SELF BETRAYAL

What Is Self-Betrayal?

Self-betrayal entails deceiving oneself and refers to a pattern of conditioned behavior where an individual pretends to be someone they are not. It is the continuous act of living in denial of one's basic needs and wants and continually preventing oneself from receiving that which they truly desire. Self-betrayal involves habitual people pleasing; the act of doing things simply to please others, even at your own expense. It is a display of limited self-forgiveness and self-compassion, leading to conscious or unconscious acts of self-sabotage. What we truly desire the most, we keep ourselves from. People who live in self-betrayal are not usually patient with themselves, nor do they understand their feelings enough to make decisions involving commitment.

Constant acts of self-betrayal prevent our true personality from shining; it reduces our authenticity and makes us dishonest with ourselves. We betray ourselves every time we act in ways that aren’t alignment with purpose, in ways that aren't in alignment with who we are at the core; our soul selves. We betray ourselves every time we fail to self-commit to growth and expansion. We betray ourselves every time we settle for less than what we deserve. Self-betrayal stems from trauma relating to chaotic childhood environments. In childhood, we often learn how to love ourselves from parental authorities and the environments we are being subjected to during those fragile stages of development.  We are often taught to self-neglect which is a form of self-rejection and a component of self-betrayal. When we dwell in the realms of self-betrayal we tend to refuse to take responsibility for our actions and live in a regime of self-sabotage.

Signs of Living In Self-Betrayal

• Suppressing your feelings: People who do not often speak up for themselves and allow others to back down their ideas may not pay close attention to their feelings. These people do not often create time for their own needs and usually oblige to resentment. They usually want to achieve something to feel validated by someone else, not necessarily because they want it for themselves.

• Criticizing Oneself: People who overly criticize themselves and their appearances, and/or compare themselves to others struggle with feelings of unworthiness. This behavior is known as negative self-judgment and is undoubtedly a form of self-betrayal. 

• Unlimited Sacrifices: This involves doing everything to maintain a relationship or friendship at the sacrifice of your peace and happiness. People who dwell in self-betrayal sacrifice their mental and emotional well-being, their money, and their time to maintain toxic relationships. They do all that is within their power to ensure the situation-ship works all for the sake of preventing confronting those fears of being alone. They consider this relationship more important than the ones they have with themselves and may endure all forms of mistreatment to sustain what’s already broken.

• Shape-Shifting: Living in self-denial makes one hide parts of who they are. Shapeshifters are incapable of living authentically because they aren’t true to themselves. They maintain a facade that often entails pretending to be something they are not or have allowed themselves to be molded by their past traumas in a way that’s detrimental to themselves and their society. These people may act one way when they are alone and act another way depending on who they’re around. Most people aren’t even aware that they are living inauthentically, subconsciously seeking outside validation for their sense of self-worth, and suppressing their true expression of self.

• Seeking Validation: Someone who constantly seeks validation outside of themselves to determine their self-worth is someone who is living in self-betrayal. People who seek outside validation would often want to feel completeness from others rather than acknowledge that they are very much capable of completing themselves. 

 Consequences of Self-Betrayal

• Self-betrayal blocks your inner peace.
  
• Self-betrayal often leads to toxic situation-ships.
  
• Self-betrayal leads to increased bad habits and addictions.
  
• Self-betrayal leads to stagnation in personal development as well as in areas of success.
  
• Self-betrayal results in difficulty committing to relationships and underlying feelings of unworthiness and self-devaluation. 

How to Overcome Self-Betrayal

• Start being honest with yourself. Take accountability for conditioned toxic behavioral patterns and negative thought processes that you’ve adopted from traumatic experiences you’ve experienced in the past. Trauma has a way of altering our perception and changing our personas as a way of guarding ourselves against potential heartbreak or threats. The way to positively navigate through life is to simply set boundaries rather than attempt to guard ourselves in ways that keep us from receiving true unconditional love. We want to remain open to receiving love and that requires us to not guard up but to set healthy boundaries and develop realistic standards that keep us from low-quality experiences. 

• Discover yourself. This entails exploring your desires, passions, and interest, uncovering hidden talents, and unlocking your creativity. Through self-discovery, we develop a deeper connection with ourselves and unwavering self-love as our self-worth begins to derive from us discovering how uniquely designed and wonderful we truly are. This process enhances our state of internal wholeness which reinforces our self-worth.

• Practice acts of forgiveness. Lack of self-forgiveness creates festering feelings of unworthiness which deteriorates our sense of self-worth. We must learn to practice habitual self-forgiveness and acknowledge that mistakes are a part of our growth process because no one is flawed and we are all learning how to be better each day. No one is perfect and chasing perfectionism is equivalent to chasing something that does not exist. It’s a waste of precious time that could be adequately spent on transforming in ways you couldn’t even imagine. There are no limits to our growth and expansion on a soul level thus there are no limits to how much we can evolve physically, mentally, and emotionally as well as spiritually. 

• Speak your truth and trust yourself. Speaking our truth is our way of asserting our beliefs and exhibiting self-trust. When we trust ourselves we become more confident in ourselves and our abilities. Self-trust is an effective confidence builder and is a powerful component of self-love. 

• Always follow your intuition. Intuition is that part of ourselves that is connected to God itself. Connect with your intuition and allow it to lead you through this journey of self-actualization and you’ll discover new exciting ways to exist that intensely provide you with an everlasting mastery of internal peace, love, and happiness.