The Mountain Is You.
Unconscious self-sabotage shows up in various forms in our lives, holding us back from the things we want the most. Brianna Wiest in her book The Mountain Is You: Transforming Self-Sabotage Into Self-Mastery displays and explains this matter in an easy-to-understand way.
I chose two examples of self-sabotaging behaviors that I bring up below.
When we choose to eat food that doesn’t serve us and after we feel bad about the choice we made - maybe we subconsciously sabotage ourselves in some way.
I recall the times I was overeating to numb my feelings and bring my attention only to the food consumed. That created a short-lasting bliss&high feeling, followed by guilt and disappointment. Now, I can understand I was emotionally & literally hungry - where only rapid, intense overeating could soothe me for a moment.
“The way you are self-sabotaging: Eating poorly when you don't want to.
You are doing too much, or you're not giving yourself enough rest and nourishment. You are being too extreme. This is why your body is requiring that you continue to fuel it. Alternatively, it could be that you are emotionally hungry, and because you are not giving yourself the true experiences you crave, you are satisfying your "hunger" another way.” (Wiest, 2020, p. 85)
When I was struggling with an eating disorder, I was pushing people away for many reasons. Turns out, it was not solely connected to the food problem. I must admit, this aspect still comes back to me these days in various forms.
I heard Teal Swan saying that when we don’t feel secure with other people to be fully authentic and show up as we are, without a constant need of meeting others' expectations, oftentimes, we choose to stay alone.
On the other side, we don’t mind spending time with e.g. our animals all the time, because we can be fully ourselves around them. Being among people can make us exhausted as we tune in to satisfy their needs, at the same time, not letting our guard down.
The paragraph by Brianna Wiest confirms that.
“The way you are self-sabotaging: Pushing people away.
You want people to love and accept you so much that the stress of it all makes you isolate yourself from the pain, effectively creating the reality you're trying to avoid. Alternatively, needing solitude too often usually means there is a discrepancy between who you pretend to bend who you actually are. When you show up to your life most authentically, it becomes easier to have people around you as it requires less effort.” (Wiest, 2020, p. 84)
— Why do we need to fill in the “awkward silence”?
— Why do we always want to have “something to say”?
— Why do we need to be “a certain way” for others to approve us?
— Why don’t we just let ourselves be?
— Let the “awkward silence” become the “comforting silence”.
— The need to fill in the silence, to say something, to be somehow - creates an uncomfortable stiff wall.
— Being in the moment and acting based on what naturally comes to us - creates a flexible space for exchange between us and others.
— It allows the energy to flow freely & undisturbed.
Reference: Wiest, Brianna. The Mountain Is You: Transforming Self-Sabotage Into Self-Mastery. New York, NY, Thought Catalog Books, 2020.
