Inner Saboteur
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A beautiful post from Estonian writer
, called Judge Me Gently got me thinking about my own Inner Saboteur. I’ve spent plenty of time investigating my Inner Critic, which you can read about in many posts I’ve written for this Substack1. But I haven’t spent any time observing thoughts that may be from my Inner Saboteur until I read Terje’s post.I commented with appreciation on her post and she asked me in the comments,
“Your saboteur is she, what about the critic? My inner critic is an older man.”
Me: “my inner critic is the most angry and judgmental older woman you can imagine😖”
Terje:“Any signs of mellowing down? My critic seems to sometimes get distracted by other things, so he is not as loud as he used to be.”
Me: “I’ve found that simply by becoming aware of my inner critic, I can catch her before she goes full throttle 😁 it’s by being aware of her and not identifying with her, that I am freed from being the effect of her, if that makes sense? It’s in the same vein of observing my humanity from my divinity — it’s the cultivation of that observing awareness that has helped me to suffer less. What about you?”
Terje: “It makes a lot of sense. Awareness and observing things with curiosity is freeing in many circumstances and it is the necessary step before acceptance, change or letting go.”
Exactly.
It’s what we’re not aware of, that can bite us on the butt.
After this fruitful exchange with Terje, just now I caught a thought from my Inner Saboteur. This thought flashed across my mind like a scorpion whipping up the tip of its tail to inflict its poisonous venom. Not only am I stung by what I’ve now learned is called a scorpion’s telson, but I also just discovered that the telson is where the anus of a scorpion also resides. So if you cut off its tail, it “leaves the animal unable to defecate and is an eventual death sentence for the stopped-up scorpion.”2 Eeew.
I have a sense that my Inner Saboteur is part of my ego, not my soul. My soul — akin to my Inner Divinity — wants me to be at peace, to blossom and thrive in this human incarnation. Perhaps this new awareness of my Inner Saboteur is yet another milestone on the path to awakening and cessation, or at least easing of suffering. (And remember, this is not to demonize the ego — which can be incredibly helpful in certain circumstances too. We just need to be aware of it.)
I’m speculating that this particular thought I observed, is from my Inner Saboteur, and it transpired when I saw that a person I know had ‘liked’ a post of mine on Instagram. It took me a second before I realized this thought had even lightning-flashed across my mind — this is it: She doesn’t really want me to succeed, she wants me to fail, as she just sees me as a competitor.
Wow.
I’ve read in many books, “Don’t believe your thoughts.” And while it’s possible that there may be some truth in this thought, it’s also a very self-sabotaging thought, even if there is truth in it. This thought does not serve my growth and evolution of consciousness. This thought has the effect of harming me. Plus this thought impacts me in a way that I don’t get to receive the possibly intended support of the other person.
Furthermore, this particular sabotaging thought may be more of a reflection of my own mind projecting my disowned issues around competition, or my own ‘muck’3 onto the “other” person. Which I know is a very human tendency, so I’m observing it in myself from a space of radical acceptance, compassion and loving kindness.
We also get to remember that what we bring into our awareness, loses the unconscious power it has over us. What we can see about ourselves — even what we may not want to know — when we can see this kind of shadow, and not live in delusion, this brings in lightness and healing.
Dictionary.com defines the word ‘sabotage’ as: deliberately destroy, damage, or obstruct (something), especially for political or military advantage.
According to Oxford Learner’s Dictionaries, sabotage is the act of intentionally damaging or destroying something to prevent it from being successful or to protest about something.
…The word sabotage comes from the French word saboter, which means "kick with sabots (a simple shoe), wilfully destroy". The term came into use after the great French railway strike of 1912, when the strikers cut the shoes (sabots) holding the railway lines.
“To prevent success” is the goal of one’s Inner Saboteur. When I really stop and think about it, it feels horrific that I have an Inner Saboteur. Awful that it even exists within me.
But what we’re not aware of can cause us harm. Once we’re aware of it, light comes to it, and it’s not so dense and heavy.
I found a free online test at a website that showed me what are my top 10 inner saboteurs. My number one saboteur is the Controller. Which doesn’t surprise me, and ironically it’s also what I most accuse my husband and partner-in-life, Jamie, most of (perhaps more projection of my own disowned muck.) Perhaps he and I both have the Controller as a primary saboteur, so you may imagine our fights and entanglement of egos at times. I thank MotherGod and FatherGod every day that we have at least learned to cultivate space around our egos, and to connect more with our souls, which often helps to soothe any troubled waters.
Shirzad Chamine, the creator of this saboteur test and author of the NYT best-selling book called Positive Intelligence: Why Only 20% of Teams and Individuals Achieve Their True Potential AND HOW YOU CAN ACHIEVE YOURS, writes:
Saboteurs are a universal phenomenon, formed in our early childhood. They start off as our guardians to help us survive the real and imagined threats to our physical and emotional safety.
Saboteur formation makes sense when you realize that the primary goal of the first fifteen to twenty years of life is just to survive long enough to reproduce.
So he’s addressing the physiological level there.
I also like how he describes the Sage archetype as an antidote to the Saboteur:
Your mind is constantly in a battle between two forces — the Saboteurs and the Sage. Saboteurs represent the negative patterns and mental habits that hold you back, such as self-doubt, fear, and frustration. [From my perspective, these three things I think writers, especially, can relate to.] Saboteurs are responsible for the stress, anxiety, and negative emotions that drain your energy and impact your effectiveness.
On the other hand, Sage represents the part of your mind that thrives on positivity. It’s the source of creativity, empathy, and clear-headed thinking. The Sage is where you find wisdom, compassion, and the ability to see challenges as opportunities. By shifting the balance of power in your mind from Saboteurs to Sage, you cultivate mental fitness, leading to greater performance, resilience, and well-being.
He also asserts:
Every person in the world is afflicted by Saboteurs that undermine effectiveness and happiness. The question is which Saboteurs you have and how strong they are. Once you identify your Saboteurs, the great news is that you can significantly reduce their power by building new neural pathways in your brain.
And I love how he also writes,
To weaken your Saboteurs, all you need to do is to observe and label Saboteur thoughts or feelings when they show up. For example, you might say to yourself, “Oh, the Judge is back again, saying I’m going to fail” or “There’s the Controller feeling anxious again.”
For me, this is 100% in line with the Buddhist idea of,
IT’S LIKE THIS.
Perhaps this is why I like Buddhism so much as it shows you how to manage your own mind, hence lessening suffering in onself, and then like the ripple effect, helping to lessen suffering in others too.
Perhaps this is also part of the power of Substack. How we all impact each other — writers and readers all effecting each others’ evolution of consciousness. Perhaps even as though each of us is but one drop in the ocean of consciousness evolving itself.
https://www.amnh.org/explore/news-blogs/research-posts/scorpions-detachable-tail-shakes-predators#:~:text=Its%20main%20weapon%20relinquished%2C%20the,for%20the%20stopped%2Dup%20scorpion.
Long time readers of this Substack will have read my writing about this many times: Like the Lotus flower with its roots in the muck, we blossom because of, not in spite of the muck. For me, this is such a refreshing re-frame, so that we can feel okay about when we discover things about ourselves we’d really much rather not know.
Wow! This made me think of two things in particular.
One is, in 12 step fellowship, we talk about our “isms.” And one of the acronyms is I Sabotage Myself (another favorite is Incredibly Short Memory).
Also, having your inner saboteur as a scorpion is brilliant! Surely you are familiar with the story of the scorpion and the frog? The scorpion asks for a ride across the river on a frog’s back, and halfway across stings the frog (in other words sabotaging himself). Before they both die the frog asks, why? And the scorpion answers, because I am a scorpion.
🦂 🐸 💕
I never tire of reading about the insights you uncover and there hurdles you are faced with along your spiritual journey. There is something very uplifting about people who just continue to show up over and over to their chosen path, and you are certainly one of these people Camilla.
Also the scorpion factoid was fun :)