You might ask yourself these questions when you feel trapped in patterns that create problems in your life and keep you from achieving your goals. Although you try to make changes and disrupt these patterns, somehow you end up in the same place, again and again.

If this sounds familiar, you could be sabotaging yourself. Self-sabotage refers to behaviors or thought patterns that hold you back and prevent you from doing what you want to do.

How to stop self-sabotage

1. Create a new self-talk script

After an emotional upset, it is normal to keep running the situation over and over in your mind. When you do this, your mind can escalate the situation and blow it completely out of proportion. You may start telling yourself that ‘no one will ever love me’ or ‘nobody cares’ which can be incredibly destructive.

When you catch yourself telling yourself untruths or exaggerated thought patterns, then you can try to transform these statements into more positive and realistic affirmations. For example; ‘I feel like nobody cares about me, perhaps if I reach out to a friend and arrange to meet, I will feel better’.

2. Surround yourself with positivity

When it comes to our family or friendship groups, we can often accept them for what they are without realising that they may be a negative influence on your life. After a rejection, or when you are feeling unloved or worthless, then these negative influences could be inhibiting your choices and how you see yourself and others.

Try to make a conscious choice to distance yourself from the people that may be a negative influence. Sometimes you can distance yourself subtly. In some cases, it may be worthwhile telling the negative influences that you need to stop spending time together because of the unhealthy choices they may encourage you to make.

As well as a positive social group, look for other ways to improve your positivity. This could be trying a new hobby or learning a new skill, joining a social club or exercise group. Focus on the healthy activities that you do that make you happy, even if that is just a walk by yourself or curling up with a good book. Self-care and self-love can be incredibly positive influences if you don’t feel particularly sociable.

Put simply, do more of what you love.

3. Get creative

We all need a release for our emotions, however flippant or silly the reason is that caused you to feel unloved or rejected. Sometimes it can really help just to write down your feelings, what happened, and the reasons why it upset you. This can be a fantastic release and may help you to review the situation in a new light.

Alternatively, you can channel your emotional pain in creative ways such as art, poetry, writing, dancing or singing. If you are creative, you have the chance to create something new. If creativity is lacking, just vent with loud music and get singing and dancing to help improve your outlook.

4. Improve your self-worth

If someone has caused you to doubt your self-worth, then it is important to solidify your self-esteem and cultivate your confidence. Spend some time making yourself feel loved. A great way to do this is to make a list of your strengths and positive attributes For many, this can be difficult and can feel uncomfortable. Another way to do this is to look back at compliments you regularly receive or have received in the past.

When you make the list, make sure you write affirmative statements such as ‘I am kind, I am intelligent’.

5. Make yourself some (achievable) goals

After a difficult time, it is crucial to have a focus so that you can avoid self-sabotage and destructive habits. Setting goals can be a great way to keep you focused. They can help you to achieve more and demonstrate your capabilities to yourself. However, setting yourself unrealistic and impossible goals can cause you to plunge further into self-destructive habits, especially if you feel like you’re failing.

With every goal you want to achieve, make sure you evaluate it. Is it realistic and attainable? Can you set yourself a timeframe for the goal or perhaps break it down into smaller goals to make it more manageable?

As soon as you start ticking your goals off, you should feel a sense of satisfaction and self-worth, this positivity will then begin to impact other aspects of life too.

It is much easier to have someone on hand to support you and enable you to make positive changes you want to see in your life. Wellbeing Center offers a range of different therapy types to help you create the perfect bespoke package. If you are looking for support through a period of self-sabotage or struggling with feeling unloved or worthless, then we are here to help you.