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I always thought self-sabotage meant purposefully doing things that hurt yourself.

Then I realized, Oh, wait. I do this.

In this episode, I’m talking about the ways self-sabotage shows up when you’re growing a business, putting yourself out there, becoming more visible, having hard conversations, or trying to become a completely new version of yourself.

There are things we continually know we want to do. We know they’re in alignment with us. We know the highest and best version of us would do them.

And then… we keep not doing them.

I’m sharing what I’ve been learning about why that happens, why trying to force yourself through it doesn’t always work, and what I’m noticing in my own life around staying busy, staying in control, avoiding decisions, and constantly being in motion.

Key Takeaways

• Why you keep going back to your old self
• What works to move past self-sabotage (it’s not force or discipline)
• What getting to your next level actually requires

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READ THE EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Emily Hirsh:

Instead of looking at it through the shame, what if we actually looked at it and said the self-sabotage is serving you? There is a subconscious element to it that is actually protecting you from something, you could read all the books, you could work with all the coaches and all the therapists and all the things, and information is never gonna teach you as much as actual lived experience.

Because if you don’t put it out there, then you don’t have to experience the feeling of rejection when it doesn’t do well. You gotta face that. Because if I let someone see me all the way, then there’s the massive vulnerability of what if it’s not enough? And that’s powerful.

Embodied CEOs don’t chase trends. They pave the way they lead from within. Move by purpose, unshaken by noise. When you are the source, you do not need permission.

Hello, my friends. Welcome back to the podcast. I hope you guys are having a good week. I’m counting down my days until my surprise trip. If you know, you know. I shared in the last episode. Watch my social media next week, ’cause I’m going somewhere with my content manager, and I have no idea where I’m going and what we’re doing, and I’ll be off my phone for 48 hours.

So, it’s gonna be a fun experience. Last podcast episode I did a more very marketing, very business specific. So, I figured this one I wanna do a little bit more of a just a chat and share a couple of things. Sometimes I have ideas that are, like, not a full podcast episode, but they’re really good points, and things that I’m learning or researching or having conversations with people, but it’s, like, not a full point.

So, that’s what we’re gonna do in today’s podcast. And there’s one specific thing I wanna talk about, because I have been, I guess, led to really look into this and kind of… not research it, but, like, deepen my understanding around this over the last week. I do a lot of reading and just reflection right now, and it’s around the concept of self-sabotage And I put an audio in our Obsessed group, as that’s our membership, our $7 a month membership, and they get a weekly audio from me where I talk about something and then I give them prompts.

And I use this as the topic because I am really fascinated and drawn to this right now. And usually when that happens, my learning and processing of something is helpful for somebody else. And I see this specific thing play out actually a lot in business. So let me back up a little. I am, as you guys know, ’cause I share a lot on the podcast, I am definitely in a season of my life of massive evolution, and I feel like I am really…

I’m stepping into a totally new version of me, and in order to do that, this old version of me has to literally die . And it is painful and scary and uncomfortable and hard and just a lot of things. And so I think right now in my life, I’m learning. I am learning more than I ever have. And if you wanna learn, you have to be in the arena.

I have a big sign in my office, “The Man in the Arena”, the Theodore Roosevelt quote, and I believe this so much, and I believe this also in our personal life. We as humans learn through experience. I believe that is what we’re here to do, experience life, and through experience, through relationships, through actually doing and experiencing things, you learn.

Because you could read all the books, you could work with all the coaches and all the therapists and all the things, and information is never gonna teach you as much as actual lived experience. And so right now, I feel like I have put myself into the arena of Personal evolution and going, “Okay, this is the version of me that I wanna become, that I am becoming, that I already am, that’s already accessible to me.

And in order to do that, I have to probably get pretty uncomfortable and learn through that.” And so that’s the season of life I’m in. It’s not good, it’s not bad, it just is. And I, I had coffee with a friend this morning, actually, who was like, “What’s the updates?” You know, “How’s things going?” And I was like, I took a breath and I was like, ” I’m learning a lot.”

Like, that’s how I would summarize my life right now. I am learning a ton. And some days I feel on top of the world, and I’m like, I’m alive, and I’m so grateful, and I feel amazing, and I feel grounded. And then other days I have harder days. And that just, it is what it is. So I was reading this book this weekend about the concept of self-sabotage, and I, I know that some of you listening to this probably understand this concept better than I did before I read this book.

But I always thought of self-sabotage as like something that I didn’t do. Like I, when I heard the word self-sabotage, it would be like, oh, purposely doing thing, purposefully doing things that hurt myself And then I realized, oh, I do do that. I do do things. I don’t think they’re on purpose. I think that they are, you know, out of control, out of my control.

but I do do those things. And so anyways, in this book, it talks about how we all s- we all sabotage ourselves in different ways. We all do this. And it’s kind of like the merging of your subconscious and your conscious mind because your subconscious mind actually has, like, a fear or something it’s trying to avoid or protect yourself from, and that, as we know, our subconscious mind is more s- is stronger than our conscious mind, and that’s actually running the show.

And then you have the conscious mind going, “I wanna grow a business. I want to be this person. I wanna work out. I wanna take care of my body. I want to have these relationships. I wanna put myself out there. I wanna create content.” But no matter how hard you try to do the thing, you don’t do it because you actually sabotage it.

And we typically, in these situations, try to willpower our way through, right? We try to, to, to force ourselves through logic to say, ” Do this thing. Be that person.” And so this … A lot of times, this is where I see this play out. It comes up a lot in people trying to be healthy, losing weight, eating healthy, exercising right.

We know we should do it, and a lot of times people don’t do it. I don’t have that experience. I work out and eat healthy fine. But a lot of people, that is their experience with, trying to be healthy. We also do this in business. When you go to put yourself out there, creating content, being consistent, having sales conversations, doing something new, like, so much of business is putting yourself out there, doing things you haven’t done before, doing things that make you uncomfortable.

And how many times do people have the experience of, “I know I should be creating content. I know I should be recording video. I know I should put myself out there. I know I should have those sales conversations. I know I should have reached out to that potential client, but I just didn’t do it”? We do this in relationships.

“I know I should set that boundary. I know that I should, you know, s- to, to say what I feel. I know that I should maybe not hang out with that person,” or whatever, but we still do it. So this comes up all over. “I want to have a clean house,” but for whatever reason, you constantly have a messy house. Another one that I feel like I do is, is being busy all the time Being busy is a way to self-sabotage ourselves because of what I’m gonna talk about, the next layer to this.

So anyways, we all do this. I learned that this week and I was like, I don’t know why, but my like connotation to the word self-sabotage, I was like, “I don’t do that.” Like, I don’t self-sabotage. I don’t do things on purpose to hurt myself. And then I’m like, oh, wait, I do. Just not in a lot of the ways that other people do.

Like, I think that’s actually the tricky thing for me, is like I’m dialed-in in terms of health and my business and most, most areas. And then there’s areas that I do self-sabotage. Anyways, instead of looking at it and going, “Why am I doing this? This is so annoying. I’m better than this.” Like and, and the shame.

The shame that comes up, right? When you have something… Think of something right now. Like, something that you constantly are like, “I wanna do that thing. I wanna be that person who does that thing.” And then maybe you do it for like a week or a month or a little bit, and then you go back. And you go back to the old you, and you go back to the old habits, and you get frustrated, right?

Then in that feeling is the feeling of shame. I’m not good enough. I can’t do it. I’m not gonna be a successful business owner. I’m not gonna lose the weight, whatever. Instead of looking at it through the shame, what if we actually looked at it and said the self-sabotage is serving you? There is a subconscious element to it that is actually protecting you from something.

And in order to figure out what that is, you have to understand on the other side of getting that thing, losing the weight, business visibility, business success, money, a healthy relationship, on the other side of that, what is the risk? What does it mean? What is the fear? Because the, the self-sabotage is actually serving you.

One of my mentors, Samson, he’s been on this podcast. He’s a good friend of mine. He will ask this question when he’s working with someone, which is you’ll t- you’ll talk about, you know, “I’m doing this thing and I don’t wanna do it,” or like, “I’m feeling this way,” or, “I’m, I’m acting this way, I’m showing up this way,” whatever.

And he’ll say, “How does…” A- and you s- you position it to somebody when you’re in that situation as, “I don’t wanna be doing it. That’s not me. I don’t wanna be doing it. I don’t wanna be showing up that way. I d- you know, whatever.” And then he’ll ask, “How is it serving you?” Because the reality is humans, us human beings in general, we really don’t do what we don’t wanna do.

Like, we might tell ourselves that we’re doing something we don’t wanna do, but deep down, like, if we don’t wanna do something, if it’s not in our best interest, we’re kind of wired that way, we don’t do it. So if we are doing something that we think consciously we don’t wanna do, there’s a deeper piece that we actually do wanna do it, and it’s serving us in some way.

So the first thing you have to understand is how is it serving you? So for me, I was like, “Okay. Well, there’s these things that I do that I, I keep telling myself I don’t wanna do them.” So an example could be I scroll. I scroll Instagram, or there are some areas of my life that I stay in indecision because

And I tell myself I don’t wanna do that. I don’t wanna be that person like in, in personal areas of my life. I stay in this place of indecision. And I was like, “Okay, let me look at it this way.” So if I keep going to the habit of scrolling Instagram at night, which by the way, I have actually been way better at this in the last two weeks.

But anyways, it i- that’s probably my worst habit. If I keep going back to that and I keep telling myself I don’t wanna be that person, I don’t wanna be the version of me who scrolls Instagram at night, I wanna be able to sit in stillness. I wanna be able to be present. I wanna be able to be bored. Okay, how is it serving me to do that?

Well, that’s actually easy when I really look at it. What is it doing? It’s preventing me from having to actually be with myself, and most likely feel emotions I don’t wanna feel. So by scrolling Instagram, and also I do this by being busy all the time, by constantly being in motion, by moving at a fast pace, by packing my schedule, by always having something I need to do or somebody that needs me, I get significance from that.

But I also get avoiding having to actually be with myself and having to be with what is underneath it all because that feels too overwhelming. That feels too scary. So to do that, I would have to slow down enough, I would have to get quiet enough, and then I’d have to be in that discomfort. And that discomfort, those emotions for me, those emotions of fear and grief, whatever comes up, is so scary it feels like I’m dying.

So instead of having to feel that, I’ve created a very great tactic that … And here’s the crazy part. It creates … This is where it gets like so, I don’t know, h- like we’re just so, intelligent because it actually creates a lot of success, The fact that I’m always busy, that I’m, I’ve got so much happening, I’ve got so much I can hold, I am, I’m needed a lot, I’m at max capacity most of the time. Well, guess what? It creates a life where I have a very successful business. I have a life where I’m constantly striving for giving my kids the best because we’re doing amazing things, because we strive for the best.

It, it allows me to be an athlete in CrossFit. Like, all these things it creates, but at the root of it, the foundation of that is not necessarily a good foundation. Not a good. I don’t like good or bad. It’s not a sustainable foundation to become the version of me that I am becoming In order to become that version, I have to stop self-sabotaging myself.

And the reason that it’s so hard for me to not constantly have stimulation, not constantly be in intensity, is because I don’t wanna sit with what’s underneath that. So for you guys, think up. Bring up the thing. What is the thing that you’re like, I, I constantly… Every week, like if, if you were to look at every single week of my journals, of my planning, it’s like, this is the area I could do better.

I could be more present. I could be on my phone less. I could be not scrolling at all. If it was up to me, if I was in my prime, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t scroll at all. Like, that would be the best version of me, the highest version of me. Every week, that is something that I feel I could do better with, and some weeks I do do better, right?

But I seem to always kind of fall back into a place of being really busy, moving really fast, maxing out my schedule, having too much on my plate, scrolling. And I only, I only scroll at night, because guess what? All day long I’m busy. Once my kids go to bed, now, you know, I have to be with myself. So I’ve developed that skill of avoiding it.

And so when I sat there and asked myself and I said, you know, then there’s the other area of my life, the area where there are some parts, mostly in relationships, and I’m not just talking about intimate relationships, friendships too, where I will avoid decisions. I’ll avoid saying no to someone. I’ll avoid…

I will leave a message unread to say no to going to a dinner or going to a party because I don’t wanna, I don’t wanna say that. I don’t wanna disappoint someone. Instead of just do it and disappoint them. I will do those things. I will stay in indecision. I wi-… I do this with, like, going on a trip or committing to something with a friend.

It’s like I will stay in indecision when I am the most decisive person when it comes to business and what I want. Okay. And I was like, “Okay, so why am I doing that?” Because if I stay in indecision, I don’t have to actually deal with the response. I’m avoiding it, right? If I stay in indecision, if I stay in this like in between place where I haven’t said yes, I haven’t said no, I don’t have to deal with the response We are very intelligent.

We are very tricky. So what is the thing that you continue to just put on your list? It’s like, “I could do this better.” And so for some of you, this is creating content. This is putting yourself out there. This is launching the business. This is launching the new offer. This is doing something that you continually know you wanna do it, you know it’s in alignment with you, you know it is what the highest and best version of you wants, but you keep not doing it.

And logically, the willpower … ‘Cause I’ll tell you, I have a lot of willpower. Most things, 90% of the things, I can get myself to do through willpower. Working out, eating, like, I can, I can cut sugar, I can cut … No problems with any of that. Very few things willpower does not get me there, and that’s very frustrating for me because I get…

Like, I’m like, “Come on,” you know? What are those things? And then instead of getting upset about those things, ask yourself, ” Why am I doing it? How is it actually serving me? If it was a positive thing, how is it serving me?” And when you get that answer, and you figure out h- why you’re self-sabotaging yourself…

And this book, the book w- is The Mountain Is You by Brianna, Brianna West, or We- West. So I wanna give her credit. I love her work so much. But she talks about how self-sabotage is the subconscious and the conscious mind basically colliding. I’m not saying that how she said it, but that’s, that’s, was my interpretation of it, and it makes so much sense to me now.

I’m like, “Yes.” Like this … Because I can’t willpower my subconscious mind, and that is the problem. Not the problem, that is the opportunity. So then decide, “Okay, how is it serving me?” Then look that in the face. So if I look at, okay, the reason I’m doing these things, the reason I overpack my schedule, the reason all those things are happening, and the reason I, I have the habit of scrolling that I get better at and then I go back to, if it’s because I’m avoiding sitting with myself, then I need to intentionally sit with myself, and that should get better.

But I can’t just, like, overhaul it, you know, and, you know, a 180 overnight. I’ve gotta do something small. Because how do we prove to ourselves that it’s not actually scary, or we’re gonna die if we do that, is through little pieces of proof and evidence, meaning In the moment that I’m in the line at the grocery store, I’m driving in my car, I

Or the moment I notice myself getting triggered in a, in a relationship situation and I, in that micro moment, catch myself going, “I’m gonna go check my phone. I’m gonna go reply to text messages. I’m gonna go help somebody else. I’m gonna go be needed over here.” Instead of doing that for just three minutes, can I just feel what’s really there?

Because I think, let you know, this is the conclusion I’ve come to, is the more that I can do that in little tiny three-minute, five-minute little moments, I will build evidence that I’m not gonna die if I do that, which is what my nervous system thinks, and I will then solve the root of it. So it’s how is it serving you?

What is it protecting you from? And then that thing it’s protecting you from, you have to build actual experience and evidence. You have to be in the arena. You cannot think your way through this. And prove to yourself you’re safe even when you do that thing. So if for you, the self-sabotage is not putting yourself out there, because I think that is a lot of business owners. If it’s not putting yourself out there, then ask yourself, “How does that protect me?” Likely by not putting yourself out there, by not creating the content, by not posting it, you know, you tell yourself, “Oh, it’s ’cause I don’t have time.

I don’t know what to post.” But deeper down, there’s probably the piece of it’s serving you because if you don’t put it out there, then you don’t have to experience the feeling of rejection when it doesn’t do well. Or you don’t have to feel the experience of judgment when you post it and your family says something, or you feel stupid or whatever comes up.

You gotta face that. So then once you’re clear on that, “Okay, that’s why I’m not actually doing that thing. This is what it’s protecting me from,” now how can you build a little bit of evidence where you, you literally like lead yourself through this? You post the thing. You sit in the discomfort. You sit in the fear.

You acknowledge it. “I feel scared. I feel rejected because it didn’t do well.” And you actually acknowledge that and then lead yourself through it and go, “Well, it actually doesn’t… Let me feel that rejection, but also let me find evidence against it. Am I actually being rejected? Am I actually being judged?

Or is it a story that I’ve made up?” And then slowly you’re gonna change that and you’re gonna build it. So that was the realization I had this weekend. That was, that was big for me. And I, I really think this is why at the end of the day with business, it’s like you can have all the strategies, all the tactics, all the things in your toolkit.

And if these things stay in the way, you will stay in the exact same place. Because until you can become the version of you that is comfortable being visible, that is comfortable taking risks, that is comfortable putting yourselves out there, that is comfortable having hard conversations. I think for me, a lot of my opportunity is in relationships.

And what do you think a team is? It is all relationships. So the more that I can learn here and be more comfortable in relationships, it’s gonna absolutely improve my leadership, which is definitely the direction I have to head to get to eight figures. So again, like, these things, you will come up against these walls, and they can only be addressed in this depth, and that’s why I talk about these things on the podcast because through my own personal experience and my own growth, I know that these are the things that move the needle more than any marketing strategy, any tactic, any ad hack, whatever, is ever going to move it.

Because if you have all of that … And people do this all the time. I see it all the time. They have all the strategies. They know exactly what they need to do, and they still don’t do it. They don’t post the thing. They don’t launch the lead gen. They don’t put the offer out there. All these things, and then they go, “Oh, I just need, I need that coach.

I need that program. I need to go study someone else. I need to look at this one more time.” That’s self-sabotage. All of that is you protecting yourself from the thing you’re actually scared of. Okay? So I hope you guys found this helpful. I guess that was a, basically a podcast topic. I, I stayed focused on mainly one topic.

there’s one more thing I wanted to say. I, I was like, “Should this be its own episode? I don’t think so,” but I, I saw this thing the other day, and I think that some of you guys would, will relate. And it’s, it’s somewhat related to what I was just talking about. But I think for me, it’s like I feel that in this season of my life, it’s almost like this, armor and shell that I’ve carried For most of my life is cracking in a good way. and a lot of it has to do with control, you know? that is my life’s work is, being able to be out of control. I think I learned from a very young age that I couldn’t trust adults’ responses to me being out of control, meaning having big emotions.

And so if I controlled my response and the way that I showed up and my environment, then I was in control, and I had autonomy. And I was, I was actually just sharing, with my husband the other day, I used to… When I was like eight, nine years old, I used to plan my day hour by hour, like every 15 minutes.

And I was like, “You know, if one of our kids did that, I would actually be a little concerned because that’s a little like excessive.” And I do- and I was talking, I was like, “Why did I do that?” Like I, I was like, I was a weird kid. Like I planned my day hour by hour. I would pack my days even at seven, eight years old.

It was like all these things I would self-inflict on myself, like I have to walk the dog, I have to do all these chores, I have to work out, I gotta run outside, I’m gonna do this. I would pack my days, and then I would plan it e- in every 15-minute chunks. And I was like, I, I wasn’t being a kid. And what’s crazy is that got a lot of praise, right?

Imagine like my friend– my parents telling my friend’s parents that, and they’re like, “Wow, that’s amazing, like our kids don’t do all that,” you know? So that level of like productivity that I had got praise. But anyways, I think that at, at a young age what that was was me controlling. I was controlling my day.

I was creating the autonomy I wanted ’cause for whatever reason I didn’t feel like I had it, and that was a real like I was trying to control every minute. Now, as I became an adult, I don’t need to do that anymore because I’m in charge of my entire schedule, right? But I’m still always in control. So this, armor and, tight grip that I have on life, I am very slowly, ’cause it is slow, letting it go.

I was, I was sitting outside the other night doing my thing that I’m doing to not scroll, which is sit outside and look at the stars, and a lot of times I, I, I do a lot of thinking, and I just had this like thought come in. And it was a voice, and it was like, “What would your life be like?” If you didn’t care about being in control.

And that’s where I’m at. the other thing, when I was… I already started this sentence. I saw this video the other day and it said, ” Admired by everyone, but truly seen by no one.” And I thought about that for a week. Admired by everyone and truly seen by no one, and I think that is something so many entrepreneurs feel.

Because you build a platform, you build this entire empire that you are in control of. You’re in control of what people see, what they don’t see, and I try to be authentic, but there’s still an element of control in it, right? Like… And you’re admired, and people look up to you, and you have all these, you know, messages that you get, and you feel like almost an emptiness from it.

Because it’s like, not that anyone in my personal life, not that my family, not that anyone’s doing anything wrong, it’s because I do not know how to let somebody actually see me. And so admired by everyone, truly seen by no one. That’s what I’m undoing. Because that is the most empty feeling I think I have ever experienced.

And it is a r- it is not someone else’s fault. It, like, it’s not someone else who’s not seeing me. I don’t let people get that, that intimately close, and it’s like, just, it’s just a weird thing when you have a platform and you’re like, “Don’t you feel, you know, so, so much love and support?” And it’s like, it’s not the same because there’s still, there’s still a protection.

There’s still the self-sabotage. Because if I let someone see me all the way, you know, then there’s the massive vulnerability of what if it’s not enough? And that’s powerful. So I saw that on a video. It was someone’s post, and it was like, calling out basically women like me . I was like, “That’s me.” But as- that has stuck with me for a week because I’m like, “That is, that is it.”

all right, you guys. I hope this episode helped, gave you something to think about. I love this stuff. I’m always growing. Life, life in business is the greatest personal development journey you could ever go on, and I am so grateful, and I am in the arena, and the six months, 12 months from now me is not even gonna recognize this one today. So alright, guys. Talk to you next week.