The Internal Resistance Files
Are you suffering from Generalised Personal Badness?
Spoiler alert: you are not
In order to stop avoiding things we know we want to do, we need to discover the real reason for our avoidance. Once we know the underlying cause, we can address it.
Sounds pretty obvious, doesn’t it? I mean, we’re not exactly unfamiliar with the logic of cause and effect.
Which begs the question: given that our brains are so smart and all, why don’t they take this obvious next step? Why do we focus on external fixes—endless date books, colour-coded calendars, proposed 5 am routines—instead of on investigating the root of the problem?
Why don’t we work as hard at comprehending our avoidance as we do at understanding all the other puzzles we need to master?
In helping countless clients and students with this problem, I’ve found there is one main answer to this question:
It’s because we think we’re bad.
We don’t always put it in exactly those words. Some of my clients describe it as feeling broken or like there’s something fundamentally wrong with them. Sometimes it comes with more specific adjectives, like ‘lazy’ or ‘unmotivated’ or ‘undisciplined’.
