Living Without the Brakes On; Learning to Stop Self Sabotage

Are you living your life with one foot on the brakes? So many of us (myself included) often find ourselves sabotaging our efforts to get what we want in life. When we do that it can lead to frustration, anger, and hopelessness. In today's episode, I talk about self-sabotage, empowerment, and how to stop living with one foot on the brakes so we can allow ourselves to have a happier and more fulfilled life.  I am now offering a 10-week virtual class where you will learn a specific process to change your particular self-sabotaging habits.  It will include pre-recorded videos, audio recordings, handouts, membership in a Facebook community, and is packed with content. You will have unlimited access to the material, so you can take the class at your own pace. Enrollment is ongoing. Give yourself the gift of this class so you can start now to manage the foods and the emotions that might derail your efforts during the holidays.  If you would prefer more individualized help, I also offer private virtual sessions. To sign up for the class or to get private help, you can send me an email at [email protected] or visit my website. Here are three things you can learn from the full podcast episode: How shame and past mistakes stop you from succeeding with your health goals. How to use your “negative” qualities to your benefit. How to better reach your health goals through your flaws. Resources Debbie Ford website Episode Highlights Living Life Too Small Everybody can make their goals happen. The problem is that sometimes we don’t know how to get there because parts inside of us take us over and sabotage our efforts. WIthout the tools to manage these parts, we can play small in life and we won’t rise to our full potential. We  fall into the endless cycle of living life with one foot on the accelerator but with the other foot on the brakes. Debbie Ford: Accepting and Embracing Our Shadow Side Debbie Ford, a renowned self-help leader, taught people how to identify the things holding them back. She came from a successful family but fell into drug addiction. Debbie ended up in rehab after rehab, but wasn’t getting better. If that cycle continued, she knew she was going to die. Eventually, she hit on something she called her “shadow side.” Your shadow side holds the parts of your personality that you don’t like or you’re ashamed of. Debbie realized that these parts of herself were driving her from a very deep inner place. The more they drove her, the more it made her shrink. She couldn’t live her life to the fullest. Debbie learned she had come clean with herself. But there’s more to it than that — you have to love it, embrace it, and use it. Otherwise, it will use you. My class teaches a protocol to help you do this very thing.  The Beach Ball Analogy Debbie described living her life as if she was in a swimming pool. She would be in the pool of life, treading water and trying to keep herself afloat. Suddenly someone would come to the pool and throw her a beach ball. The beach ball represents something that she has to hide. Eventually many beach balls would be thrown her way. One ball represented her “bitchiness,” another ball contained her shame over not feeling smart, another the shame over her belief that she was not good looking, and another that she was not very courageous and another that she was not very worthy.  In an effort to pretend that she was perfect, she would push the beach balls under the water. But keeping all these beach balls under water was exhausting. In fact, trying to keep those beach balls under the water was almost impossible, yet she would try to keep them submerged anyway. Most people go through life with not just one thing, but many things about themselves that they’re embarrassed about. These things are held in our shadow side. Because we all spend our lives trying to keep our shadows submerged we have so little energy left and we can’t live our lives to the fullest. We’re not available to help our friends and family because we’re too busy being self-absorbed with our need to hide from who we are. What’s the point of living a life that limited? Finding the Positive amid the Negative This podcast is a call to action. Rise up. Start owning, laughing, accepting, and embracing your flaws instead of running from them. Betsy acknowledges that since many people CAN’T do this because the sabotaging parts inside are too powerful, the ideas in her podcast often won’t be enough. Getting a private session or two, or taking her class, will be needed to break through.  In this podcast Betsy talks about Debbie Ford’s idea that there is strength in our flaws. We all have something we feel embarrassed about, but instead of stressing about it, use it to your advantage. Find the positive in your negative qualities. Debbie turned her “bitchiness” into a trait of passion. She took her flaw and worked with it. Her “bitchiness” became energy. All the energy she used to spend hiding from things was transformed into passion, self-love, and helping others accept themselves. Use Your Shadow Side Most people wake up every day with fears. That’s the human ego. We all have it. Our mission in life is to recognize the human part of us that takes us back to fear, worry, and control. Making peace with the things you feel ashamed of is a journey.  It’s an essential journey if you want a life of peace. 5 Powerful Quotes From This Episode “Debbie Ford said no one on the face of the planet does not go through life without a shadow. We all have parts of us that we hate and we're embarrassed about. And most of us spend our lives trying to keep them out of view and keep them submerged in the pool of our lives. And most of us, in the end, at the end of the day, have so little energy left to just really truly be in our lives and live it to its fullest.” “What is the point of living a life that limited?” “Own your stuff, stop running from it, laugh at it, accept it. But then you have to go further than accepting it — you have to embrace it.” “Once she recognized that there was a strength and there was a gift in the flaw, and if she could take that and work with it, she could turn everything around. And she could feel empowered and be free.” “Figure out how we can rise up and use these flaws — so to speak, our shadow side — to our advantage. Because if we don't, it will use us.” If you listened to the podcast and enjoyed it, please share and post a review! Have any questions or want to schedule an appointment? You can email me at [email protected] or visit my website. To making peace with eating, Betsy