Self-Betrayal and how it shows up
/Self-betrayal is a very uncommon term for a very common behavior, especially among women. From early in life, little girls are taught to care for baby dolls, plan their future weddings and expect a prince to rescue them. This starts a subconscious program of expectations that leads to self-sacrifice.
1) What society expects of me
often clashes with…
2) What I actually want for myself
The conflict begins in the 20s to 30s age range, when women start making bigger moves in the world. It could begin as early as college and deciding what career to pursue but most often, the conflict becomes apparent near marrying age (late 20s to early 30s).
This is when the energy of self-sacrifice starts to influence decision-making but it isn’t necessarily recognized or acted upon. It’s a major fork in the road.
1) Pursue both career and family simultaneously
2) Stay at home to be a mom / care for family
3) Pursue career exclusively
Self-sacrifice is a choice that is made to put other people before yourself because it is expected of you or because you desire to. The desire to could be authentic or based on wounding. Wounding typically arises from:
You have poor boundaries and you don’t know how to say no
You feel you “should” for some reason usually related to the fact that it’s expected of you
You were taught / believe it’s the ‘right’ thing to do (see #2)
What is self betrayal?
Self betrayal is so innate in most people, you won’t even realize you’re doing it. It’s based in a foundation of self-sacrifice, “the giving up of one's own interests or wishes in order to help others or advance a cause.”
People who self-betray have one thing in common: Fear of rejection.
This behavior is learned early on in life when you find that others are uncomfortable with something you are saying or doing. So, you adjust your behavior in order to make the other person more comfortable but simultaneously, your mind makes a choice about what is and isn’t appropriate. In childhood, we’re too young to be able to discern between “that’s their story” and “this is my story” so we take it all in as our personal truth.
Every time you were told “Be nice”, you could now be telling yourself “Be nice and don’t say anything”… suppressing how you feel and bottling up your emotions.
Or when your parent made you give a hug to someone when you didn’t want to, you could struggle to know how to say the word NO causing you to take on too much in your life, or you simply have poor boundaries with people.
When you had to apologize for something you didn’t do, you could be overcompensating or worrying excessively if you did something wrong.
Or explain yourself when it wasn’t necessary, you could struggle to share your ideas or over explain yourself when it isn’t necessary.
Getting complimented on your looks rather than your ideas, could cause you to seek external validation rather than internal achievement based on who you are and what you value.
Having your feelings ignored may cause emotional disconnect where you don’t understand what you need or want and depend on others to choose for you or you accept excessive advice from others (that’s usually wrong).
Told to “stop crying” may cause you to suppress your emotions causing a disruption in your relationships and making it difficult to connect.
Achieving something and not receiving any positive reinforcement could cause you to resent the work you do.
The list isn’t as important as what each of these moments in time represents and that is…
SACRIFICE.
Sacrifice is the energy the builds the foundation of self-betrayal. It’s inauthentic and it is riddled with expectation. You get a ‘hit’ every time you sacrifice a part of yourself for someone else, while expecting them to praise you for it.
Just like the Queen that enabled her people to depend on her, her queendom went broke.
Is your kingdom or queendom broke? Here’s how to tell:
You’re exhausted all the time and can’t find the energy to do things for yourself
Your time is not your own, you’re too busy caring for others
You work all the time but struggle to make ends meet
People cross your boundaries all the time but you don’t know how to fix this issue
You don’t know what you want in life nor do you have the motivation to pursue it
You still haven’t found your ‘life purpose’ (which isn’t just one thing by the way)
You’re mostly unhappy with bouts of happiness sprinkled in occasionally
Someone in your family or friend circle continuously triggers or disrespects you
You struggle communicating your needs and wants because you don’t know what they are. You just know you want to be happier.
You can’t remember the last time you met one of your goals
Self care, what’s that?
