Why do we sabotage ourselves? We do things that we know that will hurt us or are not good for us, yet we do it anyway. Expecting a different outcome, but it is never a different outcome.I put these ridiculous absolutes in my head that feed into my self-defeating story that if this person is doing this or if I see that, then it must mean I am (insert any self-defeating adjective here).
I use someone else’s behaviours to gauge how I feel about myself, rather than seeing it as something completely detached from me, nothing to do with me. And I rationally know this, but if it will feed my false self-beliefs, the self-defeating story of I am not good enough, special enough, loveable enough, I will believe it over rationale. And then I am on a role as I further feed my story with skewed perceptions of what I see or hear and make it mean something negative about me. “Oh my ex is still with that girl that he met just 2 months after we broke up, then I mustn’t be very special, I mustn’t have meant very much to him, he mustn’t have cared about me, she must be better than me” and on it goes….feeding the story, feeding the demons.
My wisdom and all the things I claim to believe and know about the human psyche goes out the window.
I claim to believe that we draw to us how we feel about ourselves, yet if I really believed that then that would negate my self-defeating story. I would see that he only drew to him exactly what he is, exactly what he always has. Someone that is codependent and insecure, someone that will tolerate being treated poorly.
I would believe that he just defaulted back to who he always was and how he has always been because he never did the hard work of facing his own demons, his shadows, rather he ran away like a coward and stayed in denial. If I believed what I claim to and believe what I know strongly enough then my self-defeating story would be squashed and I wouldn’t be tormented by my thoughts. I wouldn’t perceive his behaviours as proof of a negative self-belief. Yet I do. Thus, the demons have won this round.
The old stories and self-defeating beliefs are still winning. My inner demons are still stronger than my wiser, more evolved, esteemed self.
These demons need to be slain once and for all so I can LIVE.
I found that it was the demons that helped shape me when my soul-mate walked out on me 15 months ago. I'm over it now, of course the memories remain, as does the sense that maybe I wasted some of my life which just resulted in me becoming painfully heartbroken.
ReplyDeleteI've had good days but I'm always capable of summoning in the dark days. I've realised that my demons help me see the black and white in life. In a weird way I let my demons show me clarity!
Its strange for me reading your posts as I described this way of thinking myself within my own blog at this time last year!
You do express your state of mind very well though....I bet he couldn't do anything like this?