When we’re chugging full-speed ahead down the road to success, a strange thing sometimes happens. All the progress comes to a screeching halt – by our very own doing.
Yep, we humans tend to be spectacular creatures at foiling our own success, and this series of posts is about the top four reasons we self-sabotage.
Top 4 Reasons for Self-Sabotage: Reason 3
Insightful info from psychologist Gay Hendricks shared in Edward Vilga’s DailyOM course disclose the Top 4 Reasons for Self-Sabotage. We already met reasons 1 and 2 in previous posts:
Now we get a face-to-face with reason number three.
Fear of success
Now why the heck would you fear success, you may ask.
Success would be the answer to your dreams. Success would give you everything I’ve ever wanted. Success is your ultimate target destination!
Those three thoughts alone can put a veil of fear over the idea of success. After all, If success truly answered your dreams, gave you everything you’ve ever wanted and brought you to your ultimate target destination, that could mean:
- You’d have nothing left to do or strive for – so you’d have to go and die
- You’d have nothing left to complain about
- You wouldn’t know what to DO with everything you’ve ever wanted
- You’re still not sure if you DESERVE everything you’ve ever wanted
- You’re not really sure WHAT you want (and trying to figure it out could be a pain, so it’s easier just to sit around in fear)
- List a zillion other reasons here, all of them fueling the fear of success
Silly fears? You bet. But they’re still powerful enough and ingrained enough for us to allow them to hold us back.
Fear of success bringing bigger burdens
And then there’s the heavy load of burdens you’re sure would come weighing you down when you hit the threshold of success. You’d have all that additional money to manage, which could be real pain in the arse.
You’d also probably have to WORK HARDER to make and maintain that higher level of success, and who in their right minds actually wants to work harder than we already do. For goodness sake, it may interfere with our tabloid reading.
Then there’s the annoying paparazzi who follow successful people around like a swarm of big, fat flies. They’d be buzzing about your home, your workplace, your favorite hamburger joint – snipping and snapping those photos.
No privacy. No peace. Not only that, but unflattering photos of you stuffing your face with a cheeseburger would start popping up in those tabloids we read.
You can’t live like that. So it’s better to nip all these potential problems in the bud by just avoiding success in the first place, right? Unfortunately, that’s what some of us may think, even if we don’t consciously realize it.
Overcoming fear of success
Writing down all the thoughts that pump your head with fear of success can do wonders for alleviating them. Once they’re down on paper, you can refute them with evidence to the contrary. Such as the likely fact that paparazzi will NOT be swarming about your yard if you get that promotion or pay raise.
A few other methods can also work, and I’d be delighted to guide you through them. It’s amazing when we can stop fearing the very thing we’re trying to achieve. Then we can actually achieve it! Book a free 30-minute call today.
I help amazingly creative souls who want more out of life than sleep-work-sleep get their dazzle back so they rock their world.
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