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Here we go again

Lately I've been afraid and upset about something. Much anxiety, fear and frustration have been experienced daily. Due to extreme emotional abuse as a child, there has been a clear pattern of self-destruction in me. Yes, literally self-inflicted, physical injuries have been part of my individual self-sabotaging tendencies. I have dangled with the concept before and been close to dealing with the same thought-process, but this time it really hit me and became extremely vivid, and now I know that all those times getting hurt were a behavior acted out purposefully for the sake of a subconscious need to "stay low", which is exactly what I just realized tonight, and which I now want to explain in detail to you:

Not acting on one's wants and desires in life for an extended amount of time almost always leads to depression at worst, and temporary apathy and feeling down at best. Why we don't act in such circumstances is less pressing right here, and is not the main point of this post, but it is important, of course. The question is this: When does it feel that it more acceptable to not do something you really want to do? Is it when you're on top - when you have a high income, a good job, a satisfying friendship and overall stability? Is it when you're in the dirt, don't feel like you have a future, when you're low on money and feel like your mind could burst any second?

It feels worse not making a move when you are in top shape, physically, mentally, economically, etc, because there's less of an excuse not to act, thus immense feelings of dissatisfaction and weakness arise, along with a lingering aspiration to avoid the pain of what you could've achieved, but are not achieving, because of inaction.

VS:

It feels more acceptable to go against something you want when you don't have things going for you, because then you have more an excuse for not acting. In a state of degradation, the feelings of apathy make you think and feel something like this: "Well, I couldn't have gotten it anyway, so it doesn't matter that I didn't act".

Therefore, after a childhood consisting solely of suffering, tears and sorrow, success feels like a parasite you need to get rid of. You weren't prepared for it, because all your life you've been told that you will never amount to anything, do anything of importance, fulfill your dreams, or achieve your greatest desires. The idea of success was so foreign and strange; it became so unreal that you stopped believing it could ever apply to you.

When struck with abrupt success, your battered and bruised brain will have no way of knowing how to deal with it, and rather than feeling pleased and joyful, it will emit an emotion of fear, because this is dangerous: "I thought I wasn't going to be successful. What's going on? What's happening to me?". So you could've applied for a job when you were 18. So you could have asked that pretty girl out when you really wanted to. So you're not useless. Now you're an adult, and you're experiencing real success, thus given an opportunity to go against your entire history and childhood and all you've ever known, and that's scary. This is where the fear of success comes from. Decades of opportunities lost in time, and now you know you "could've". This brings deep sadness, pain and anxiety, and it's the anxiety that is the defense mechanism keeping you idle: The anxiety is telling you not to act to keep you in a state of slavery to the past in order to protect you from the pain and sadness for all those years of your life lost forever because you thought you were useless and could not achieve greatness. The anxiety is trying to protect you from that deep and true realization about yourself. But by now, unfortunately, the anxiety has become the bad guy.

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A History of Inaction + Sudden Success = ?

If you have a tendency for inaction, then not behaving in a way that is in accordance with your values, or not acting upon a desired idea or thought in the face of opportunity, in direct relation to being "on top", or "in shape", will absolutely feel devastating, because your body; your mind and body, and your entire system will feel something like this: "Why didn't you act? You had an opportunity. What was that?", hence the need to fall back down to escape the anxiety caused by you not acting when you actually could have. This is why a prolonged pattern of inaction in one's personal history due to fear, combined with success, often leads to subconscious self-destruction and self-sabotage.

This is what I've gathered so far thanks to my epiphany. What do you think?

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I hereby promise myself that I will be aware of this pattern, do my best to prevent negative outcome due to it, and strive to stay on top despite the pain, fear and deeply heartbreaking realizations about my past.

I hope this can help the thinking of other people dealing with a similar problem.

-mus