the problem that seemed huge or overwhelming simply just isn’t important anymore. Funny how life moves past those events and puts it in perspective. We just fail to look back and note that our concern was not really needed in the big picture. The second thing found is that if we can imagine our reaction to it differently we can learn how better to deal with other problems in the future. As long as we pay attention and make the effort needed to change.