Do you enjoy self sabotage

[Diend]

So today i wish i failed my class. But when i realized i had misread the date of the final exam and that i still have two days before it,i wish i could just fail it. Its weird how i sabotage my own success. Can anyone explain this?

 

[xylo]

I notice this a lot in my own life too. I seem to be drawn towards my worst fears. Like when you go near a cliff edge and feel a strange compulsion to jump off. Whenever I think about the worst that could happen in situations, there's something inside me that almost wants it to come true. I don't fully understand why, but I'd love to find out what's really going on.

I guess part of it is just a natural curiosity of finding out where life's boundaries are. Like a child that does naughty things to see what will happen. I wanna know if I'll be ok if the worst really did happen, or whether it'd be too painful and I'd know to steer clear in the future.

Also I think sometimes the world tells you you're supposed to be a certain way, and sometimes our self-sabotage desires are more of a rebellion against what we perceive to be bad advise from society, or false messages. You know, is life really about good grades, a mortgages and wearing suits and ties etc.

Or maybe sometimes the pressure of trying to do the right things all the time can be too much, so we might desire to purposely do the wrong thing just to release that pressure, perhaps.

There's probably lots of reasons why we sabotage ourselves I'd imagine.

 

[kihira]

My experience is that success means taking more steps forward in life and as a person full of self-doubt, moving forward into the unknown means more anxiety.

 

[hidwell]

My experience is that success means taking more steps forward in life and as a person full of self-doubt, moving forward into the unknown means more anxiety.

These are the reasons why I stay in neutral. :thumbup:

 

[sahxox]

My default mindset is to try and sabotage my own happiness by undermining it with some form of negativity.
It's like a protection, so no-one else can. The last few months I've worked at it, by noticing when it's happening and taking action to stop it. It takes a lot of effort to break the cycle.

 

[jaim38]

I also have such tendencies to sabotage myself, especially when I think somebody is interfering with my life trying to make me do things they want me to do. I sabotage myself as an act of rebellion, so to speak. Sometimes I also have sadistic tendencies like fantasizing about self hurt. It could be low self-esteem and thinking that we don't have control over our destinies so we self sabotage so that we don't have to deal with the future and the unknown. Some people wish they can stay in school longer so they don't have to deal with finding a job, unemployment, etc after graduation.

 

[MBinMN]

Its flight or fight syndrome. You do want to succeed yet you feel a great deal of anxiety about it so your brain tricks you into "flight" mode. You want to get away from that feeling of anxiety any way possible.

 

[Pacific_Loner]

My experience is that success means taking more steps forward in life and as a person full of self-doubt, moving forward into the unknown means more anxiety.

That makes a lot of sense...

Also I think it's a depression thing. If you start succeeding, it means you have to keep going. Failing gives you a reason to stay in bed and be unhappy. I used to do that a lot when I was depressed.