Am I self-sabotaging?

Hello from a wet and rainy Austin. I'm lovin' every minute of it. If it keeps the heat at bay, I'm into it.

Today I want to talk about a tricky little beast: Self-sabotage. I thought about this topic for today's newsletter because I've been experiencing self-sabotage myself recently (taking shape as a #4 on the list below!).

Self-sabotage is slippery devil because it's really hard to recognize it when it's happening. And just like the creative process, where everyone gravitates toward a particular stage, every artist gravitates toward a specific kind of self-sabotage. Here are the 5 types that I've been able to recognize in my work as a coach:


1. Over-committing
This is when we sabotage ourselves by committing to too many things. We don't want to lose out on an "opportunity" so we engage with everything — we try to grow our painting practice, start a business, have a side project, and fill our social calendar. In trying to grow in many directions, we end up exhausted. We have little bandwidth left for the work we actually care about. We tell ourselves it's because we're just too busy, but in reality, we've created this busyness to protect ourselves from the vulnerability of doing the work that's most important to us. What would it look like to create open space in your life — to allow your creative work some breathing room?


2. Over-editing
Over-editing happens when we re-work something over and over again, in hopes that we'll find the perfect painting or perfect text. I see this a lot with painters. In the process of re-working a painting they keep killing the possibility of the work. Instead of re-working a single painting, we need to move that energy into our next painting vs. re-doing the same work over and over. How can you allow for the answers to show up in many works, vs. one?


3. Being a prisoner to your "formula"
This happens when you've experienced some success in your work — you've made a bunch of drawings or written a bunch of songs — but you begin to feel stuck. All of a sudden the method that got you this far is not feeling exciting anymore. You feel burdened by your constraints vs. empowered by them. By forcing yourself to continue with your formula, you get stuck. Is your process working for you, or is it time for a change?


4. Re-inventing your wheel
The opposite of being a prisoner to your formula is constantly re-inventing your wheel! Artists love to approach things in novel ways. While allowing for new possibilities is important, it's also OK to build on your existing knowledge. Is your interest in changing direction because something truly isn't working, or does it come from a place of fear (i.e."I'm not doing this right") or FOMO (i.e. "I should do it like that person"). Are you quitting something because you want the immediate relief that comes with quitting? 


5. Looking for perfect
Sometimes when we get really close to accomplishing something we've set our minds to, and it finally arrives, we get scared. We do what Julia Cameron calls a "Creative U-turn". We look for flaws in the opportunity in front of us vs. all the ways it "checks the boxes" of what we want. Are you sabotaging yourself by looking for perfect? What would happen if we accepted something at 90% perfect? 


Oof. Tell me which one hits home for you. I'm a #4 and #1 all the way bay-bay. But this is how I work through it.