Author Topic: Thoughts on self-sabotage  (Read 5522 times)

Gaining Strength

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #30 on: October 23, 2008, 12:41:33 PM »
Allright - this is where I am - with thanks to this thread.  (Hope you don't mind Phoenix Rising - I feel like I have moved in.  I was getting lonely over there in "Today's Hurdles".)

I was taught overtly and covertly that I did not deserve what I had by virtue of being my parent's daughter. Self-acceptance requires that you know and feel that you deserve success and the object of your goals.  I am participating in a closed loop system in which, as a child, in order to survive I had to participate in my parents value system - e.g. I don't deserve what they have and what they provided me.

SO, I set as an intention the undoing of that closed loop.  Worded in a different form:

I intend to release self-acceptance and foster self-realization each and every day by setting up long term goals and daily steps towards those goals.  These goals will fall in 4 catagories: Home; Finances; Work; Self/Family.

The daily goals will be minimally 1 and maximum 3 per catagory.

This I can do.

Big blocks - resentment.  Resentment over being cast off in the servant role.  Bigger REsentment over being shut out of my father's inner circle coupled with the inauthenticity of what that circle was - it was a lie, hocus-pocus, smoke and mirrors.  Still trying to get into that circle.  That is a major catch in my loop.  Does anyone identify with this or have any penetrating insights that might help me?

sKePTiKal

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #31 on: October 23, 2008, 04:36:57 PM »
The more the merrier GS!  :D

Bigger REsentment over being shut out of my father's inner circle coupled with the inauthenticity of what that circle was - it was a lie, hocus-pocus, smoke and mirrors.  Still trying to get into that circle.

My question, would be WHY? Which part of this resentment still holds you rapt & captive? You already know it was a lie... a figment of their gradiose, good old boys club. Why did you - do you - want to be included? What's the payoff for you, in being included? Then? Now?

Yes, I identify with this. I was never included in my Dad's world. Red-haired stepchild was more my role. Someone who made him uneasy; because he always wondered how much I'd really remembered. Afraid I'd dredge up the past, which would embarrass him in his "second life", as his pastor called it. I was firmly a part of his first life - only.

Important thing about this: if only I had focussed on what I HAD, instead of what I felt was denied... I might have been able to de-code all this, a lot sooner. Every coin has two sides... by letting resentment keep my feelings fixated & obsessed on that denial for so long... I never valued the flip side of the coin: the opportunities, relationships, and life-wealth (richness of life) that I had simply because I WASN'T included. (A blessing in disguise??)

Well, duh. I let that original wound exposed; open to infection... I smeared dirt into it... I participated - capitulated in the upside down; inside out relationship with my mother. Without my cooperation: it never would've happened. (Yes, I was tricked - with the "promise" unfulfilled - that by caring for my mom, she would care for/about me. I don't believe that anymore.) I fed the infection of the original wound with resentment, fantasy hopes, imagined revenge until it became gangrenous. Still trying to blame the people who should've been responsible for caring for me, with the original wound.

It's not possible to make anyone be or feel what they are not or don't feel. I can't change what happened - ONLY myself. Self-sabotage is a finite set of habits - emotional, intellectual, being-habits - predicated on an emotional reality that NO LONGER EXISTS for me. I can BE who I am, without fear of abuse... from anyone... and I don't have to hide any longer. Nothing bad will happen - unless I invite it... by continuing my old, worn-out, useless habit of self-sabotage.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

Gaining Strength

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #32 on: October 24, 2008, 09:31:09 AM »
PR - thanks for welcoming me and responding.  I have to laugh at myself because I did not self-censor what I wrote.  I was actually writing from someplace deep inside that was from my child experience.  The inner circle was more accurately his inner heart and when I wrote that I am still trying to get in it was more that the child that I was is still trying to get in.  That is what makes this stuff so very difficult - parsing out the difference between the child and the adult - between the past and the present - between the unconscious, subconscious and the conscious - parsing it out and ordering it - allowing it to emerge unsupressed.  The longing was real and is real - it is a child's natural longing and rightful place to be loved and nurtured.  I believed I was that is the complication.  I believed that what I was receiving was love.  I repressed my longing to be brought into his inner heart because I had to believe that I was even though I was cognizant of some HUGE dissonance. 

Knowing now what I know does not remedy that profound, longing.  It still exists. And that little girl still needs, longs for, yearns for that love and acceptance.  I cannot just wish it away it is too much a part of me and its absense is the core of my wounding and the pain is indescribable and colors my every action even today when my mind knows that that particular human will never provide that which he was obliged to give.

sKePTiKal

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #33 on: October 24, 2008, 11:17:09 AM »
GS - that longing, I know well. It all feels so sad. I've been "with" that feeling for a long time. But little girls - even inner children - can and do mature and grow up. They find ways to manage disappointments, realities of life - with good parenting. Yeah - the apportioning of motivation, emotion, and thoughts to conscious, subconscious and unconscious gets VERY confusing. It's almost easier to think of the little girl - growing with your care & guidance - a relationship between the two of you, even communication.

"Twiggy" has grown up a lot. Inner children are relevant to self-sabotage, too. That's where the original wound(s) still live on. They have healing to do, too. And their healing is vital to getting to the root cause... the original motivation to self-sabotage.

I think I got to my root cause, today. Almost by accident... but I can trace the steps, the thought processes, the re-evaluating and re-framing... and all of that finally converged into what I think is the motivation - the need and payoff - for self-sabotage. Again - I have to let this sit... because my ability to "think" things has led me down blind alleys before, not wanting to face something.

Basically, my emotional attachment to smoking - this last form of self-sabotage I am puzzling through - is because of life/death NEED to PROVE to my SELF, that the story Twiggy told me over the course of months of therapy.... is TRUE. At one point, I referred to smoking as a "smoke signal"... like an SOS... a cry for help.

The way this fits, is that:

a.) I was told that what I remembered happening - didn't happen. I was told I was imagining things, hallucinating, and making up ways to intentionally hurt my mom, because I was angry about the divorce. Hell - I wasn't THAT angry to finally have a whole night's sleep without breaking glass, yelling & fighting... you know? I did see the benefits.

What I was really angry about, was not being believed. And then, being forced to question my own sanity... because I remembered things that my mom said "didn't happen". SHE WASN'T THERE. How the hell would she know? And when she finally had to face the fact of my pregnancy.... denial and coverup; gaslighting.

b.) The other thing is that I had huge anger and abnormally intense fear; a normal "aftermath" set of feelings to rape. There was no logical explanation for those feelings EXCEPT what I remembered happening. I wasn't allowed to be angry; angry was "bad"... since I couldn't control or explain those feelings to my mother's satisfaction - she convinced someone to hypnotize me (I think)... and I was left with the suggestion that I could choose to "not remember" my memories... or have to deal with those feelings... by putting Twiggy in the "box": push it all to the unconscious.

Well - Twiggy never did anything against her will without a fight; trying to get the last word in. Since she'd been smoking anyway... I think she latched on this... the smoke signal... to get my attention, to prove to me that she and those memories were REAL. Part of this was also a harsh self-judgement: after everything that happened I was now "sure", convinced, that I was one of "those" kids - from a broken home... they all smoked... that there really WAS something wrong with me. Otherwise, WHY would my mother not let me believe what I believed to be true?

In therapy, I spent a long time dealing with whether people believed me. My husband, my T. Who would believe such an ego-damaging betrayal as making me question my own sanity - perpetrated by my own mother? I even had a hard time believing it. I excused it in a thousand ways. So.... the smoke signal.... Twiggy's/my SOS.... the breadcrumb trail of clues back to those memories... the NEED for PROOF. Proof = physical evidence.

I was a model student. I was ambitious, picked up skills quickly, responsible, social, funny............ and I smoked. It didn't "fit" with anything else in my personality. (Yeah, I tried the 70's crap; paranoia and paralyzing fear didn't make all that stuff overly attractive). Smoking became the "physical evidence" I needed all these years later - that those really awful bad things really DID happen to me. Evidence that there "was something wrong" with me... the hope and waiting for someone with "eyes to see" that would finally "get" my message and rescue me. Vindicate me; validate me; PROVE that all this really happened to me... to my mother; to me. Prove my mother WRONG.

I know that I'll never be able to prove this to my mother; when I told her I was remembering things about that time, she said "you won't be able to remember them 'right' ". Yeah. Right. And Iams dog food is "bad" because it has too much protein in it. Where does she come up with this crap??

Proving my mother wrong was the "revenge" I wanted/needed. I'm OK with being denied that. The key, was proving to myself, that all this was real... it really happened... and I finished all that up a year ago, in therapy. But, I'd lived with that doubt for so long - it simply took time for it to be replaced with trust in Twiggy.... in Twiggy I trust!  :D

Now, maybe she'll let go and let ME deal with the addiction.


Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

sKePTiKal

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #34 on: October 27, 2008, 10:29:52 AM »
CORRECTION:

what I had to prove, was that I wasn't exactly like my mother... so I latched onto my Dad's outward behavior... and I hoped against hope that he would see how much I was like him... and rescue me. (One of my mom's lovely tales to me, during that awful time - was that my dad didn't believe I was his kid.)

I threw myself into this, as if my life depended on it - emotionally, it did.

And it had additional benefits: numbing my feelings, hiding my real self, and addiction/helplessness: pretending to be "just like my mom"... and playing the mirror to her self... so she would leave me alone. It also served as a self SOS... hoping that someone somewhere would see... and care... I mattered; but I wasn't allowed to act like it and care for myself... it would've thrown up an uncomplimentary comparison against my mother... her "secret" revealed... and at all costs to myself, I had to protect myself from that... by appearing to protect her feelings...

a perfect storm; a closed loop; all the steps in the rediculous circular thinking....
based on core beliefs that genetics, nurture, destiny, and fate were inescapable... more powerful than free will; intentional choice. That I was DOOMED to be this self-sabotaging person forever... thanks to another belief, that I somehow deserved this.

My Dad had only asked two things of me, all my life. One was to quit smoking. The other, was to produce art work. And despite my being "shut down" on both of those areas, up till now... he never abused me with belittling, or demands, or judgements for that paralysis. He never bought into any of my excuses about why "I can't", either.

I never really HEARD him... through the din of anger/resentment over being "abandoned" to life with my mother.

DUH.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

Gaining Strength

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #35 on: October 27, 2008, 11:08:39 AM »
There is a symmetry and perfection in your writing above, a perfection and symmetry in your acknowledgement of your father's two requests and your current struggle with smoking and perhaps with art as well. It is so clear, so powerful. Your work brings hope to me.  I want to be free and to give life to that freedom that will allow me to mother more lovingly.  Thank you PR.

Hopalong

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #36 on: October 27, 2008, 09:03:41 PM »
Amber:

Quote
Smoking became the "physical evidence" I needed all these years later - that those really awful bad things really DID happen to me. Evidence


Yesssss! That made SO much sense. Really jumped out at me. When we hurt ourselves, it's like part of us sitting there cutting away...lbut if we voiced it, instead...ike Sojourner Truth: "Ain't I a woman? When you cut me, do I not bleed?"

GS:

I see you, one day, waking up burning with determination and curiosity -- to find out how happiness works.

love
Hops
"That'll do, pig, that'll do."

sKePTiKal

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #37 on: October 28, 2008, 10:59:24 AM »
Oh, Hops... there is yet more I'm discovering; stuff that's been right in front of me all this time. Stuff that I've written; said out loud. I simply wasn't ready to acknowledge the significance, I guess.

The key to unlocking this prison, has been working on separating my self from the act of smoking; separating emotional reasons (or excuses) from the addictive crave itself.

Today's amazing fact, truth, that's been there all this time:
I smoked to separate ME from the projective emotions/identity of my mother. I can't say DUH enough times... this is so obvious. But, if someone had told me this I wouldn't even have considered this idea as valid for me. I had to work my way there, by myself.

So... what I'm suspecting, NOW... is that smoking itself IS the "closed loop" of cause, effect & payoff/emotional benefit...  It's the physical, functional manifestation of the emotional process of self-sabotage, in my case. And the ONLY way out is to stop smoking. At least, that's how I'm going to test my theory. Smoking is triggering - through repetition - all the emotional/thought patterns of projective identification, enmeshment, lack of boundaries - and the life/death need for boundaries... managing/hiding emotions in self-defense...

each cigarette is keeping me locked in this struggle. End of discussion. To end the struggle; I need to end smoking. The situation is (predictably) 180 degrees from it's appearance - the "normal" description of dysfunction, gaslighting, projection....

DUH-HUH.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

Gaining Strength

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #38 on: October 28, 2008, 02:11:31 PM »
PR - very interesting thoughts re: smoking being the closed loop.

I want to share my reaction that may not have any fit for you - take or discard as you will.
I have to bring into conscioiusness my act in order to make it a choice.  My present struggle is to face my "resistance" (formerly kown as "paralysis") rather than to supress it, repress it by reading, listening to the news doing anything to avoid the resistance/judgment of the things I SHOULD  be doing.  Bear with me.  My point is - that you may want to find a way to bring into consciousness your draw to smoke before you respond unconsciously.  One that I love is a CBT 4 step process created by Dr. Jeffry Schwartz.  here is a great description  though there are other descriptions on the internet - just google Schwartz + four steps.   www.hope4ocd.com/foursteps.php

Sending you strength and consciousness to stop that self-sabotage closed loop. - your friend - GS

sKePTiKal

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #39 on: October 28, 2008, 03:53:21 PM »
Interesting! Those four steps are practically identical to CBT tips for managing a crave for nicotine. If you just substitute "addiction" for OCD... very, very similar.

I've been researching Alan Carr's method - the "Easyway" to quit. Again, a short list of steps. And to even GET to the first step, I need to quickly separate my thoughts & feelings... from those that were implanted, projected into me. Been at that now, for years, so it's just about wrapped up.

The first step is to make a solemn, totally serious, totally COMMITTED vow to myself - while smoking - that "this" is the very last one and then to rejoice in the freedom of healing myself from addiction. Not there yet; still bargaining with myself... still not "just" me... still sorting out the old mental/emotional projected crap & trashing it... but the hold it had on me is getting very, very weak. Each cigarette these days, is very conscious... very mindful... not at all pleasant: merely the feeding of the addiction. It is still also, "the devil I know"... still associated with comfort, relief (of the crave, ya know?), still shreds of the old belief that it's "necessary" to function as "me".

I do, however, have a firm deadline - this stage simply can't go on forever.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

sKePTiKal

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #40 on: October 29, 2008, 10:25:56 AM »
UPDATE:

OK - now I'm just "me"!   :D

Ever since I've been on this board, I've been dancing around this "duality" in me... twiggy, my unconsious self... the role... and now I've FINALLY figured it out, because of a simple term: projective identification.

My mother injected me (like a turkey) with emotions, thoughts, habits, that she simply couldn't abide in HERSELF... and convinced me; tricked me into believing that her projected "self" - was me or a part of me. I was pretty easy to trick - 100% vulnerable and traumatized - and she'd never allowed boundaries between us, ever. At 12, I was just beginning to get a clue about this - when I was whisked away from adults I trusted enough to talk about such things and isolated... and brainwashed.

And what's fabulous is that the only EFFORT required to sort this out, is to simply know what is ME and what is HER - hello, basic boundary 101!!!!

Off to plan the timing of my quit now. My absolute deadline was Friday, this week. I have a very important meeting tomorrow - early - and I'm trying to decide, quit before - or after. After all: "I" will be just fine without nicotine... just as I was before she "finished the job" of getting me to carry her load of crap...

hell, she probably wasn't even aware she was doing this... isn't aware of it NOW and shouldn't even NEED it anymore, since her life isn't traumatic anymore.

DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH DUH

I do forgive myself ya know... for being 12, 100% vulnerable, and a "good girl" who was taken advantage of.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.

sKePTiKal

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Re: Thoughts on self-sabotage
« Reply #41 on: October 29, 2008, 10:52:52 AM »
Silly me - I forgot the most important part! I can wrap up this thread, now.

Self-sabotage was a 40 year struggle between ME and her projected self... I hated that projected personality or identity with a passion and a strength that was never yielding. I feared it, as well - during the time I believed it WAS me. That identity was sacred & holy - and it was life/death to deny it, reject it, or disown it.

Because to do so, to create that kind of boundary would leave her to deal with herself. My "job" - in being that self for her - was to find a way to "fix" it for her.  Well, simply carrying it meant that she could deny it was her emotions/self that she dumped on me - right along with everything else she denied about me. She's melted, and toes curled up like the wicked witch of the west, with every boundary I ever tried (regardless of success or failure) to create.

Internally - because I really believed, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that her projected self was me - killing that self off seemed like suicide. At the same time - the "itch" and poor fit of that self layered over ME - was a constant source of agony: self-sabotage.... constant resistance... constant doubt... constant duality... constant frustration and confusion.

Lordy - was I ever trapped between a rock & a hard place!

Learning to separate smoking from my programmed times, realizing I needed to separate having a smoke from my emotional triggers to smoke, and finally realizing that all that "programming" developed as a result of how I managed under that un-me burden... that I smoked to escape to "me" and to placate her projected self... ameliorate the projected symptoms caused by taking on that projection... when it was the projection ALL ALONG... that "needed" something external to "be"... like a parasite seeking a host... or an addiction looking for it's next fix........

I'm outside the closed loop looking in, now. I'm amazed that all it took, was simply realizing what is ME and what is HER... and separating HER from my definition of myself. There is still work to do, practice, more details... but this is the big shattering of the shackles - once and for all.
Success is never final, failure is never fatal.