We do it to ourselves. We undermine our health, our wealth, our relationships and more. It’s called self-sabotage, and I caught myself doing exactly that, this past weekend.

On Friday night, I woke up at 2am with a stomach ache. Why? Because I had eaten something way off my healthy lifestyle plan – and had indulged in a couple of drinks as well. The scale was up 6 pounds over the last 2 weeks and I laid there wondering WHY was I doing this to myself? And it hit me….self-sabotage. I’ve had a few challenges recently, just like we all end up facing at one time or another, and for me, food had previously been a way to cope. When I really asked myself the tough question of WHY I used food to numb the pain, the answer was because I do not feel healthy and sexy, I don’t deserve to be loved, and thus I’ll just hide behind my weight.

Here’s what I know…. We can make a 100+ excuses for not committing to pursuing a better version of ourselves. We want to lose weight, we want to make more money, we want a connected romantic relationship, we want to take better care of ourselves…. we want, we want, we want.  And then the excuses begin… I don’t have time, I like my junk food, I hate to exercise, I like my red wine, my clients don’t have the money, I’m not good enough, smart enough, fast enough, healthy enough… ad nauseum. At what point do you say enough is enough?

It’s a choice. You can choose to stay stuck with your pity party OR you can choose to let it go, and work on you moving forward. As a business owner, we sabotage by undervaluing our acumen and then wonder why our bank account is low. With our health, we sabotage ourselves with food, alcohol and lack of movement and sleep and then wonder why the scale creeps up and our body fights back. In our relationships, we sabotage ourselves by taking things personally and picking a fight instead of using compassion and letting things go.  Oddly enough, sometimes, things may be  chugging along so well that we wonder if it’s too much good and do we really deserve it, so we sabotage ourselves. Gaye Hendricks, author of The Big Leap, refers to that as an “upper limit problem.”

There are certainly days when I don’t want to look within. It’s much easier to make excuses and blame others for my circumstances. But that gets us nowhere. Self-development can’t be accomplished without self-discovery. Is it hard? YES, it can be. Is it worth it? A big resounding YES!