Further Your Lifestyle

EP.96 - Self Sabotage. Your Success Killer | Further Your Lifestyle Podcast

January 15, 2023 Your Host: Chris Furlong Episode 96
Further Your Lifestyle
EP.96 - Self Sabotage. Your Success Killer | Further Your Lifestyle Podcast
Show Notes Transcript

In this episode, we'll explore the root causes of self-sabotage and how to overcome it. Listeners will learn how to identify and acknowledge their self-sabotage behaviors, challenge negative thoughts, set specific and achievable goals, and seek support and accountability. By implementing these strategies, listeners can take control of their actions and make meaningful progress towards their goals.

YT version: https://youtu.be/_N0Qc9a76II

2-3 Interesting Things Listeners Will Learn:

What self sabotage is and how it can hold you back from achieving your goals

How to identify and acknowledge self-sabotaging behaviors
Strategies for overcoming self sabotage, including time-boxing efforts, creating a plan, and seeking help from others 

If you've ever struggled to follow through on your goals or found yourself engaging in behaviors that undermine your progress, this episode is for you. You'll learn how to identify and overcome self sabotage so you can move forward with confidence and achieve your dreams.

▬▬▬▬ CHAPTERS ▬▬▬▬

0:00 - the success killer
1:02 - does this sound like you 
2:00 - the PROBLEM!
2:20 - what is Self Sabotage
3:43 - the perfect parallel for life
4:15 - another example
6:00 - how do we deal with this?
11:15 - recap 
12:00 - some questions for you (a few)
15:15 - a book suggestion 

The Mountain Is You: Transforming Self-Sabotage Into Self-Mastery
by Brianna Wiest
https://www.amazon.com.au/Mountain-You-Transforming-Self-Sabotage-Self-Mastery/dp/1949759229


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[00:00:00] Chris Furlong: Yo. Yo yo. Welcome back to the Further Your Lifestyle Podcast, conversations on lifestyle passions and hustles. My name's Chris Furlong. I am your host and I'm super excited to be back here having the conversation with you, episode 96 today, and we are talking about self sabotage and how it is your success killer.

[00:00:18] Chris Furlong: Now if you are listening to this podcast, if you're listening to this episode, there is a high chance, a likely chance that you've got big goals, you've got big dreams, you've got big ambitions, and you've got big plans for yourself, and you want all these different things. You, you like the idea of being able to be a bigger and better version of yourself or of what situation you are in.

[00:00:38] Chris Furlong: Or maybe you just want, you know, that next promotion or you wanna pay rise, or maybe you wanna grow your romantic relationship, or maybe you just want more free time. I'm pretty sure this is gonna sound like you. Does this sound like you? Is any of these things vibing with you? Resonating with you? Big ambitions, big goals?

[00:00:56] Chris Furlong: Or maybe you just want something different, something fresh for this year? Well, if that does sound like you, well, I wanna ask you something else, and maybe this also sounds like you, and we're gonna get real here. So be be honest and we're diving straight in, procrastinating on a task that needs to be completed, even though you know it's important for your.

[00:01:16] Chris Furlong: Or you choose to engage in distracting or unproductive AC activities instead of working towards your goals, or maybe you fail to follow through. On a plan or commitment that you've made, even though you know it will help you achieve your objectives, telling yourself that you are not capable of achieving your goals and using this belief as an excuse to not even try or not even to start in the first place, or you engage in behaviors that undermine your progress, such as not taking care of your physical health or setting boundaries with others.

[00:01:46] Chris Furlong: If any of what I have just shared just now sounds. Somewhat like you, or you've had those thoughts before or you've, you can be honest and put your hand up and say, yep, I've, I've had that in my own experience. Well, this is the episode for you and that's what we're diving into today. We're talking about self-sabotage, the success killer.

[00:02:03] Chris Furlong: And the problem is that half the time we know it, but we don't, because sometimes we numb ourselves to realizing that maybe, ah, yeah, it's not that bad. But as we progress further, And this is where hindsight comes in, we start to realize we should not have done that. So what is self-sabotage? Essentially?

[00:02:22] Chris Furlong: Self-sabotage, if you dunno, what it is, is doing things that we think will help us achieve our goals, but ultimately do not contribute to. Our success. Now, I like to think of these as side quests. If you've ever played a video game or if you're familiar with video games, you know that there's a main storyline, there's a main narrative that we have to follow, a linear path that everyone needs to do in order to finish the game, to get a hundred percent or to complete the game, for instance.

[00:02:48] Chris Furlong: And there's a lot of signed things to do. There's a lot of side quests or, you know, sub-story lines or just little things that you can collect along the way. Now, these are fun. It's definitely fun if you are a, if you want to, A completionist, right? If you are a completionist, you wanna be able to collect all the things along the way.

[00:03:03] Chris Furlong: Now, as I said, these are fun. They keep you entertained and they can help you explore and you know, make new decisions and things for yourself, and you feel like you're part of this bigger and different world. But when it comes to getting back to the main storyline or the main quest line, it means you may have to train a skill that you didn't like, or it may mean you have to invest time.

[00:03:22] Chris Furlong: You know, beating one part of the game or going to round to, or going around and having to talk to other MPCs that's, you know, non playable characters. It may mean you have to go fight a boss and that boss is really, really hard and you're not strong enough to go do it. So you have to go level up more, or simply put, it means you will have to get uncomfortable and lose a sense of control, and you have to dive into the unknown.

[00:03:43] Chris Furlong: Now when, when we say it like that, this is the perfect parallel for life. For me, when I, when I realized this, I also clicked because it became a new constant reminder for me that I need to keep myself more self-aware and more aware of my actions on an ongoing basis based on, you know, the decisions I'm making and all the things that I'm doing to make sure that what I'm deciding to do is actually playing out to my true intents, to the things that I really, really want.

[00:04:10] Chris Furlong: Now, if you are still not vibing with me, if you are still not understanding what I'm talking about, Think about it in this way. Think about maybe when you needed to clean your office or clean your room, whether it was when you were a kid or maybe when you're as an adult as well. We all have chores, and we all know that we don't like doing chores.

[00:04:25] Chris Furlong: Now when we do this, we set an expectation. We set an intention of what needs to be done. What do we need to do now as we begin? We find, especially when it is a chore, that distractions tend to pop up just naturally because they're things that , they wanna take us away from the, the hard thing or the chorey thing that I, that we need to do now.

[00:04:45] Chris Furlong: For instance, you're cleaning your room or cleaning your office. Now you might stumble across some old bills, some paperwork or some memories or something, which takes your a. at that moment, and you think, oh, I, I better deal with this now, right? 30 minutes later, an hour later, two hours later, yes, you may have paid some bills, you may have sorted some paperwork and you've reminisced on some good old days and some photos of friends, or you know, back in the day of with grandma, but you still have an office or a room to clean and you haven't done it.

[00:05:12] Chris Furlong: You felt productive. You felt like you were doing something that has enabled you to get. So you felt accomplished, but you have only filled that void of not doing what you needed to do. So now you're back at square one, knowing you still need to do the hard chore that you hadn't haven't done and that you hadn't intended to set out to do in the first place.

[00:05:33] Chris Furlong: And you've actually tried to. Make yourself feel better by not doing it, by doing these other things because they make more sense to do. Although were quicker things to do, or they were side quests and there were things that were going to make you feel better about getting them done. See how we tend to use other things or side quests or distractions as excuses to make us feel like we are moving forward, yet we are just avoiding the climb we still need to do to get to the other side or to get to the top.

[00:05:57] Chris Furlong: So the big question you are probably thinking or probably asking, or maybe you just want answered, is how do we deal? , how do we tackle it? How do we manage this? And look, I don't have all the answers for this, but what I wanna share with you is some quick ways on how you can work on preventing self-sabotage and take back your winning self.

[00:06:16] Chris Furlong: Now, of course, this all comes back to you. All right? Here I am telling you these things that you can do. And look, this is just as much as a conversation to myself as it is to anyone else. But the reality here is you need to be responsible and accountable for this. I can tell you, but you still have to take the.

[00:06:31] Chris Furlong: That's the reality of it. So what are some things that you can do? I'm just gonna have a sip of coffee. Ah, . All right. Number one is identify and acknowledge yourself Sabotaging behaviors. So what does this even mean? It means you need to start to be aware of it. You need to be conscious of it. So as you go through and do things, there is that point in time that.

[00:06:56] Chris Furlong: Small snippet of time. It might be a split seconds. It could be a couple of seconds where, we'll, we'll go back to the example around cleaning your office or cleaning your room, that you're doing it and you see something else that takes your attention. You think, oh, I need to do that now. In that moment, you have a split second chance to say, okay, I'm gonna shelve that and put that to the side, and that comes something that I need to do later, and you continue on with your task.

[00:07:18] Chris Furlong: It's in that moment that you get to decide how you're going to react and how you're going to act. So you need to identify that. Do you do this? You know, back, back before when I, I said at the start where we were talking about, you know, do you procrastinate? Do you choose to engage in other, you know, distracting activities?

[00:07:35] Chris Furlong: Do you you know, make yourself. Think that you're not capable of actually achieving this, do you, you know, fail to follow through on a plan or commitment because you know it, it's just too hard and it, so all these different things, you need to be aware of them. You will know what you do the most.

[00:07:49] Chris Furlong: Sometimes we might not realize it, and that's why we're gonna go through this to help you maybe have a bit more clarity. But you need to, if you know that you are doing something, you need to be calling it out, understanding it and saying, Hey, yes, I've got this and I need to be. Assertive, more attentive and more open in in trying to handle it.

[00:08:06] Chris Furlong: So number two is you need to challenge your negative thoughts or opposing thoughts in the moment as they occur. So as I said before, as these things happen, it's the same. When you start to have the negative thoughts in that moment, you need to take back control. You need to actually identify, okay, hang on.

[00:08:22] Chris Furlong: What am I thinking here? Is this, is this necessary? Is this right? Is this actually helping me or is it just the doubt, the fear stepping in? Because a lot of the time. When we have a big, ambitious goal, or we want to be somewhere, we, we do, we, we tend to jump forward and we think, oh, how are we gonna do this?

[00:08:37] Chris Furlong: And we start to panic and we think, oh, what happens here? And we, we think if we get to that situation, we're not gonna know what to do. So therefore there's no point we even starting this because if we get into that situation, it's gonna be too hard to handle. So therefore we don't want to even wanna have to go down that, that road.

[00:08:54] Chris Furlong: But the reality is, if you. Pull back a little second cause the situation is not happening and you actually understand, well, what would I do? How can I plan for that? How can I, you know, incorporate and think positive about this situation? Think positive about this opportunity, and work on how do I continue to move forward.

[00:09:12] Chris Furlong: Now, a lot of the time when things pop up that we don't think about, We think about a lot of the worst cases, but when life comes at us and we don't plan for a worst case situation, we have to deal with it as it happens, and we work our way through it. We make our way through it, and usually things aren't as bad as we seem or or thought.

[00:09:30] Chris Furlong: So the reality here is, is if you just prepare yourself, if you just look at it not from a negative side and say, okay, there will be some challenges. How do we handle. It can help you then not to be so scared to move forward, but actually embrace moving forward. Another little tip would be to timebox your efforts.

[00:09:47] Chris Furlong: So when you are trying to get uncomfortable in order to grow yourself, you know, in order to level up, in order to be better, it means you're gonna have to do a bit of the hard work, which means you're gonna have to get a little bit uncomfortable. So you want to make those, those actions, those tasks, and those challenges that you need to overcome.

[00:10:05] Chris Furlong: On a regular, consistent basis, digestible, you wanna make sure that they're, you know, they, they're bite size enough so that you can conquer them, but you can keep showing up and keep throwing the punches, right? You don't want to overwhelm yourself. I mean, if you've never, if you've never hiked a mountain before, and you're gonna go do Mount Everest.

[00:10:22] Chris Furlong: Well, that's not really the reality that it should be, right? You need to start small. You need to do a little bit and work your way up to that. The next one is create a plan which works for you. Now, this is very cliche, but you wanna build a routine to that minimizes disruptions or enables you with an environment that gives you the support or the motivation or the ability to do what you need to do and get.

[00:10:46] Chris Furlong: And the final one is to seek help and look for support from some, from someone else, whether it's accountability partner or someone that you know is going to be honest with you and be open with you and someone that can encourage you and, and keep you motivated, supported. Accountable, but they're not there to take on that , that baggage for you.

[00:11:06] Chris Furlong: They're to call. They're there to call that out. They're there to ensure that what you tell 'em of what you want to achieve is they're there to keep you honest. All right, so let's just recap. Let's just resummarize these short and simple strategies that you can use to prevent you and overcome self sabotage.

[00:11:22] Chris Furlong: Number one, identify yourself Sabotaging behaviors. Understand what. , be open. Be real with yourself. Write 'em down, acknowledge them. Number two is challenge your negative thoughts as they occur. As you know what they are, make sure you fight them. Address them with positive thoughts. How can you handle this?

[00:11:39] Chris Furlong: If we were going in with a positive mindset, three set specific achievable goals. Now we didn't necessarily talk about it, you know, smart goals or anything like that, but when you're going to go do something, have an understanding of what you're trying to. And make them achievable. You wanna create a plan and you wanna stick to it.

[00:11:57] Chris Furlong: That's number four. Create a plan and stick to it. Building that routine, it keeps you consistent, it keeps you motivated, and it keeps you moving forward. And then number five is seek support from others. Get help, it's okay. Now I wanna hear from you. I wanna ask you a couple of questions and. Look, you can answer them and you know, leave me a message, drop me a comment on YouTube, or send me a message over on Instagram at further your lifestyle or even on Twitter at further your life.

[00:12:25] Chris Furlong: And most importantly, I want you to think about these questions. What are your biggest challenges or obstacles when it comes tochi achieving your goals? Right. And I think for me I'll get personal here, is I think for me to answer this, It's . For me, it has been, it's been the imposter syndrome. It's been the self-doubt.

[00:12:43] Chris Furlong: It's been the fear in knowing what happens. Well, what if I don't make it or what if I, you know, make people feel uncomfortable along the way? Or what if I, or who am I to be able to do this? I'm a nobody, right, and already I'm talking myself down. Right. It's so stupid. Right. But it's because we know that what we are about to embark on is so.

[00:13:03] Chris Furlong: It's gonna be scary. It's, it's, it's gonna be so challenging. It's, there's gonna be some ups and downs, but most of the time it's actually gonna be pretty good. And that's why when we look at the big picture, if you say, oh, I wanna make a million dollars, and you think, oh, I'm gonna have to do all this work, well break it down.

[00:13:16] Chris Furlong: How do you do, how do I do $10,000? Right? If you could do $10,000, then it's just a matter of how do I 10 exit? How do I a hundred exit, right? And start to grow in that mindset. Break it down. Make it easy for your. , and I think that's my biggest challenge is sometimes I, I'm a big thinker and I can get a little bit overwhelmed with knowing what I need to do.

[00:13:37] Chris Furlong: But when you remove those obstacles, when you remove those fears and the imposter syndrome, it means you can actually move forward. What about you? How have you overcome self-sabotage or other roadblocks in the past? You know, have you experienced them? Have you been able to work through them? Or maybe you've, you know, experienced them with someone else and helped someone else work through them?

[00:13:54] Chris Furlong: So that's a great question to ask yourself. And if you wanna share, you can. Number three is what small step could you take today to start making. Progress towards your objectives, right? And I think I've talked about this in the last few episodes, really, what are the small things that we can start to do to make it consistent in terms of seeing the growth and getting to where you want to be and making it digestible.

[00:14:16] Chris Furlong: Not making it super hard. Like if you wanna run, you know, a marathon, you can't go expect to run ha half marathon every week in lead up to that marathon because you gotta start from zero. You've never done it. Right. You need to build that momentum from couch to 5k, then 5K to 10 K, then 10 k to half marathon, and then build that all the way up to a marathon.

[00:14:37] Chris Furlong: The other question I have for you is, who in your life could provide you support? And you need to think about this. Who? Who can give you the encouragement that you may need to help you work towards your goals? Or, you know, making sure that you are not self sabotaging your process. Or your progress. Think about it.

[00:14:52] Chris Furlong: Who, who could you ask for some help? And number five is what are some resources, books, articles, websites that maybe you've found helpful or maybe that in the past, you know, has helped you stay motivated? I would love to hear, I would love for you to share them back to myself, but back to the community as well.

[00:15:07] Chris Furlong: And if you do share them, I can send them out via, you know, whether it's via email or on the socials, and let other people know what has worked for you to maybe help motivate them. Now, I will share a book with you before we finish up. And this. Look, I've just finished it and I think it will help dearly if you are struggling with self-sabotage or if you've got struggles with doubt, with fears or the ability for yourself to actually, or trusting yourself that you have the ability to actually succeed.

[00:15:33] Chris Furlong: And that book is The Mountain is You transforming Self-Sabotage into Self-Mastery. And that's by Brianna West? I think it is. And look, I've put the details down below. You can click through and have a look. . I really think it's a really good book because one, it gave me a very strong, fresh perspective.

[00:15:49] Chris Furlong: It's actually the reason actually what prompted me to create this episode. It's given me a fresh perspective of some areas where I know that I've, I've been really bad in terms of self sabotage, simply because you think you are making progress and you go do something and you feel like you're achieving, but it's actually not going to get you where you want to be.

[00:16:07] Chris Furlong: Now, for me, I know that a lot of the time, hard. , right, is hard work, but the more you do it, the easier it gets. The good example of this would be running right? When I first did my first half marathon, when I first did my first 15 k, I'm thinking, oh, how can I do this? How could I do 10 K, let alone 15 K? And then you do it and you're like, oh, that wasn't too bad.

[00:16:29] Chris Furlong: right? And now all of a sudden it's like, okay, I'm ready to take on to do half marathon. But it was only like, you know, six weeks before that I was thinking, how could I do 10? How could I do 15? Yet now I'm thinking, oh yeah, 20 one's possible. Right? As you start to get comfortable with the uncomfortable, you start to realize the possibilities and you start to see how easy it actually is to get to where you want to be.

[00:16:51] Chris Furlong: Right. And for me it's, it, it's kept me honest. It's really made me call out some of the. To make sure that I'm working towards my true self and not making it harder for me when it doesn't need to be. And I think that's a big takeaway away that I would encourage you is a lot of the time we overthink this stuff.

[00:17:11] Chris Furlong: A lot of the time we make excuses. A lot of the time. We are our own worst enemies. And to be honest, that's me versus me. I'm not competing against you, you're competing against yourself. Listen to this episode, recap on the things that I've just spoken about. But if you are serious about this, I would highly encourage the Mountain Issu that book.

[00:17:30] Chris Furlong: It will, it will give you some pretty good reality checks, I think personally. But again, comes down to you, you have to make that decisive decision that you wanna make the change, that you wanna address. Some, you know, big elephants in the room and you are the only person that can do that. So, I would strongly consider that you go check it out.

[00:17:48] Chris Furlong: And of course, if this episode has resonated with you and you think someone else could resonate with it, please give it a share. Send it to someone. Send it to someone that maybe, you know, you think needs to hear it or maybe send it to them for the someone that you think can help you, right? And they can help keep you accountable and they can understand where you're coming from.

[00:18:06] Chris Furlong: I really do appreciate you being here. If you have any questions, comments, or you wanna continue the conversation, more than happy to do so. You can reach out via. All the details in the description below. If you're on the YouTube as well, you can drop a comment that's quite easy. Yeah, it's an absolute honor to be able to have this conversation with you, and I hope you do take one thing from this, right?

[00:18:24] Chris Furlong: And I'm gonna leave you with this. Self-sabotage is your success killer. So you know, you are the one that is responsible, accountable, and you gotta get your stuff together. It's only you, you can't blame it on anyone. , you are responsible. So if you wanna make a difference, if you want things better, if you want things to be, if you want to be further along where you want to be.

[00:18:46] Chris Furlong: Then you gotta start to do the things necessary to make that happen. You need to start being comfortable with getting uncomfortable, and then the sooner you do that, things will get a little bit easier and you do it all again. Alright, appreciate you Tim. You have a wonderful day. Cheers.