this post was submitted on 01 Jul 2026
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I find I am my own worst enemy. Self sabotaging before I even get started. Doubt. The cycles of starting and then quitting jobs or healthy habits.

What are your tricks to get out of your own head?

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[โ€“] jaycifer@lemmy.world 5 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Self-forgiveness, practicing thankfulness, and incremental growth.

I tend to ruminate on my failures and shortcomings. Guilt can be a powerful motivator/teacher for positive change, but dwelling on it for too long or too much prevents you from following through on those lessons. At some point before that happens you need to forgive yourself and give yourself permission to move forward past that guilt. I found myself doing this so many times I eventually put together a playlist of songs to help me reset, forgive myself, and restart. I recommend you do something similar. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLeC2eNJHSGPcKuKjBAMN8sS7F_Vt9gqsN

There is no point in working on a life that has no joy or good in it. When I ruminate I tend to lose sight of the good things that are already present. Acknowledging those good things, even if they feel sparse or small, may help you feel the potential for more good things or inspire new goals and things you want to achieve.

Incremental growth is the hardest but most powerful thing of these three. When I first acknowledged that I was cycling between short highs and long lows, my goal was simple; during the few times I felt good, instead of basking in feeling good before the crash invest that good feeling into either making future good times longer or bad times shorter. It took many slow years before I started hitting a tipping point where the good started to outweigh the bad, and even then one bad thing happening out of my control threw me back several steps. It takes a lot of patience with yourself to grow, but the other two things I mentioned makes it easier.

[โ€“] pinball_wizard@lemmy.zip 2 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Great write up.

That's how I cope, as well.

I didn't even realize I had the highs and lows going until this year. I just found that aiming for small incremental improvements to situations that sabotaged me was the only way for me to get by.

Edit: This year, someone pointed out to me that certain personality types seem prone to burts of high activity and slumps of low energy - and that I matched most of those traits.

I've been coping through my low energy times with various habits and routines, while I write a to-do list to remove obstacles, which I systemicly work through. Of course, during high energy times, I get much more done against that list.