Addicted to Failure

Are you addicted to Failure?  Yes, you read that correctly. And it's a question I have pondered for over a decade. It seems like many of us have become addicted to Failure.

But how could people become addicted to something that makes them feel less than others? Something that makes them feel not good enough. That makes them feel inadequate.

Why would anyone deliberately seek out this outcome? Like, say to themselves—Yep! I want to fail. I want to completely sabotage and fail at what I'm setting out to do. This thing that I want to do so badly. Why would anyone deliberately do that?

It raises an excellent question. And it has been boggling my mind for what feels like an eternity.

I have discovered that is precisely what many of us do daily.

After much research, I've read countless books focused on a particular subject matter. I sought information on excuses, limiting beliefs, habits, and self-sabotage. Which I now call Identity Sabotage and have framed my work around this new theory.

What stops us from achieving, reaching, or starting something we want to do?

Why are we stuck in bad habit loops? Even when it's crystal clear what we want or need to do. Even when we have the solutions to those problems, we still find ourselves repeating the same things over and over again. Why is that?

When I was in the early stages of my recovery from my addiction to alcohol, I was so caught up in why people kept relapsing. Why are we going back to drinking when we know through prior experiences that that wasn't the answer. But there we were, going back to the bottle, thinking it was a new solution. Why is that?

From all of my personal experiences, education, and schooling, I have found what I believe to be the truth behind our addiction to failure and why we are caught up in this identity sabotage loop.

It's not about the bad habits. It's not about the excuses we tell ourselves, like, I'm too busy, I'm too old, I'm too young, I'm not smart enough, I'm not talented enough, I don't have the money, and I don't have the support system. We've been focusing on the symptoms of a much deeper condition.

I realized that it's none of the reasons I mentioned above. It’s our unsafe beliefs about who we think we are that keep us craving more of what we think we deserve. We are addicted to failure because it reinforces our unsafe beliefs that we have been living as our truth. It's a form of what I like to call identity sabotage. This is where our soul-self, our true self, is at war with our false self. A false self that is made up of these unsafe beliefs creating our false identity.

Our soul-self calls to us, but our false self makes it hard to hear. This is where you feel a longing, a calling, or a burning desire to change and evolve. This is where you find your dreams and your aspirations. This is where you find your interests and your passions. This is where your authentic voice lives. Your truth lives here; your purpose lives here. But then our unsafe beliefs start talking.

They start interrupting our soul-self with erroneous beliefs and hijack our brains without us even knowing it. Thus, allowing yourself to be tricked by your unconscious to ensure you fail. And allow, yet again, another alibi for proof. Proof as to why your unsafe belief is true.

It's not about the excuses. It's not about the bad habits, failed diet attempts, addiction, or toxic relationships that are the problem. Our true identity has been sabotaged, and has become addicted to failure. It gives us a false sense of safety, security, and validation for our behavior. It permits us to give up. It permits us not to try or show up and supports the story we tell ourselves.

Now I believe that failure is the roadmap to success. When we have the proper tools and GPS to guide us, I call this system our inner compass, and the best way to connect to this is through meditation. This is where we sit in contemplation. This is where we sit, listen, feel, and hear our soul-self speaking. This is where you will begin to identify your unsafe beliefs and start challenging them with some important questions.

Here are some signs that your identity has been sabotaged.

1. You have an all-or-nothing mentality.
2. You overcompensate.
3. You are a fixer.
4. You're easily distracted.
5. You procrastinate.
6. And the least obvious, we stop showing up for ourselves.

Some examples of unsafe beliefs are,

1. Making mistakes is bad.
2. I’m not good enough.
3. If I can't do it perfectly, why bother?
4. I must never show weakness.
5. Working on my problems could hurt me.
6. Anxiety is bad.
7. Strong people don't ask for help.
8. If things don't go right, something must be wrong with me.

Like any addiction, it only has power over us when we choose to give it our power.

The first step to recovering from the cause of the condition is acceptance. Accepting that we have an unsafe belief about ourselves allows us to take back our power. When we accept the fact that we have adopted unsafe beliefs, we begin to write our new story. From here, we can learn to question, challenge, and rewrite.

Once we have identified our unsafe beliefs, we can ask the qualifying questions.

1. What do I feel when I think this thought?
2. Why does this feeling make me think the way I do?
3. Where did this come from?
4. What evidence supports this?
5. What's the payoff for thinking this thought?

When we identify our unsafe beliefs and the emotions linked to them, we can reroute the delivery system to our thoughts before taking action. By doing this, we reprogram and override the delivery system trying to reinforce our unsafe beliefs.

We begin to acknowledge our feelings linked to our emotional memories and create new experiences to debunk our erroneous beliefs. In between emotion and thought, a new belief is formed, which will activate a different thought and action, producing a better outcome.

The biggest lie we tell ourselves when we don’t reach a goal or obtain something we want in life is to say that we “self-sabotage.”

Self-Sabotage implies we know ourselves. Identity Sabotage is more appropriate. The true identity of our spiritual being has been sabotaged.

Recovery is all about Discovery!

Love & Ignite your Light!

xoxoxo, Tonya De'laine

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