Guest Post: The Self Sabotage Man
We are joined by fellow Substack writer, Katrin of For My Sake!
Hello dear friends!
Coming to you much later than I had hoped is this really cool interim Substack guest post from my new friend and fellow Substack writer Katrin!
This month, shit really hit the fan in my life so I apologize for the delay but Katrin’s writing just so happens to be extraordinarily relevant to what I’m going through and I hope her reflections can resonate with you too.
Katrin writes
, a trauma informed publication about healing and restoring regulation to your body. Which just so happens to be shit I’m really into. Definitely check out her other posts!Thanks so much to Katrin for taking the time to write with us!
When the Valentine’s Day balloons might or might not have triggered me to write SHUT YOUR SELF-CRITIC UP!, I asked the question:
What is the opposite of Self-Love?
I teased my readers and provided them with no answers.
I told them what self-love is, but not what self-love isn’t.
Until the very end, I did not tell them that self-hate is not good enough, it doesn’t do justice to what we do to ourselves.
If self-love has 6 pillars, how many do you think self-hate does?
If you have a person in your life who treats you the way you treat yourself, would you want that person to remain in your life?
The teaser that I am, you will not receive the answer to these two questions just yet, but I will introduce you to someone: the Self-Sabotage Man, a son of Self-Hate and what-we-have-not-been-taught.
Courtesy of @JustLiveSimple.com
He would like to tell you what is ‘wrong’ with you, your relationships, your career and your choices.
He would be like a broken record, an unstoppable one at that.
He would be good at hiding so you may not even know he is there.
He would be the banana peel between you and your self-worth.
He would be the nasty voice that tells you “I told you so!” when things do not turn out the way you originally planned.
He would not be You, nor Me. He must have been introduced to us when we were so little that we weren’t allowed on a rollercoaster.
You are tall enough now, so the rollercoaster is here to be confronted.
He would say no.
He would also add that you will never find love because you don’t deserve it.
He would tell you not to leave an unfavourable dynamic because you couldn’t possibly deserve better.
He would tell you not to bother the boss for that raise he promised you 5 years ago.
He would tell you that you suck at what you excel at because of that one post you saw and thought “Oh, I wish I could be this good!”
And when you say to yourself “I can do this!”, he would make you question your decisions.
He would tell you all the different ways the new path could go south.
He would put on your Decision Paralysis sunglasses your parents bought you when you were 5.
He would tell you how miserably you would fail.
He would bring his friend, self-pity, for a quick introduction to the post-failure episode.
He would show you the couch on which you would sit and binge 3 series while eating junk food (in the not-crying intermission).
He would act as a friend and tell you that it is for the best that things did not work out.
“It is not your fault, it was just nature!”, he would whisper to distract you from the lesson you could have learnt.
He would make you forget about the radiant You and give you a distorted version of yourself (for convenience he would call it ‘Your True Self’.)
He would make you act like this other person, it is nature after all, not choice.
He would whisper words into your ears so you know what to tell yourself next time.
“Remember that time you said what you shouldn’t have said?”, he would announce and leave.
“Remember her? She was better than you! She must have been!”, he would claim at the door.
He would count on you to know what to tell yourself next: the words would have been thoughtfully written, carefully practised, and significantly routinized.
He would stop you from doing something new.
He would tell you your comfort zone is great for you (even if it isn’t).
“Be jealous! Resent!"
He would whisper in your ear, but he would change the way you see yourself, others, the world.
He would be there until you find him: cultivate self-awareness.
Don’t hate him, he is a hurt child: nurture self-compassion.
Talk to him kindly, understand who told him that in the first place: recognise the hurt.
Observe him, compassionately, and get to know him: what patterns do you see?
Then, find what You want, know what You want and go get it: make the choice.
Forget Everything And Run,
or
Face Everything And Rise.
How do you spell FEAR?
Creatively yours,
Katrin
Maggie here again. I’m hoping to get out another post in the regular format soon and hoping to do more collaborations.
It’s hard to make room for the realistic possibility that my mental health and my Self Sabotage Man will get in the way of me doing things on my preferred timeline. But all I can do is communicate as much as possible when it’s happening and try to be as patient with myself as my friends are.
I hope you’re well and thank you so much for subscribing!
Thanks for sharing, this was a great read and resonates