Why Smart People Still Self-Sabotage

Have you ever asked yourself, “Why do I keep doing this?”

You know what to do. You know you should make that phone call, stop procrastinating, eat healthier, exercise, ask for the raise, or finally start that business you’ve been dreaming about. The information isn’t the problem.

So why do so many intelligent, capable people continue repeating the same frustrating patterns?

If knowledge alone created change, nobody would smoke. Nobody would stay in unhealthy relationships. Nobody would keep putting off the things they know would improve their lives.

The truth is, your conscious mind knows what you want. But your subconscious mind is running the habits.

Thomas Edison understood something that most of us forget. Before he successfully invented the light bulb, he tested thousands of materials that didn’t work. Imagine if, after attempt number 500, he had decided he simply wasn’t smart enough. Or after attempt number 1,000, he concluded that failure meant he wasn’t meant to succeed.

Instead, he famously said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”

What made Edison remarkable wasn’t that he never failed. It was that he never allowed failure to become his identity. Most of us do exactly the opposite.

We try to lose weight and gain it back. Suddenly we’re “someone who has no willpower.” We get nervous speaking in front of a group, so we decide we’re “not confident.” We procrastinate on an important project, and before long we’ve convinced ourselves we’re lazy.

But those aren’t identities. They’re patterns.

One of the reasons I love the combination of hypnosis and NLP (neuro linguistic programing) because it focuses on a completely different question. Instead of asking, “What’s wrong with you?” it asks, “What pattern is running?”

Maybe procrastination is actually protecting you from criticism. Maybe perfectionism developed because making mistakes didn’t feel safe when you were younger. Maybe people-pleasing became your way of keeping the peace.

At one point, these patterns probably helped you. Your subconscious learned them for a reason. The problem is that your subconscious doesn’t automatically update the program just because your life has changed.

So it keeps running yesterday’s software in today’s world.

Over the years I’ve worked with business owners, tradespeople, teachers, nurses, contractors, entreprenuers, and professionals from every walk of life. Some of the smartest people I’ve ever met have sat across from me asking the exact same question:

“Why can’t I just make myself do it?”

The answer usually isn’t a lack of motivation. It’s a subconscious pattern that’s become automatic. That’s why one of my favourite things to tell clients is this: