[00:00:00] Hello, and welcome back to Not Another Mindset Show. Today we are getting into a very, very popular topic, and that is self sabotage. And I feel like this has become kind of like a buzzword in general. However, I think we all understand that it does have a very important place when we’re talking about pursuing health and fitness goals and honestly pursuing any goal.

So today we are going to talk all about essentially the research behind self sabotage and also just generally How your brain works and how that leads you to self sabotaging behaviors. If you are a coach, a health and fitness professional, who works with Honestly, if you’re anyone who works with someone that I’m going to help them change their behavior in some way.

[00:01:00] My bread and butter is working with health and fitness coaches to better help their clients. So I will be using examples in that realm a lot, but it really can be applied to very, very many other instances. So we’re going to go through the research and the following episodes that I have for you guys.

are going to sort of build off of this episode. So this is sort of going to be part one of two or three episodes in general. But we’re going to start here just talking a little bit more about, again, like how our human brains are kind of wired to self sabotage in a way. But I hate saying that because I don’t want you to think that because you’re wired that way that you can’t change.

Because that’s not the case either. So the first, first, first, first thing we must do is talk about your mindset related to self sabotage. Because ultimately, at the end of the day, if you’re a health and fitness coach, and you’re helping people change their body composition, change their lifestyle, change their habits, their behaviors, all of [00:02:00] this stuff, and you think That self sabotage is something that you can’t help.

That if you have a client who says they’re super motivated, they’re ready to go, you guys have this great amazing plan put together, and then they just can’t seem to stick to it, and that happens maybe over and over, you’re noticing this pattern where they’re consistent for a few weeks, and then they fall off the wagon type of situation, and you just feel like your hands are tied.

as the coach. That is going to impact how you actually coach that person. If you see them, even, even a little tiny bit in the back of your mind, you see them as potentially a lost cause because you’re doing everything that you can from a nutrition and fitness perspective, and you likely are trying to help them with their behavior change in their mindset, the psychological components of this, and just nothing seems to be working.

So at this point, you may start to label this person as uncoachable. That happens. Anyone else who’s listening, maybe you’re not a health and fitness [00:03:00] coach, and you’re just really curious to learn more about self sabotage, especially maybe as it applies to yourself. How do you view self sabotage? Do you see it as something that can be worked with?

Is it something that can be done? changed? Or is it just something that you have to deal with and is not necessarily something that is entirely workable, and you just have to kind of ride those waves of when self sabotage comes into play, when self control fails, and that’s just kind of part of the process?

Which I would argue is somewhat of the case. Like, it becomes less about how do we stop self sabotaging altogether and more about how do we manage self sabotaging behaviors and get ourselves back on track quicker, while also, yes, trying to avoid doing it maybe as much. So. With that said, as we’re getting into the rest of this episode, the rest of these episodes that are all about self sabotage, I really, really want you to think about where [00:04:00] you’re operating from at a baseline when I say self sabotage and changing self sabotage and what that means for you, what that means for your clients.

Because If you are operating, again, from a place of a fixed mindset when it comes to self sabotage, even if it’s a tiny, tiny, tiny little bit, just a sliver in the back of your mind is like, yeah, I think sometimes those clients who get in their own way, I can’t do anything to help them. It is going to impact everything else that I tell you and is going to continue to impact your coaching practices.

And I know that it already is. So. Noodle on that for a little bit, maybe, maybe pause here, really think about where you’re at before we dive in. So, I think at face value, we all would agree that self sabotaging behaviors do indeed get in the fact. Get in the fact. Get in the way. What am I saying? Do, in fact, get in the way of health and fitness outcomes.

When we are striving towards a health and fitness goal, self sabotage does get in the way. And the research does support this. [00:05:00] And I wrote down a couple, I found three separate meta analyses. For those of you who know what a meta analysis is, some of you may not. So quick, brief explanation. Number one, we love a good meta analysis.

Love, love, love them. They kind of sit at the top of the pyramid when it comes to research evidence that we’re looking for, where we really, really want to look to. So if there’s a certain topic, like self sabotage, that we have a meta analysis on, that’s Awesome, because what a meta analysis is doing is pulling results from tons and tons and tons of other studies and bringing them together to say, okay, what do we now know based on all of this evidence and all of this research, not necessarily just one study at a time.

So I actually found three separate meta analyses. And the first one found that individuals who engage in self sabotaging behavior, so things like procrastination, avoiding exercise, [00:06:00] are less likely to adopt and maintain healthy behaviors related to fitness goals. So, the authors in this case suggest that interventions, and when I say interventions I don’t mean like sit someone down and intervene in the behaviors that they’ve been doing, I know that’s what people think when I say intervention, but more or less like programs, right?

The authors suggest that programs aimed at reducing self sabotage could be effective in promoting health behavior change. Meta analysis number two. This meta analysis explored various factors that influence physical activity and behavior change. The authors found that self regulatory processes, such as self monitoring, goal setting, are important for reducing self sabotage and promoting physical activity and behavior change.

And the final one examines the efficacy of the theory of planned behavior, which is a theory, a very, very long standing theory inside the psychological literature, that Best describes how people decide to change or [00:07:00] not. And it’s one of many. It is one of many that I also teach inside the Health Mindset Coaching Certification.

There’s a lot of different theories, long standing theories of behavior change that we really should, as coaches, be operating from if we’re looking to, uh, change someone’s behavior. So they are examining this specific beh this specific theory. And how well it predicts and explains health behaviors, including fitness related behaviors.

And the authors found that self sabotage is an important factor to consider when attempting to predict and explain health behaviors. They suggest that interventions aimed at reducing self sabotage could be most effective in increasing the likelihood of successful behavior change. So basically, I just spent the last two to three minutes saying the same thing over and over again in a way, right?

But what I really want you to take away from this is that these are three meta analyses. These are three big, big, big studies that have studied, that have looked at a lot of other studies within [00:08:00] them. And all of them are saying this is a very important thing that needs to be focused on in any sort of program related to changing health and fitness behaviors.

It needs to be focused on managing self sabotage. That’s what we’ve learned from this. And all said and done, we’re talking probably hundreds, if not thousands, of studies that these three separate meta analyses were looking at, right? So, kind of already tells us what we already know. But at the same time, I think it’s really, really important that I’m not just sitting here saying, everyone knows that self sabotage is something we need to focus on.

If you want to change your behaviors and if you want to live a healthy lifestyle, I’m not just going to sit here and say that I would like to provide the evidence to support that as well and so that is really something that should be a Thank you. And very, very strong focus inside your coaching programs.

And for those of you who do one on one coaching, you should be thinking about what this means for how you’re [00:09:00] communicating with your clients, the certain questions that you ask. Maybe you have a group program, or you have like a DIY workshop product, that sort of thing. All of this should be included.

Because when we’re talking about interventions from a, um, Research perspective, that is when someone develops essentially a program and goes in to deliver it to try to get a certain outcome from a group of people. That is what we’re doing, but inside our business is inside our coaching practices. So in a way, we’re kind of, and this is how I look at my business too, very much so all of the time, especially just like coming from a research background myself, we’re pretty much always testing things.

We’re testing things with our audience. We’re testing things with our clients, prospective clients. And if we know from the research that paying attention to self sabotage and making that a very key feature in these research studies that are aiming to help people change their health behaviors is a, it’s a really core component.

We need to also be doing that sort of in our own mini [00:10:00] research studies, which is. working with each of our clients or groups of clients or people who go through our programs. So, okay, I’ve, I think I’ve very thoroughly laid the foundation there. Um, but there’s a little bit more foundation because now I want to talk more about just like defining self sabotage because it’s talked about a lot and I think we all have a general inherent idea of what we’re all talking about when we say the word self sabotage.

But the research definition is that self sabotage refers to behaviors, thoughts, emotions, So thoughts and emotions are included here that interfere with an individual’s goals, aspirations, or well being. Plain and simple, right? So pretty much what we already know, but I think it’s also important here that the research definition, and I think how we should really be looking at self sabotage in general, is that it’s not just the behaviors that you do that get in the way of your goals.

It’s also the thoughts and the emotions that likely lead to those behaviors, but could also do some damage just all on their own, right? So the problem [00:11:00] is, In the health and fitness coaching space, very specifically, is that most coaches, I would say the majority of coaches, from my experience in the space for as long as I’ve been in here, they are trying to, quote unquote, fix self sabotage with their clients through

They’re trying to resolve it through, okay, you’re, you’re self sabotaging on the nutrition plan. We just need to change the nutrition plan. Okay, you’re self sabotaging, you’re getting in the way of how many times you’re trying to get to the gym. Let’s just change the number of times you’re going to the gym or change the type of exercises that you’re doing.

And I’m, I struggle with this because the reality is that self sabotage is not an issue of nutrition and exercise. It’s something that needs, it requires behavior change mindset psychological tools, [00:12:00] not fitness. And I think everyone kind of knows that to a degree, but it’s not something that’s actually being implemented unless, unless you’ve gone through the health mindset coaching certification and you’ve learned from me in this capacity.

And I actually did take some time, I polled hundreds of health and fitness coaches and learned that. Health, health and fitness coaches truly believe that self sabotage is the number one thing that gets in the way from their clients seeing more results. So we’re all on the same page here. The researchers are on this page.

I’m on this page. You’re on this page. The hundreds of coaches that I’ve pulled are on this page. We’re all like self sabotage. is pretty much the number one problem here. However, when I also sent out this poll to these coaches, there was a general lack of understanding on why self sabotage even happens in the first place, and then a very, very strong lack of understanding of how to successfully manage it with clients.

So it’s essentially [00:13:00] everyone saying, I know that this is an issue. I’m very aware of it. I see it all of the time, but I don’t actually feel super confident in my coaching practices when it comes to understanding why it’s happening and how to resolve it. So we think a lot of the times that nutrition and exercise type of methods are going to help, but for those of you who have tried that, you know most of the time that’s not going to resolve the issue.

But it’s unfortunate because so many health and fitness coaches have gone through their traditional education and training to become a coach, and it’s all been focused on exercise and nutrition. So, What do we do with this, right? We, we need to have a better understanding and I, I would love to just immediately jump into tips and tricks and hacks with you, but in order to really know what you’re doing and to really, I want to set you up for success.

And in order to do that, we can’t just say like, okay, here’s one through five [00:14:00] tips for reducing self sabotage with your clients. That would get lots of clicks, get lots of listens. But that’s not what we’re doing here. And this is how it works in the health mindset coaching certification too. I spend actually the entire first section just setting everybody up with some of those theories of behavior change that I was mentioning earlier.

And we talk about a lot of the like psychological foundations of just. It’s human decision making and why we do what we do or we don’t do what we know we need to do. So we talk about all that first because then once we get into the fun tips and tricks and hacks around willpower, self control, motivation, habits, mindset, all of that, now you already have this strong foundation.

So if something needs to be adjusted for a client, you need to go a different direction. You use this hack and it doesn’t work and now you don’t know what to do. That won’t happen. Because you have that foundation. And I say all of this because I want you to understand why I’m going this direction with this podcast, too, with this episode.

So, to get into some of that foundation for you, we’re gonna do a little bit of, like, light dusting of [00:15:00] neuroscience. And I am not I am not a neuroscientist, and I will not pretend to be. So if you have any complex questions about brain anatomy, I can only help you to a very, like, small degree. But after that, I am a psychologist by training, not a neuroscientist.

And even still, I am not a clinical psychologist. I was trained as a researcher. So, just take that, take that for what you will. I’m always going to be straight up and honest. I do believe myself to be a credible source, but Just know my, my neuroscience background is, um, not as strong as most other things.

So with that said, self sabotage in general stems from a biological adaptation. So we are self sabotaging in order to survive. And that sounds backwards and weird, but how it really works is that self sabotage is It’s usually just trying to protect us from something. And back in, you know, the caveman, cavewoman [00:16:00] days, that was really helpful because if we were protecting ourselves from danger and things that are uncomfortable, it usually means that we’re going to stay alive.

Today, that’s not so much of an issue, but a big focus of humans in the caveman, cavewoman days. And even now today as the software. In our skulls has not really been fully updated the two things that we are pretty much constantly trying to do Just a big focus that we have in general is either to attain reward or avoid threat You know humans are very complex creatures, but we’re also very very simple that at the end of the day All we’re trying to do on a daily basis in our lives is either attain reward or avoid threat.

It’s really kind of what it all boils down to. So we’ve been conditioned to understand that doing so, avoiding threat, attaining reward, is what’s going to [00:17:00] keep us safe. It’s going to keep us safe from the saber toothed tigers that are out to get us, and that’s not necessarily the world we live in anymore.

But those desires still live on. Today. So that first desire, attain reward. We’re talking things like food, community, stability, safety. When we have all of these things, we are going to feel our best and we’re going to feel like we can stay alive. And we will stay alive if we have those things, you know, shelter, tribe, that whole thing.

Um, and that’s carried on to today. Obviously we also have like some secondary rewards that have become. important to us as well that are more socially conditioned, and that’s things like money, education, climbing the ladder, getting more successful in some of these areas, like obviously that wasn’t something that was It’s a, a reward that was wanted to be attained when we were, you know, hundreds and hundreds of years ago.

But [00:18:00] even still, those things, education, money, doing better in our careers, those things provide that sense of safety, security, keeping us alive, right? So One thing I want to note when we’re talking about attaining rewards is it’s hard to talk about any, any, even little dusting sprinkle of neuroscience and reward without talking about dopamine.

And I think dopamine in general is often talked about somewhat incorrectly in that it is the like the pleasure neurotransmitter when the reality is it’s actually reward seeking. So what I say about what I’m what I mean about this is that. Dopamine is released before, during, and after an action, and it’s going to make you more likely to want to continue to repeat it because of that.

And the human brain is wired to strive for these goals because achieving them feels good. [00:19:00] Dopamine is released in anticipation of the reward. Which results in us actually taking action to pursue the reward. It’s often talked about that dopamine is this thing that like, gets released after you do something that feels good.

But the reality is, it’s a reward seeking neurotransmitter. So, in anticipation of receiving a reward. That’s when dopamine is released really the most. And that’s what puts you, like, gives you the wind in your sails to actually go do the thing. So just wanted to put that out there because I do think it’s often talked about incorrectly.

So that is why we are constantly seeking to attain a reward. And as one, it’s a big focus that we’ve, we’ve had for a long time. It probably is not going away any, anytime soon. Keeps us alive. Keeps us stable, keeps us safe, and our brains are quite literally wired to continue to want to do those things.

Alright, so desire number two is to avoid [00:20:00] threat. So this is sort of like the other, the flip side, the other side of the coin. Our limbic system, in our brains, is really, really focused on avoiding threat. And The neurological response that we have to threats, and that could, that could, that could come from the saber toothed tiger.

It could also come from a stressful email. It could come from an upsetting conversation that you had with your significant other. It could be that you’re upset that you’re not losing weight in your weight loss goals. So, when these things happen, we feel like there’s like a threat to our, our goals, our survival, our happiness.

What happens inside our brain? Is that the thalamus will first detect that a threat is present. And then after that, your amygdala, which most of you have probably heard of the amygdala if you’ve heard of anything brain related as far as like where your, your fear kind of lives. Your amygdala then activates a fear response.

And from there, you will see [00:21:00] a sympathetic nervous system response initiated. And this is where we see people talking about fight versus fight, flight. freeze type of, um, just kind of like the common terms I feel like that are used to describe the sympathetic nervous system response. So that’s the, the step by step process that happens when our brains detect a threat and then like move forward with understanding what that threat is and how our bodies, our brains respond to it.

So this process increases cortisol, which is our primary stress hormone. There is so much in, on the social media land, in social media land about Cortisol right now, and I don’t know where this is all coming from. I would really, really like to just say that cortisol isn’t necessarily inherently bad. And it seems like everything I see these days is like, How do you reduce cortisol?

Cortisol’s so bad for you. Cortisol’s keeping you from losing weight, blah, blah, blah. You, you do need cortisol. If you didn’t have any, that’d be a really, really big problem. So just please keep [00:22:00] that in mind. So that said though, in these threatening situations, in these sympathetic response required situations, it does increase our cortisol.

Um, what’s interesting is what I don’t see talked about when it comes to cortisol is that Increases in cortisol during these times of threat actually help you remember those situations better. And this is where we have our caveman, cavewoman brains turning on and essentially building this library of memories from when the cortisol was released during a certain situation.

In the past, you know, saber toothed tiger, my brain is registering that as a threat, it’s making me have this fear response, this sympathetic nervous response, and I’m releasing extra cortisol. I need to remember this for next time. I need to remember how I feel and, like, what’s happening here so I can try to avoid it again in the future.

That’s happening too in our day to day lives with, again, those stressful emails, those, like, negative conversations with people. So it really is [00:23:00] a survival mechanism in that way, and we then become more selective in our ability to remember negative experiences and mistakes because of this, because the goal is to avoid them.

So we build this memory bank of negative experiences, and we have, as humans also, inherently a negativity bias, where we are constantly on the lookout for the negative in order to protect ourselves too. So it’s just like double whammy. Many, there’s many whammies of just like holding on to negative experiences and stressful experiences in our lives.

But the problem is, for us in this day and age, is that avoiding hypothetical threats. So if we start, our brains start to like, have the alarm bells and the thalamus of like, I’m sensing this. Detective, I’m detecting this. This threat is potentially present. It may only be hypothetical in nature for us these days, right?

It may be, oh, if I do this thing, I might fail. Or, oh, if I speak on stage, what if I, I [00:24:00] fall off or I faint, or whatever and I embarrass myself, or, oh, if I make this big investment into my business. What if I don’t actually use it properly? It’s like, all these hypothetical threats lead us to avoiding opportunities that could ultimately improve everything for us.

So, we’re kind of going up against this, this old school wiring that, yes, keeps us alive, and yes, we need it, and yes, we need cortisol, and it’s not all a bad thing, but however, we then get very caught up in these hypothetical threats that actually just keep us stagnant. So. We have two desires. We want to attain a ward, and we want to avoid threat.

Both of which our brains are very, very much so wired for. Both of which have a lot of benefits. Both of which have kept us alive for hundreds and hundreds of years. But They’re not always balanced in the best way. So when I say [00:25:00] this, your clients will feel their best, you will feel your best, and operate the most effectively when you’re equally working towards attaining reward and avoiding conflict.

Your clients are going to be far more likely to self sabotage. When this balance is out of whack. So, the self sabotaging trigger that our clients face with this, like, imbalance of seeking reward and avoiding threat is called the Approach Avoidance Conflict. And, I’m gonna read the definition here, so I Make sure it’s entirely clear to you guys.

This is a psychological phenomenon that occurs when an individual is faced with a decision or a situation that has both desirable and undesirable qualities or outcomes. So, the problem really becomes when avoiding threat. [00:26:00] overrides attaining reward. So this takes clients away from working towards desired goals because they are trying to avoid the threat that they feel.

The threat of failure, the threat that it’s not going to work for them, the threat that they’re going to lose money on this coaching experience if it doesn’t go the way that they want it to. And this is the underlying mechanism of So many different forms of self sabotage, which we’re going to get into different forms of self sabotage in the next episode.

So be on the lookout for that. So this, again, just to make it super clear, this desire to avoid threat. often overrides our desire to attain reward. And in doing so, that’s more often when we see self sabotage happening. And a lot of times it’s because avoiding those threats, those threats are just hypothetical in nature.

And they don’t, they won’t ever necessarily turn into anything. We’re just worried that they will. So an example might be when a client wants to lose weight, [00:27:00] but that client is also worried about the need to make significant changes in their lives. Their desire to avoid feelings of anxiety, worry, failure, overrides that desire to make changes, and attain that weight loss goal.

So that’s what we see a lot. But the beauty of all of this, I know, I feel like I’m kind of painting a negative picture here. I’m like, your brain is actually set up to make you self sabotage and The way that it’s set up is actually, like, what causes the self sabotage. So, what do we do with this, Casey? Um, there is a lot of beauty in this, because it can feel like it’s something that’s totally out of your control, but when you realize that it’s all just biological, human brain type of stuff.

You can see how you can also rewire it. So just because we’re wired this way does not mean we can’t rewire and and sort of take back control in that way. So I don’t want you to [00:28:00] leave feeling discouraged, especially you coaches out there who are working with so many clients that are doing this. It wants you to understand that just because your brain is wired this way does not mean you can’t do some rewiring.

And your clients and you are rewiring all of the time. In fact, as you’ve been listening to this episode, you’ve likely started to rewire different pathways in your brain and think differently about self sabotage in a way that you never have before. And that is impacting the way that you’re going to continue to think about self sabotage in the future.

We are We’re constantly getting updates to our brains in that way. There’s actually a word for it. It’s called neuroplasticity. So we’re constantly creating new connections in our brain and pruning back old connections that maybe we don’t use so much anymore. So please, please, please just know. The important thing here is that, oh, we can understand why someone’s brain would be set up for self sabotage.

But that also means that we have [00:29:00] opportunities to rewire.

And that is what we are going to talk about all in the next episode, is diagnosing different types of self sabotage, knowing what to do with it, how do we rewire some of these pathways. I have a really fun acronym that I’m going to walk through with you guys, but just again, please note that even though your brain may be wired to do some of this stuff and it really is coming from a good place.

Survival, protection, safety, things that we really, really, really need. They can still be adjusted and promote our goal pursuits. And again, that’s what we’re going to get into in the coming episode. So I hope this was helpful, lays a really good foundation for you. Maybe makes you think a little bit differently about self sabotage in a way that you haven’t before.

That’s always so much a big goal of mine is to just make you think differently. Think, think more about things in ways that you maybe haven’t before. So. We’ll wrap up the episode [00:30:00] there. Thank you so much for your time today. I appreciate you so, so, so, so much and I’ll see you in the next episode.