Are you sabotaging your own success?
Almost a year ago I was drugging through a blizzard in high heels to the US immigration office in Toronto, Canada. After many grueling months of hard work, I was about to have my interview to see if my visa would be approved.
After signing in, I noticed a man next to me, about to go in for his interview. He was unshaven, wearing a pair of jeans and looking out of sorts. I was completely shocked. He was completely sabotaging himself.
As a background…The type of visa that we were applying for is extremely challenging to get. The application is 500 pages long and completely exhausting and emotionally draining to complete. I had to work 24/7 for 3 months straight to prepare it and had a team of 5 to help me. Not to mention the substantial amount of money that anyone doing this visa has to spend along the way.
The interview is the last step. All I kept thinking was, “After all that hard work, your dream on the line and all the money you spent, why would you show up looking like you are going to a seedy bar? You could lose everything you worked for.”
I just kept thinking about how many of us say we want something and may even work hard and go after it yet never seem to reach the top and have our red carpet moment.
Here are things to reflect on:
1. Be really honest with yourself. Look at something you want but have not achieved yet and ask yourself, “Am I sabotaging my own success or is there more I need to learn before I accomplish this goal?”
2. If you are sabotaging yourself, ask why. What is the payoff? Often we stay stuck where we are, unable to break through because it is serving us somehow. Example, I realized just this week that I have yet to meet my life partner because I am sabotaging by always using work as an excuse. “Oh I will get out there when I get this project done.” My payoff is that as long as I am distracted by work, I don’t have to face my fear of rejection.
3. Once you know how staying stuck is serving you, then you can start to face that monster and start healing it… whether you talk to a friend, journal about it, write a forgiveness letter, etc. For me, I closed my eyes and imagined talking to someone who had rejected me in the past, told them I forgive them and myself, gave them hug and then saw the cords connecting us dissolve so I would no longer be tied to them.
4. Take action… even if it feels uncomfortable. So tonight I am off to a sexy singles mix and mingle. You? How are you going to move forward, stop sabotaging yourself and be the superstar you were meant to be?
To learn how you can be the superstar in your own life, I invite you to check out my VIP Red Carpet Home Study Workshop by clicking HERE.
Topic: Overcoming Fear Tags: Achievement, action, blessing, dreams, goal, goals, immigration, monsters, payoff, red carpet, self sabotage, Success, superstar, Toronto
January 26th, 2010 at 11:45 am
This is so true! I have spent years helping people uncover how and why they sabatoge thier success in having the things they say they want. It is usually unconscious and often a blind spot for people - even if they have done alot of introspective work.
Thanks so much for writing about this and sharing your story.
BTW - did you get your Visa?
January 26th, 2010 at 11:55 am
Yes I got my visa! That’s awesome that you are helping people see their blind spots Melanie. It is true that even those of us that do the work may miss something. Keep shining!
January 26th, 2010 at 1:16 pm
great post and very true!
January 26th, 2010 at 3:54 pm
Excellent article. I think I am indeed sabotaging my own success. I’ve been trying to get my own business to become profitable for a few years now, but have been losing money while my skills have been improving. In the mean time I had a day job that was worked to to pay for the cost of living. I’m nearly out of money in my business now, and about an hour ago I found out that I lost my day job.
I’m not sure what the payoff is, unless it could be that I’m somehow addicted to pain and misery - as if it where some sort of dear friend that I can always count on to be with me. (Could that be it, or would it have to be something else?)
I sure wish I knew what to do, and wish I could have hope that things will be better in the near future - I don’t know how much longer I can take this. The thought of leaving through the ‘emergency exit’ is rather compelling these days.
Sorry for being so negative.
January 26th, 2010 at 4:32 pm
I have this Invention patent pending for some years now and I feel that it would never hit the market. It’s that what you call SABOTAGING? I call it fanancial struggle. I don’t want to sabotage my future in any way but when I find myself pinshing penny’s it’s because something am doing is not working in my part. I’ve being storying the law of attraction some time now and it’s not as easy as some people make it out to be. I’ve learned that asking the right way to the univers the univers will give you what you want. And this is the way I’ve learned to ask: I’ve learned not to say the word want because when you want something the univers will here you and you will alway’s be in the want.So I tell the univers from now on that am so happy and greatful to know that my Invention looks good on store shelfs you know what I mean. I’ve learned to make believe I already have it on the stores and so far I’ve been seen small resorts fanancially and that’s a good thing for me. I wish I had more understanding in how to go about asking the univers for speed so I can see resorts this year.
January 26th, 2010 at 4:43 pm
Am going to be the person I want to be from now on. I will not sabotage myself any more with wrong wishful thinking and having negative thoughts ever. From now on I will have possitive thoughts and make believe everything comes to me easy with out struggle. And no more SABOTAGING.
January 26th, 2010 at 4:52 pm
Hi Cindy!
I love reading your “pep talks” because it reminds me and wakes me up as I try to move forward towards any goals. Thank you and take care!
xoxo from Toronto, Canada
January 26th, 2010 at 5:10 pm
George, I am so sorry that you are going through all this. You are not being negative. You are going through a tough time and need to express it. I have been in your place so many times to the point (18 years ago) where I even attempted the ‘emergency exit’ 3 times. You WILL pull out of this. It is wonderful that you did take action and built your skills. I obviously don’t know your entire situation but I know for me, I sabotaged for years unconsciously because I never felt like I was worthy, lovable and deserved anything. My best advice to you is that when you don’t know what to do, be still. Nurture and do things to love yourself. Find things that bring you joy. All these things will help you release resistance and help you remember who you really are — these will help with the surrender or allowing part. Sending you all my love. I KNOW you can get through this.
January 26th, 2010 at 5:16 pm
I agree Gilbert, LOA is not as easy as people make it out to be. There are actually 12 universal laws. It could be a law of gender for you - which is that things happen in divine timing. Just like a couple who sets an intention for a baby - it may take 9 months or maybe they need to adopt and it takes 5 yrs. Are you taking action, learning as you go, making adjustments as you learn and then taking more action? Just like Edison took over 1000 tries to get the light bulb right, you need to look at what your actions are, learn from them and keep trying. In addition to that, really take time and see what underlying fears you may have that is blocking you. And maybe you need to be asking for help… finding a partner who can do the business side.
January 28th, 2010 at 5:59 am
Hi Cindy
You’ve prompted me to write the truth of my life. Having so many extreme challenges throughout my life, nearly 30 yrs ago I fell down a metaphorical ‘Holographic hole’ and into another world, (yes like Alice, seeing everything from a different perspective) and from that experience, I gained insights that were unbelievable – inconceivable - EINSTEIN sized Insights. They are about all of the Secrets and Unknown Mysteries still as yet undiscovered about us and our world.
So from that totally Awesome experience which kept on continually happening, after I had taken stock of what was happening and realised I had experienced ‘Satori’ (instantaneous FULL-BLOWN ENLIGHTENMENT) I began writing, and writing, and writing. So huge was the body of material that I couldn’t stop the flow. I had opened the floodgates and had tapped into a source that was so Infinate that it just flowed through me like a river of pure channeled Magic.
Now the block is – what do I do with it all? I tried publishers and Agents, but this is too incredible for words, and I can’t think of a way to find help in getting it out into the World – where it belongs. You might think that it is already ‘out-there’, but I have been trying to seek it out, and can’t find it. It is all so totally Amazing and Startlingly new, and takes us into a totally different mind-set that improves everything, but which at the same time, sadly makes it unbelievable too. So how can I unblock this Gigantic thing?
Farfalla
January 28th, 2010 at 10:25 am
Wow Farfalla, that is amazing. If it flowed through you so easily and abundantly, then for SURE it is meant for the world to see. We often get stuck on the ‘how.’ For years I was trying to ‘manipulate’ how I thought I need to get out there with my stuff and where it needed to go. After years of frustration, I finally had to ‘let go’ and ’surrender.’ Perhaps journal about your end vision and then ask universe/spirit/God for signs of what is your next step and then take action as you get the signs. When I did that, a series of bizarre synchronicities lead me to move to California (which I never would have thought was the way to go). But now that I am here, I am on track and things are moving fast. But it was because I was willing to let go of what I thought I knew. And BTW you can self publish…. but make sure you hire (or barter) with someone (or maybe even a whole team) who can help you market it. Enjoy the journey, keep faith in the vision and you will arrive with persistence.