Wisdom Wednesday: Issue #1

Self-Sabotage

A professional is prepared, each day, to confront his own self-sabotage. - Steven Pressfield, The War of Art

I have fallen into the regrettable habit of spending hours each day playing a stupid yet dizzyingly addictive mobile game on my phone, despite the many things there are to do in my life and all that I promised I’d accomplish. The self-discipline it requires not to download and play it is Herculean. You better believe I delete it from my phone at moments when my willpower and shame are high and I’m feeling committed to having a more productive day tomorrow…and yet. My willpower wanes with each instance wherein I do the thing I know is out-of-alignment with my goals and values, and it feels like I’m fighting a losing battle, especially at this time of year. February is by far my least favourite month because my mental health always invariably takes a nosedive. The habits I’ve constructed to fend off the darkness inevitably crumble like a cobblestone wall made without mortar, leaving me scrambling to pile the rocks yet again in a frantic attempt to dam the tide.

Perhaps that’s why I get such satisfaction from answering questions on Quora; because after 3+ decades of life, I feel I have accumulated some wisdom worth sharing. The shame-filled catch is when I ask myself, “How closely are you following your own advice here, bucko?”

I’ve used the analogy of the overweight personal trainer countless times to illustrate the importance of checking the “fruit on one’s tree” before taking advice from a seemingly-helpful Good Samaritan type, but it does sting a little to reflect on how some of the best advice I have to give on discipline and self-care goes unapplied in my own life.

So in the spirit of transparency, in this inaugural issue of Wisdom Wednesday, I’m going to be frank and share that some of the insights I may share with you in these posts might not be 100% reflective of practices I adhere to with perfect regularity.

I told a friend of mine yesterday, during a conversation on whether the job he’s sweating over keeping is more important to him because of the pay or because he actually gets genuine fulfillment from the work; “You can lie to me, but you better be honest with yourself.”

So if there’s one piece of wisdom I’d like to impart on you, dear reader, as I close out this first issue of Wisdom Wednesday, it’s to fully and transparently look with objectivity (as much as is humanly possible) at where your actions may not be aligning with your perceptions of them. We can get into the difference between intentions and actions another time ;-)

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Since wisdom is cultivated through self-reflection, let me ask you in which area could you shore up the self-sabotage, and perhaps implement some system or boundary with yourself to keep yourself from slipping into those destructive-yet-irresistible bad habits?

May Wisdom guide you, and Courage move you.

Steven

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