Stop Doing That Sh*t: End Self-Sabotage and Demand Your Life Back

by Gary John Bishop

Right now, think of something in your life that you barely, if ever, give thought to, something so mundane and benign it just fades into the background of your thoughts. It could be anything—the color of your car, your middle name, the light bulb above your head, the size of your feet. Any item that, when you give it some thought, has no impact on you one way or the other. You experience neither joy nor frustration nor sadness nor passion nor any emotional state connected to it. You literally experience nothing with regard to that item. Do you know why that item has zero impact on you? Because you genuinely accept that item the way it is. You have no urge for it to be better or different or for it to change in any way. You’re not “past it” or “getting over it,” and you have no need to cut it from your life or barely even think, let alone talk, about it. And so, it sits there. Accepted. Undisturbed. It has no bearing on you because you accept it for what it is. That item is itself, and while it’s part of your life, it has no influence on you. There is no emotional tug at you. That’s what true acceptance is for a human being. When you can let something be itself without any charge or reaction around that thing. When it has no influence, and I mean NONE, good or bad. Nothing either way. You can’t ignore the darker parts of your unconscious. You can’t repress them. Because they don’t go anywhere. And oftentimes they just keep getting worse and emboldened by your attempts at ha...