Why Do We Sabotage Ourselves For No Reason?

Carl Yung discussed how Consciousness can easily succumb to unconscious influences which are often truer and wiser than our conscious thoughts he noted that unconscious motives frequently override our conscious decisions particularly in matters of vital importance many people tend to undermine their own agendas leading to frustration and bewilderment as they find themselves making irrational decisions experiencing mental blocks and even suffering from physical ailments that thwart their plans it's as if a mysterious Force takes control steering them away from their intended goals plagued by ongoing self-sabotage these individuals seem never to reach their desired destinations but why do we sabotage ourselves why do we ruin our plans for no apparent reason the psychiatrist Carl Yung discovered plausible answers to these questions by becoming aware of a part of the psyche he called The Shadow we can view the shadow as a psychological container within the realm of the unconscious in this dark place where the light of our conscious awareness does not reach we store our undesirable traits there are various reasons we might hide certain unwanted aspects of ourselves under the rug perhaps our parents disapproved of them or they didn't align with societal ideals or life taught us that they lead to suffering we repress these traits by banishing them to the depths of the psyche as if they weren't part of us but they are and according to Yung repressing unwanted aspects of ourselves doesn't solve the problem in fact it can have disastrous consequences as these aspects take on a life of Their Own operating in the darkness here is where self-sabotage Begins the repressed parts of our personality revolt against our conscious Minds from the depths of the Shadow we find ourselves at war with ourselves without even knowing whom we are fighting fortunately there are ways to stop this self-sabotage instead of repressing what is in the shadow Yung urged us to integrate it into our personality we can only do this by making the unconscious conscious and discovering What Lies Beneath let's explore the psychology of self-sabotage and how to overcome it based on Carl yungk works there is a common misconception about the shadow that leads to much confusion and misunderstanding about the role of the Shadow and how to integrate what has been repressed it's often thought that the shadow is simply the dark and negative side of the personality due to the problems it can cause and it's often envisioned as a shadowy figure suggesting an ominous Other Self that exists outside our conscious awareness however the shadow refers to something fundamentally different the shadow is more like a dark place than a shadowy figure we might think of the Shadow as a dark closet in the human psyche where the light of Consciousness does not shine and this dark closet is where we lock away all the repressed parts of the personality that we are unwilling and unable to confront or reintegrate at the time for various reasons such as trauma or unmet needs thus when we talk about doing Shadow work and integrating it we are not integrating the shadow itself we are integrating the contents of the Shadow and when I say the contents of the Shadow I mean all the repressed parts of the personality these are the parts of the self that dwell in the dark place that is the Shadow just as you might put objects in a dark closet and they become enveloped in Shadows you could also take those same objects out of that dark closet and bring them into the sunlight and they would no longer be wrapped in Shadows this is also true for the parts of the personality that dwell in the shadow there is nothing inherently shadowy or negative about them it is simply that they have been placed in a shadowy place and are operating outside of our conscious awareness and often causing problems for us because of this disconnection an important realization here is that when these parts of the personality are repressed it's not as if you simply have some repressed traits it wouldn't be entirely accurate to say something like repressing my greed or repressing my joy because both greed and Joy are floating qualities to repress a quality like greed Joy or anything else you would have to repress an entire fragment of Personality that is associated with those qualities these fragments of Personality which often detach from conscious awareness and are called aspects of the Shadow are really more like mini personalities and each of these many personalities is 100% you because they are fragments of your personality and when these many personalities detach from your conscious awareness and are placed in the dark closet of The Shadow they become separate and autonomous from your conscious personality which is the ego and the part of yourself that is in the light of Consciousness that you refer to as I in the same way that our conscious personality or ego has its own perspectives needs and agendas each of our aspects of the Shadow also has its own perspectives needs and agendas and the agendas of Any Given aspect of the Shadow may or may not come into conflict with the agendas of our conscious personality when the agenda of your conscious personality clashes with the agenda of one or more of your aspects of the Shadow this can cause quite a bit of internal agitation and a feeling of resistance or struggle with yourself you can notice your aspects of the Shadow and their agendas in action when you engage in procrastination and self-sabotaging behavior that prevents you from making positive changes in your life let's discuss an example of how shadow-based self-sabotage can manifest in someone's life and hinder their plans suppose a man strongly identifies with being solitary his goal is to run a successful online business and live in the countryside because that lifestyle minimizes interaction and dependence on other people which he consciously believes is ultimately what he wants despite the practicability of self-sufficiency he repeatedly undermines the progress he achieves for instance he has offered the opportunity to buy land in the countryside at a friendly price but he rejects it for a flimsy reason or he attracts a considerable number of followers on his lifestyle blog that has much earning potential yet he decides to stop posting without being able to explain his decision with solid arguments from the perspective of the ego the way he consciously perceives himself and determines what he wants and needs his choices make no sense after all he strongly identifies as the solitary Batman and has dreamed for years of being self-sufficient independent and away from the herd but as soon as his dreams become reality he throws a wrench in the path he can't explain why it's as if something or someone is sabotaging him as if an unwanted guest is lurking in the shadows of his soul supervised out of his conscious awareness and as this person quickly takes control without cons