When it comes to maintaining your routines, it can be a challenge especially if you are the person getting in your own way. It can be hard to take in but could you be sabotaging your own progress? In this episode of the Routine and Things Podcast, I share how we all sabotage ourselves at times, what sabotage can look like, and why it’s important to get this under control. Put in your earbuds and take a listen!
Word For Word
Ashley Brown 0:00
[Intro] Routines, my absolute favorite word, but you either love them or you're working on getting there. But either way, I strongly believe routines can be a springboard for improving your home, yourself and your life. I'm Ashley Brown and this is the Routine and Things podcast. In each episode, I'll share practical tips and simple ways to help you consistently live your happiest life, one routine at a time. Trust me, you're gonna want to keep listening, because you're well on your way to getting and staying happy.
Ashley Brown 0:49
Hey, girl, Hey, welcome back for another episode of the podcast. I am so happy you're here with me today. So this episode is kicking off the month of March. And this month's theme is consistency. And so I wanted to talk about sabotage and how sometimes we can sabotage our progress. You may have clicked on this because you're like, you know what, I think I may be sabotaging my progress. Or you might just want to hear what I have to say. We're going to be talking about if you are sabotaging your progress, because, you sabotaging your progress, especially when it comes to routine building. If you are trying to get a routine down pat, and you're trying to keep that routine thriving, maintain your routine, right, sabotage is not going to help you. When you self sabotage, it is going to hinder you, from where you say you actually want to be right, from where the goal is right, you're not going to make it to your goal if you continue to stop yourself along the way. So that's why I'm talking about this today. It's really, really, really important. But before we get into that, I want to give a listener some love today. And that listener is 4829bettygirl. And she left a review of the podcast, which I absolutely love. And it says "fun and informative, thank you for enthusiastically sharing your ideas without making us feel guilty or overwhelmed." Thank you so much. Thank you so much 4829bettygirl, I totally appreciate you for leaving that review. It just warms my heart every time you rate and review the show. So be sure to do that today. Subscribe to the podcast if you haven't already so you don't miss any episodes. But also rate and review the show, especially if you listen every week. If you're listening right now and you have not rated it and reviewed this podcast, girl, do me a favor, review and rate the show. It really supports everything that we are doing here at Routine and Things.
Ashley Brown 2:50
But anyway, let's go ahead and get into self sabotage. Are you sabotaging your progress? How would you even answer that question? Do you feel like it's a yes or no? You might be in between like, maybe, I don't know. So however you feel, let's go ahead and get into that. But like I was talking about before, we can sometimes sabotage our progress. And like I was saying, in my healing journey, I remember it was at a certain point because I'm still in the healing journey of like, just trying to get better at you know, getting to know me, loving myself fully for who I am, being able to heal past wounds, past traumas that can affect where I'm trying to go with my life that can, like affect my progress and hinder my progress. And so, at a certain point within my healing journey, I recognized that I was sabotaging my progress, because I was focused on something that really didn't need to be focused on and I was not focused on my healing journey. And I remember I had to, you know, collect myself and get myself back on track. And thank God I have and even even my bestie helped me with this too. She's like, girl, stop. So sometimes it happens. And I'm here to tell you that it is totally normal sometimes to sabotage. Is it healthy? No. But is it normal? Yes. Because sometimes it's like, but I don't want to do that thing. Right? How many times are you like, I don't want to do that routine. I don't feel like doing that routine. And so you got to do something else, clear indication of you are sabotaging your progress. And so let's get into how this could look, right, to sabotage your progress, especially around routines.
Ashley Brown 4:47
The first thing I want you to understand is that you have to know that you have to have sabotaging behaviors, like no one is exempt from this. Most of us, all of us have sabotaging behaviors that we do. That either we know we do, right? We're aware of them, or we're unaware of them. But we all have them, it's nothing to be ashamed of, you are not bad if you sabotage your progress, right, I don't want you to lean towards that you are not bad, right? You're listening to this, that means you're trying to get on the right track or recognizing what your behaviors could be. So it's not bad that you sabotage your progress, especially if you want to do something about it. And then many times, it is a subconscious thing. It's not something that you are really aware of, until you become aware of it. And so until you bring that to the surface, and so that's why I'm going to help you do some today is bring your self sabotaging behaviors to the surface so that you know, and can check yourself real quick to say, you know what, let me stop, let me stop and let me get back on track with what I know, I want to be doing how I know I want to be feeling and how do I know I want my life to look? Okay. So that's the first thing, you have to understand that we all have self sabotaging behaviors, and it's totally normal. We're here to recognize them.
Ashley Brown 6:07
Secondly, you need to be able to recognize what those behaviors are. Some of us are very clueless, you may be clueless about the ways that you sabotage, or you may not recognize certain things that you do as sabotage. And so I'm going to talk about that a little bit. I'm going to share with you my sabotaging behaviors just to give you like an example, and some information here. So the ways in which I sabotage my progress, when it comes to routines, I'm gonna say when it comes to routines, especially, but this is with anything, if I know I have a goal, that I am trying to meet, an outcome that I want to make happen. And I'm doing these things, that means I'm sabotaging my progress. And so those things are my phone, if I find myself constantly scrolling on Instagram. First of all, I don't follow many people on Instagram. I don't know if you've peep that if you follow me on Instagram, I don't follow many people and that is intentional because I want to be intentional with my time. But if I see myself constantly scrolling on Instagram, knowing I already done look at what everybody had to say, that means I'm sabotaging right now.
Ashley Brown 7:18
Another thing that I will do is clean. Like if I'm cleaning up. And it's not like any deep cleaning, no, not deep cleaning. But if I'm like cleaning up straightening up, and I know I need to be doing something else. And I could be using my time in a more like in a wiser way because I have this goal I need to reach or this outcome I want to make happen or I need to be over here cooking. And I'm sitting here straighten up stuff, when the kids are looking at me they're running around the house like okay, Ashley, just get in the kitchen, start cooking something girl, you know, that's sabotaging. When I am organizing, oh, I'm big for this, especially when I'm working. When I'm working if I go into my Google Drive, and I start to organize and clean up files, boom. That is, especially when I have my to do list and my planner, my daily planner notepads sitting on the side of me that has x, y and z for me to do and I'm I'm sitting on the Google Drive organizing and cleaning up stuff. That is a total indication. I'm sorry, because it's so funny because I find myself doing that often. I'm like, Ashley stop. Get back to what you were doing because that one right there will take me to the point where I just need to get back to what I'm doing. I need to get back to what I'm doing when I am organizing Google Drive, right? Because I have specific times I actually organize things on my computer and my desktop and everything. But if I'm doing it at a time I need to be doing something else, it's sabotage.
Ashley Brown 8:55
Another way that I self sabotage that hinders my progress, and I have seen this happen on multiple occasions, is when I am working. Work is a form of sabotage for me, work. And when I say work, I mean my business. If I'm working in my business, when I know that it's something else that I need to be doing either A. in my home, B. with my children, C. with my husband, D. with myself, and I am working, that is a form of self sabotage. And that is for me and I know work can sabotage me from making progress in other areas of my life, if I allow it to. So I have to be very careful because I'm a go getter. I'm like one. Let's get it done. Let's go. Right. That's me. So I already know when I'm like oh, let's get it done. Let's go let me do some work. And then I know I have something to do like I didn't clean out that frigerator upstairs, or I didn't schedule these appointments for my girls, girl, Ashley, get off the computer stop working. When I know me and my husband have not had any type of time together and I'm sitting here on the computer trying to finish up editing the podcast episode. No, not good. Not good, because that's what makes it sabotage.
Ashley Brown 10:24
I remember even in my healing journey one time, basically, I was working when I knew I needed to wrestle with something in my past that I had not healed. And I was sitting here just working, just doing business stuff like getting it done. And it's like, but Ashley, sweetie, you avoiding and what actually needs to be done. You're avoiding killing this wound that is still open, girlfriend. Let's get it together. That's what makes it sabotage. Because you might be listening to this. And you might be saying to yourself, Well, how was work sabotage? How was cleaning sabotage? How is organizing sabotage? It's getting something done, right? Yes, it is. You are being productive, you are getting things done, when you are working, when you are cleaning, when you are organizing. Yes, for sure you are moving the needle in some type of way. But when you actually know, when you're doing that thing, to avoid doing the thing that you actually say that you want to do that thing that you actually said that you needed to get done, but you are using the cleaning and the organizing and the work to avoid the goal that you actually say you wanted to accomplish. That is when it is self sabotage. Those things alone organizing and cleaning and work. Those things alone alone are not sabotage it's when you are using those things to avoid what actually you want to do. When you started at the top of the year was like you know what I want to get my figure together, I want to get my stomach down a little bit. I want to you know, kind of snatch things up a bit. Now you sit here working, right working on a passion project, and now you're cleaning. But you have'nt exercised in two weeks, self sabotage, you haven't been eating the healthiest of foods, self sabotage. Because it's not in alignment with the goal that you actually said you want it to work on. It's not in alignment with the outcome you actually want to see come to fruition in your life. That's when it becomes sabotage. And we can do that with our routines as well.
Ashley Brown 12:45
When we are doing our routines if you have started the exercise routine, if you want to start a self care routine, like a morning routine, a bedtime routine, whatever the routine could be, right? You want to start that routine. You started it and then you're doing other things, right, like binging Netflix. Girl, that's your third episode of Bridgerton, let's let's cut it off. Right like let's get it together. Let's cut it off. I'm talking to myself too. I just binged, first of all side note, I just binged in one day all of Bridgerton. Y'all done got me up he I was even gonna watch it. But I was and let me check it out and then binge the whole season. But anyway, when you are doing that when you know that your routine is sitting over to that kitchen looking at you like girl, I'm nasty over here. Come clean me up. So when you wake up in the morning, you can just start and make breakfast. You don't have to clean me up then, right. When you are doing you know stay focused on your routine because you will sabotage your progress. In which ways are you sabotaging your progress? Can you think about that right now? While you're listening to this and which ways is it the phone? Is it cleaning? Is it organizing? Is it work? Is it TV? How are you self sabotaging? When you know you have an outcome that you actually want to see happen. You have to start calling out your sabotaging behaviors. I do it all the time, you have to start calling them out yourself. And it's better for you to call them out then for other people's call it out because you might even feel a little offended with me saying this now, you might be like dang, dang, she doesn't she then got me all the way together today. Right? Because it doesn't feel good when someone else is bringing something to your line of view when something when someone is bringing something to your forefront. It doesn't feel good.
Ashley Brown 14:43
But when you can check your own self, when you can check your own self that is where power lies when you can check your own self. Check yourself boo. That's it. Start calling out those behaviors because that's when you're going to get more on a path to being consistent with your routines, being more consistent with moving and being in alignment with the goal that you want to reach. You start to hold yourself accountable. And when you can hold yourself accountable, that is a powerful way for you to stay in alignment with what you want in life. So powerful. So ask yourself today, how have you been sabotaging your progress? How have you been sabotaging your routines? And begin to call yourself out, so you can become more consistent and continue to move towards the highest version of yourself in your life because it's possible for you.
Ashley Brown 15:34
Alright, let me share with you some routine wisdom before we wrap up today. And that is your consistency becomes stronger when you are willing to call out the ways you sabotage your progress. Let me repeat that, again. Your consistncy becomes stronger when you are willing to call out the ways you sabotage your progress. The month of March is all about consistency, can you start to strengthen that consistency muscle, this is one way, it's through calling out your sabotaging behaviors and getting back on track with what you want.
Ashley Brown 16:12
So the last thing that I want to share with you is something that is going down this month, I am super excited for this event. I mean, so excited. It is the Purpose Driven Mom Summit. Just hear that purpose driven. Whoo, sounds beautiful to me. I am going to be speaking at this summit along with so many other moms. And so all of us are moms there are speaking at this summit, along with so many other moms and we are going to be speaking specifically about how you can use routines in certain areas of your home. This is like a really jam packed, routine oriented type of summit that is going to help you in your life. I'm so excited about it. And I'll be speaking specifically about morning routines. So I'm definitely going to link it in the show notes for you to check it out. Because I really truly believe that if you are wanting to use routines as a powerful way for you to improve your home, yourself and your life this summit is for you. So check out the link in the show notes. Sign up to join us for the Purpose Driven Moms Summit. I can't wait to see you there and I hope to see you there.
Ashley Brown 17:20
But that's it for this episode. I hope that you enjoyed it. I hope you took away something from it. And if you did, if you're like you know what Ashley, you really gave me some clarity about this, tag me on Instagram, take a screenshot right now on your phone if you listen to the podcast, and tag me on Instagram and let me know that this helped you in your life even if you did feel a little bit offended but you know I love you. Alright, enjoy the rest of your day. Continue to enjoy wherever you are, whatever you're doing, and I will talk to you next week.
Ashley Brown 17:55
[Outro] Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed today's episode, take a screenshot and share it on social. I would love to know you're listening. And for tools to help you start, maintain, and enjoy your routines, be sure to head to routineandthings.com. Here's to staying happy!