Hello everyone and welcome back to the savvy psychologist. I'm Dr. Ellen Hendrickson and this

and every week I'll help you meet life's challenges with evidence-based research, a sympathetic ear,

and zero judgment.

Why do I do this to myself?

If you have uttered that phrase, you may be an unwitting victim of your own bad habits.

Call it getting in your own way, call it self-defeating behavior.

Whatever you call it, if you have a goal, you can make sure it doesn't happen with self-sabbatage.

So this week, by request from listener Seri in Melbourne, Australia,

we'll talk about six reasons why, instead of shooting for the

stars, we aim straight for our foot. Now, self-sabbatage is any action that gets in

the way of achieving your goals.

On a diet, kids pizza crusts have no calories if they're inhaled standing over the sink.

Want to rock your work assignments and get that promotion?

You're all in, right after a tiny bit of World of

Warcraft. Thinking about taking your relationship to the next level, it's a perfect

time to pick a fight about which way the toilet paper should hang. There are a million

ways we self-sebatage, but some of the most common are procrastination, self-medication

with drugs or alcohol, stress-eating, and interpersonal conflict.

And actions like these are especially insidious because they're relatively small.

It's just one argument, one trip to the fridge, one beer, and in the moment they may even seem helpful.

But, like a river erode in away rocks, over time, self-sabbatage creates a grand canyon of self-defeat from which it's hard to climb out.

So why indeed do we do this to ourselves?

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