A Mindful Perspective
Welcome to my podcast! I'm Nick Levesque, and I'm on a mission to help you navigate life's challenges with a mindful perspective. Join me every week as I dive deep into the realms of mindset, spirituality, and personal growth. Drawing from my own experiences, I want to provide you with tools, strategies, insights, and inspiring stories that will help you go from where you are now, to where you want to be.
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A Mindful Perspective
How to Get Out of Your Own Way in 2025
In this week’s episode, we’re tackling the invisible barriers that hold us back from achieving our goals and living the life we truly want. I’ll explore the concept of self-sabotage and the subconscious limits we place on our success and happiness. Together, we’ll uncover practical strategies to identify and overcome these patterns, reframe limiting beliefs, and step out of your comfort zone with confidence. If you’re ready to break free from self-doubt and make 2025 the year you thrive, this episode is for you.
Hello everyone and welcome to A Mindful Perspective. I'm your host, nick Levesque, certified Spiritual Life Coach, and I'm here to share insights into my journey of mindfulness and self-discovery. Each week, we'll explore mindset, spirituality and personal growth to help you navigate life's challenges, with practical strategies and inspiring stories. Let's dive in. What if the biggest obstacle to achieving our goals and finding more peace and happiness in our lives isn't necessarily only tied to external circumstances, but what if it's ourselves? Okay, what if we are the ones getting in our own way?
Speaker 1:Now, this is something personally I've noticed in my own self-development journey where I was getting in my own way a lot. I was self-sabotaging a lot, unconsciously. Right, for a lot of us, we just self-sabotage unconsciously. We're not necessarily doing this on purpose, but we are doing this nonetheless, and often it's not someone else or something else that's keeping us from living the life that we want. It is our own fears, our own doubts, our own patterns, our own behaviors, our own beliefs about ourselves and our own beliefs about the world. Now, this is really what I want to dive into in today's episode and talk about this so that we can step into 2025 and truly go after what it is that we really want to be achieving, okay, and stop getting in our own way.
Speaker 1:Now, one thing that I want to bring up right away is a book called the Big Leap by Gay Hendricks. Okay, now, this is such a phenomenal book on overcoming your fears, self-sabotage, understanding and explaining more on a psychological manner why it is that we get in our own way. Okay, and one of the terms that Gay Hendricks coins in this book is called the upper limit problem. Okay, and the upper limit problem is basically these unconscious limits that we place on ourselves. Right, it's these unconscious limits that we place on our happiness, our success, our wealth, our love, our growth, all these different things. Right, they all kind of fall into the same category, but it's basically a glass ceiling, okay, and this is how he explains it, and I think it's so. It's so beautifully explained. Basically, it's a glass ceiling, all right.
Speaker 1:So let's say you're here, there's this glass ceiling, right, and we cannot break through this glass ceiling because it's stopping us, right, so it's a glass ceiling because we can see on the other side that there's potentially a lot of great possibilities. Right, there's greater possibility, possibilities when we break through that glass, but we struggle because of all the ingrained beliefs that we have, right, all of the beliefs that, you know, stem from our childhood experiences. All these different things, right, our fears, our doubts, all these different things. They come to play. And this is why we cannot break through this glass ceiling. Right, but again, it's a glass ceiling because we can see the potential on the other side. We can see the potential on the other side. We can see it, but we just can't break through it. Right?
Speaker 1:And that's where the question becomes what if we can stop getting in our own way and truly get through that glass ceiling? And because of this glass ceiling and because of all these internalized beliefs that we have, sometimes, even when life gets too good and we start going up, up, up, we're going to unconsciously do something. Right, not necessarily on purpose, but to bring us back down to our comfort zone. Right, because we're not used to going so high and flying so high. Right, for a lot of different reasons, you know, maybe we're afraid of it, maybe we're afraid of that success, maybe we're afraid of failure, maybe we're afraid of rejection, all these different things. Okay, but just to give you an example, maybe you're working on something and you know you're, you're, you're, you're potentially on the brink of success with whatever it is that you're doing, okay. And now, all of a sudden, right, because you're so close to doing that thing and so close to achieving your goal, you start feeling unworthy. You start feeling extremely anxious, right. So then you start procrastinating or you're making excuses to not do that thing.
Speaker 1:Okay, so let's say you are writing a book, the book is going extremely well, and then you're on the final chapter of your book and you're like, okay, I'm on the verge of publishing this. This is great, I'm so excited. But then, oh, all of a sudden, right, kind of imposter syndrome comes up. A lot of different things comes up. You start getting anxious, and then all these beliefs and fears and all these things start to stem up, right. So you're like, oh, who am I to even write this book? Right? Or you know, what if this fails? What if this doesn't do? Well, okay, I'm on the last chapter. What if I publish this? And then you know, no one likes it and no one wants to read it. And then your mind goes crazy, right?
Speaker 1:So what can happen then this is what I mean right is, unconsciously, we'll do something that will self-sabotage whatever it is that we're doing. So maybe, instead of writing that book, you're going to procrastinate, right? You're going to find every excuse in the book to not work on it right now because you're going to push it off, right, and you're pushing off, basically, also that pain. You're pushing off that pain of what if this fails, right, that rejection, all these different things, okay, which is why, essentially, you're procrastinating, okay, but this is what I mean Now. This is self-sabotaging, because you could be writing this book, publishing it and making good money off it, helping a lot of people, all these different things, but now, because of your beliefs and because of your fears, you're self-sabotaging, you're not doing it, you're procrastinating. So this is just one example that it can show up.
Speaker 1:Another one could be as an example in terms of relationships, when we're pushing people away. So what I mean by that is, unconsciously, when a relationship starts to become too close or potentially too good, something that you're not used to. Again, this is unfamiliar to you and you need to be back at the baseline, like we talked about, of what you're used to. So maybe you'll unconsciously start creating conflict or withdrawing emotionally from that person, right? Because, again, you're starting to get too close and out of the fear of being too vulnerable and opening up and hurting yourself or maybe getting rejected by that person. Again, we self sabotage, right? We self sabotage your relationship because, again, I don't want to get hurt.
Speaker 1:Basically is what this is encompassing and what it's trying to say, right? So do you see what I mean? This is what I'm trying to say when I say self-sabotage gets in our way in so many different ways, and this is what I'm saying. When we get in our own way, sure, sometimes life happens, there are circumstances that are out of our control, that there's nothing we can do, right? Obviously, that happens. Most times we get in our own way, and a perspective that I also want to share as well, that I've noticed personally in my own life, is, sometimes, when we get in our own way, it's typically when it's something that means so much to us. It's something that means so much to us, and what I mean by this.
Speaker 1:Let's say, again, you are working on this book, right? I'll just stick with the book example here. You're writing a book, okay. Obviously, you're pouring your heart and your soul into that book, okay, so that book obviously means a lot to you. You want to. You know, obviously, if you're, if you're being honest with yourself, you do want the book to do well, you want to, you know, make money off the book, but you also, again, you want to stay true to your mission and help people with your book, right, whatever it is. Maybe it's helping people financially, whatever the book is about out, it doesn't matter. But, again, this is what I'm trying to say, right.
Speaker 1:But again, because it's so personal, okay, a part of us can feel like if our work gets rejected, then we get rejected, right. So if that's not good enough, then it's a reflection of us saying, hey, we're not good enough, right. But again, sometimes I think that if you find yourself constantly procrastinating on something or constantly self-sabotaging on a specific topic, right, maybe it's the book. Maybe self-sabotaging on a specific topic, right, maybe it's the book, maybe it's whatever, maybe it's also because it just means a lot to you and maybe it's something that just matters deeply to you personally, right.
Speaker 1:And I've noticed this is what I'm trying to say, right, personally, in my life, this is what I've noticed when I started, when I was about to start coaching, when I was, you know, no-transcript enough, and I, you know it was, you know, shame at the end of it, right At the bottom of it, it was fear, but also shame, right, because, again, if that wasn't good enough, then that was kind of a reflection on me of I'm not good enough right Now, of course, working. You know, this is something that I got, I became aware of because, like I've shared many other of my episodes, that I'm not good enough is something that really kind of prevailed with me for a lot of, a lot of my life, right, but again, this is what I'm trying to say we get in our own ways for a lot of different reasons, right, and again, these self sabotaging behaviors can be so perfectionism, procrastination, overthinking, avoidance, right, turning to drugs and alcohol because we're avoiding something, could be, you know, numbing something emotionally. There's a variety of different ways that this can show up in our lives. A lot of it can be, again, limiting beliefs, I'm not good enough, I'm too old, okay, and for a lot of us as well, it could be fear. Obviously, fear is very, you know, fear is a big thing underlying a lot of these issues.
Speaker 1:If I'm being completely honest, if you peel back the layers of, again, procrastination, perfectionism and all these different things, a lot of it it's rooted in fear, right, and that could be fear of failure. It could be fear of success, right, actually fearing success, because if we get so successful, we don't really know what we're going to do. How are we going to manage that? How can we, you know, manage all this new success, wealth or fame? Okay, and sometimes it could even be uh, as Gay Hendricks talks about in the book, the fear of outshining others. Right, it could be siblings. This is an example. If you're too good, then you're, you know, you're kind of putting your siblings away as an example, right? So you're outshining your siblings and maybe as an example. In your childhood you were trying to do well and when you were doing well, your parents would say like, oh, you know, no, no, you, you know, you got to tone down a bit, right, because you're making that other person jealous, right? So because of that, of course, there's fear of shining other people, not necessarily only siblings, but to truly go out and be your authentic self, right. So there's many good examples from the book. Again here, gay Hendricks, the Big Leap, highly recommend that you read that.
Speaker 1:But these are different ways that we just get in our own way and self-sabotage. Right. Now I want to talk about. How do we get through this right? How do we work through this self-sabotage? The first tip that I want to share to help you get out of your own way is you need to build awareness, right, you need to understand what it is that you're doing, because you cannot change what you're not aware of. And that's the thing with self-sabotage and getting in our own ways. A lot of times, this is unconscious, right, we're not doing this on purpose, but nonetheless we are doing it right. So I think the best way to do this is just to start tracking things, start becoming aware of what it is that we're doing right. The thought patterns that we're thinking constantly, the behaviors, the patterns. Are we seeing any patterns? Right?
Speaker 1:And just to give you a personal, quick example here, when I started the podcast, or when I first, you know, started looking into how to do the podcast, there was many variables, right, how do I even start? Where do I host this thing? Right, like, what microphone do I need? I had so many questions and then I started Googling. I was, you know, I was getting into it and then, all of a sudden, everything started coming up. Right, who am I to be starting a podcast. What do I have to share with the world? I'm not good enough to do this. You know, why am I even doing this, right? And then all these different fears. And then, obviously, what I did?
Speaker 1:Not only did I have these thoughts and these limiting beliefs about myself, but then I grabbed my phone, started scrolling, scrolling, procrastinating, left the room, just, you know, I didn't do anything. I was like, oh, wait up, wait a second. I caught myself, right, and that's the thing you need to catch yourself. But then I grabbed a journal and then you start writing things down. Right, what was I just thinking there? I'm not good enough. You know, I'm not worthy of this. Who am I to be starting this podcast, right? Who am I to be sharing this information? Who am I to?
Speaker 1:Whatever imposter syndrome for a lot of people is is very real, right, I've. I know, I've suffered from it for a long time personally, right, and I still do sometimes. And but I'm working through that, right? But again, this is what I'm saying. Right, I started noting things down. Okay, what was I thinking? What was I doing? Right, what did I turn to right? What was it that I turned to? I turned to my phone, right. Then I left the room, I turned to my phone, I started procrastinating, like I said, right, and yes, doom, scrolling and grabbing your phone all the time can definitely be a way that you self-sabotage, right? So this is just a quick example on how you can start noticing these patterns, right? But I think, again, we need to write these things down. We need to write these things down because then we can start seeing. Need to write these things down because then we can start seeing.
Speaker 1:Okay, maybe you know, if you try this for a few weeks as an example, right, then you go back to your notes and you say, okay, I'm not good enough, comes up a lot for me, right, why, what is this? Right? And then something else comes up a lot. Hmm, I'm procrastinating. I've been procrastinating a lot lately. Yeah, yeah, I'm pushing this away. I've been pushing these things away. These tasks are not doing them. Why? Why is that? What is causing me to not do these tasks? Right? And this is what I'm saying. This is where you can start really diving into these things.
Speaker 1:Now, of course, as I always say in every episode, right, these things sometimes can be very hard to dive into, right, it takes a lot of work, so you can obviously work with a coach or a therapist or someone that can really help you kind of make sense of all that's coming up for you, right? Because, again, depending on your childhood experiences and such, these things can demand that you go back into your past and see where these things are coming from. Right? So, example, like you know, because this is a thing, right, when you start understanding these patterns and these beliefs about yourself, then it's time to really reflect, right, like what past experiences might have shaped my self-worth? As an example, right, that's a good question that you can sit down with and ask yourself. Right, are there limiting beliefs I developed in childhood? Or from societal expectation is another one, right? So, again, these are just very quick questions to reflect on. There's a million you can find online, but it's about challenging the narrative. Right, it's about challenging those limiting beliefs that you have about yourself and the patterns that you have. Right?
Speaker 1:But typically you turn to a pattern because of something that you're thinking, because of of something that you're you're not processing properly, right? So, as an example, you're not good enough, you're not ready to do that, so no, I can't do this, I'm not good enough. And then you start, you know, shame, right, that that feeling of shame comes over and then you're like, no, I can't do this, right. Then you grab your phone, or for some people they'll grab the alcohol or whatever else. It may be Right. There are so many different ways that we can kind of cope with this and self-sabotage, but this is what I mean.
Speaker 1:Typically, we turn, we turn to a pattern because of something we're feeling right, something we're thinking, something we're feeling that we haven't sat with, that we haven't processed right. So this is what I'm saying Sometimes this process is better done with a coach or a therapist, depending on you know what it is that you are working on right. And the other thing is obviously we, you know, when we start to understand this, we need to start challenging those beliefs that we have about ourselves. Like for me personally again, personal story here the feeling that I'm not good enough is something that stayed with me for a long time and still sometimes I feel that I'm not good enough, right, but I know that's not true, right, I know genuinely that's not true. I now know where that comes from. All these different things, right, I understand the story, right, and I understand that that story isn't actually true. It's not grounded, in fact.
Speaker 1:But in order to do that, in order to be able to say and reframe and say things like okay, like I'm not good enough, I'm going to turn that into being able to say I'm capable and deserving of success as an example, right. In order to do that, I needed to understand where these limiting beliefs come from right, and this is why, for me, sometimes I'm not going to speak for everyone here, but from my own experience, things like affirmations right, affirmations are beautiful. There's nothing wrong with affirmations. I think that can be a very big part of your work. What I noticed specifically for myself when I started using affirmations right and talking like you know, using affirmations example like I talked about right, switching that from I'm not good enough to I'm capable of you know success and I'm deserving of love, and whatever the affirmations were that I was kind of reciting at the time. Initially it didn't feel right, it didn't sit with me. I had so much resistance when I was saying these things because I actually didn't believe what I was saying right. So this is what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Sometimes affirmations are great, but sometimes I feel like it's not just about trying to brainwash yourself into thinking like, oh, I'm capable of love and such you are. I'm not saying you're not, obviously you are. I think everyone is right, Everyone is good enough, everyone is capable of love and worthy and deserving of love. Right, I'm a firm believer in that. But if you're trying these affirmations and they're not working for you, then you need to understand the story. You need to understand why, first and foremost, why there's resistance, where that resistance is coming from, and then dive deeper into that limiting belief. Right, because that limiting belief is keeping you from truly receiving that affirmation.
Speaker 1:But once you have an understanding like, hey, I'm not good enough here, right, what I'm feeling here, that something that happened in my past, right, maybe you know that is a belief that I got from. You know my parents, you know caretakers, teachers, all these different things. But that's not true, right, that is not a true story, it's not grounded in fact. And now that you understand this, then you can truly start receiving that affirmation correctly, right and truly. You know, utilizing the power of that affirmation. In my personal opinion, that's how I really went through that, right? So this is really what I want to share in tip number one, and you know, I apologize if it's a bit of information, but it's really something that truly helped him, right. So, again, you want to build that awareness and you want to keep track of what are the patterns, what it is that you're seeing, right, and obviously, once you start getting a better understanding of this, then you can start working through it. Right, but, again, you cannot change what you're not aware of. So you have to build that awareness.
Speaker 1:The second tip that I want to share is what is your mission? What is your why? Okay, it's important that we remember our why, in whatever aspect it is that we're doing. Okay, maybe we're starting a fitness regimen or fitness routine. Maybe, you know, again, we're writing that book and I'm going to stick with that example of the book, because we talked about the book earlier as well. Okay, so, as we're writing this book, right.
Speaker 1:So let's say, as an example, we're writing this book, we're at the final chapter and then we start getting all these crazy thoughts, right, like, oh, my goodness, who am I to be writing a book? Imposter syndrome is coming through. The fear of rejection, all the shame that's coming through, right? I think it's so important to take a step back. Yes, it's important to understand where this all comes from and also the unconscious beliefs that you have about yourself the glass ceiling that we were talking about earlier. But also, I think you need to really understand your why and you need to be very clear on why it is that you're doing what you're doing.
Speaker 1:Okay, so with me for the podcast, for example, I want to reach more people Right. I want to help people just better themselves Right Through self-development, through healing, and I want to help people go from where they are right now to where they want to be Right. And again, this is a personal goal of mine, that's a personal mission of mine, right, and it's to really help people go through things that I've personally gone through myself and I've been able to work through right, whether that is myself, whether that's with clients as an example, right, and this is also the same reason I do my coaching Right. I just, I love helping people Right. That is really my mission to really help people get from where they are now to where they want to be so they can live and lead a better quality of life right.
Speaker 1:And that to me sometimes is like when I start thinking about, okay, what am I doing? Right, like, what am I doing. I've got all these fears and beliefs right. Sometimes I take a step back because I have a reasoning, I have an understanding of where these beliefs come from. But, again, I'm not perfect. I'm very human and, of course, these beliefs and fears always come back right. But one thing that truly helps me when they do come back, sometimes like, okay, what am I doing? Right? What is my mission here? Right, and I just talked about my mission. But that is my why, okay. And I think sometimes, when you put yourself out of the equation and you realize that you're doing this to be of service and to help other people, then I think it becomes greater than yourself, right? And I think this is why it's so important to remember your why, be clear on what it is that you're doing and why you're doing so.
Speaker 1:If you're writing that book and you're at your last chapter and you're scared and you don't know what to do and you're like I can't do this, I can't publish it, et cetera, right, take a few deep breaths, take a step back and remember why it is that you're doing this. Yes, there is a possibility that it won't do as well as you think. Yes, there is a possibility that some people might not be, you know, resonating with it or, you know, may not like it as much. But what if it does so? Well, right, like what if you publish your book and you're helping a thousand people? Right, that's, that's amazing. That's still great, right?
Speaker 1:So this is what I'm trying to say you have to think about the bigger picture, right, and put yourself out of the equation and really, truly take a step back and remember why is it you're doing this? Right? Maybe for yourself. You are writing your finance book because you understand what it was like to maybe be broke at some point and you want to help people achieve financial freedom, right? Once you start taking yourself a bit out of the equation here, okay, and really being of service to others, I truly believe that that, in and of itself, is a crucial component of how to get out of your own way, because you need to get out of your own way to be of service and to help other people, right? So that's the second thing that I wanted to share is, again, what is your mission? And to remember your why. The third thing that I want to share is that you need to take ownership of your life. You need to take accountability for yourself, okay? Because here's the thing We've all heard this before, but no one is coming to save us, right?
Speaker 1:Literally no one is coming to save us. So, all these fears that we have, all these doubts that we have, all these different limiting beliefs that we have, it's on us to work through them, right? It's on us to seek help. It's on us to get the help that we need to get through those so that we can again lead that quality of life that we want, so that we can start working on things, so that we can start getting out of our own way.
Speaker 1:Right, as I always say, what happened in our childhood, for example, okay, definitely wasn't our fault, right? So, obviously, for a lot of us, some of these things can be stemming from our childhood, right? These limiting beliefs that I'm not good enough. It could be things from our childhood, right? But again, at a certain point in our lives, I truly think it is our responsibility to heal. It is our responsibility to take ownership and say, okay, listen, I had no control over my childhood, I had no control over what happened, but now it is my responsibility to do something about it. Okay, Whatever that's starting to read books, go to therapy, coaching, whatever it may be, right. So we need to take accountability for that, so that we can stop getting in our own way, right. So that's really what I want to share here we need to take accountability, take responsibility for our lives so that again, we can live that better quality of life.
Speaker 1:And the last thing I wanted to share is that you need to take imperfect action. Okay, I think this is so important because I think, for a lot of us, we hold ourselves back because we're waiting for that perfect time. Right, that perfect Monday or that perfect whatever, it doesn't matter, but we're waiting for that perfect time. Okay, you don't need to have the stars aligned to be starting something. Okay, I think it's an important thing to do the inner work, have an understanding of why you're unconsciously self-sabotaging, you're limiting beliefs, all these different things, right.
Speaker 1:But I think, in my personal opinion, a really good way to break through that glass ceiling, like we were talking about earlier, is to just start. Right, it's to do the thing. It's not going to be perfect. Nothing you ever start is going to be perfect. Your first book that you publish is not going to be perfect. The first YouTube video is never going to be perfect, right, nothing is ever perfect when you first start. But as long as you start, that's how you're going to build the confidence and you're going to get clear on, okay, what it is that you're doing and how you want to do things going forward right.
Speaker 1:But again, I think truly this is a way that you also overcome these limiting beliefs and break through that glass ceiling is by proving to yourself that you can, right. So please stop waiting for the perfect time, because that's another example of getting in your own way right. So, again, tip number four is simply to take imperfect action right and embrace that discomfort. So, that being said, that's all I've got for you guys on today's episode. If you did like the episode, please feel free to leave a comment or review, share it. It really helps bring awareness to what I'm trying to do, which is really kind of, you know, spread this podcast on a broader scale to really help people just navigate everyday life challenges. So, again, with that being said, I hope you have a good week and I will catch you guys next week, next week.
