How IFS Therapy Can Help You Stop Self-Sabotaging
The Pattern You Can't Break
You're about to land your dream job… and you stop returning the recruiter's calls.
You're finally losing weight and feeling great… then you binge eat for three nights straight and quit the gym.
You meet someone amazing who actually wants a relationship… so you pick fights until they leave.
You're on track to finish your degree… but you miss deadlines, skip classes, and watch yourself fail.
You know you're doing it. You hate that you're doing it. But you can't seem to stop.
This is self-sabotage, and it's one of the most frustrating, shame-inducing patterns humans experience. You watch yourself destroy the very things you want most, and you can't understand why.
Here's what most people get wrong about self-sabotage: It's not laziness, weakness, or a character flaw. It's not that you "don't really want it" or "aren't ready for success."
Self-sabotage is actually a form of self-protection.
What You'll Learn in This Article
Why you self-sabotage (and why it's actually protective, not destructive)
The IFS framework for understanding self-sabotaging behaviours
Which parts drive self-sabotage and what they're actually afraid of
How IFS therapy works to heal self-sabotage at its root
Practical IFS tools you can use to interrupt sabotaging patterns
Real examples of what self-sabotage looks like in IFS terms
When to seek professional help for persistent self-sabotage
If you've been beating yourself up for sabotaging your own success, this article will change how you see yourself. Because once you understand the protective logic behind self-sabotage, everything shifts.
What Is Self-Sabotage? (And Why Do We Do It?)
Self-sabotage is when you engage in behaviours that undermine your own goals, values, or well-being. These behaviours (frustratingly) appear often right when you're on the verge of success or positive change.
Do you recognise yourself in any of these common self-sabotaging behaviours?
In relationships:
Pushing people away when they get close
Picking fights over small things
Cheating when you're in a good relationship
Choosing unavailable partners repeatedly
Sabotaging relationships before they can fail on their own
In career/education:
Procrastinating on important projects
Missing deadlines or opportunities
Not showing up to interviews
Failing to complete degrees or certifications
In health/wellness:
Starting diets and later binging
Getting fit then stopping completely
Sabotaging medical treatment plans
Ignoring health issues until they become crises
In personal growth:
Starting therapy and then ghosting your therapist
Beginning self-improvement routines and stopping after one or two weeks
Setting goals and doing the opposite
Knowing what helps but refusing to do it
In finances:
Overspending right after getting financially stable
Sabotaging job opportunities that would improve finances
Making impulsive large purchases
Ignoring bills or financial planning
Traditional approaches to overcoming self-sabotage treat it as a problem to overcome through:
Willpower ("Just stop doing it!")
Accountability ("Get someone to hold you responsible!")
Consequences ("Feel the pain until you stop!")
Positive thinking ("Visualise success!")
Habit change ("Replace bad habits with good ones!")
These approaches occasionally work for surface behaviours, but they don't necessarily address why you self-sabotage. And when the underlying drivers remain unaddressed, self-sabotage returns (and often stronger than before).
The IFS Understanding: Self-Sabotage Is Protection
Internal Family Systems offers a radically different perspective:
Self-sabotage isn't you being weak or self-destructive. It's protective parts of you desperately trying to keep you safe from something they perceive as dangerous.
Think about it: Why would you sabotage something you genuinely want? The answer is simple: Because a part of you is more afraid of what success would bring than of staying stuck.
What could possibly be scary about success?
The visibility and scrutiny that comes with it
The expectations and pressure to maintain it
The fear of eventual failure ("better to fail now on my terms than later publicly")
The identity shift required ("I don't know who I am as a successful person")
The relationships that might change or end
The responsibility that comes with achieving goals
The pain of outgrowing your family or origin community
When you understand self-sabotage as protection, everything changes. You stop fighting yourself and start getting curious about what you're protecting.
Why Self-Sabotage Happens: The IFS Explanation
Now let's get specific about how self-sabotage works from an IFS perspective. Here's what's actually happening inside when you self-sabotage:
Step 1: You Approach Success or Change
You're about to:
Get the promotion
Commit to the relationship
Complete the degree
Achieve the goal
Experience the change
Step 2: An Exile (Young, Wounded Part) Gets Activated (Triggered)
Success or positive change activates a young, wounded part carrying beliefs like:
"I don't deserve good things"
"If I succeed, I'll be abandoned/rejected/alone"
"Success means I'll be exposed as a fraud"
"If I have this, it will be taken away… so better not to have it at all"
"I'm only lovable when I'm struggling… success means I'll lose support"
"If I succeed, I'm betraying my family/origin story"
These beliefs were formed during childhood experiences - real moments when real or approaching success DID lead to pain, or when you learned that being "less than" kept you safe or connected.
Step 3: The Pain Feels Unbearable
The exile's terror, shame, or grief threatens to surface. This feels overwhelming, destabilising, intolerable.
Step 4: A Part Activates to Extinguish the Pain
A protective part swoops in with an urgent strategy: "Destroy the opportunity before the exile's pain destroys you."
This is self-sabotage. It's a part desperately trying to help by:
Removing the triggering situation (no success = no exile activation)
Giving you something familiar to feel instead (failure feels safer than success)
Protecting you from the vulnerability that comes with achievement
Preventing anticipated pain ("can't be rejected if I reject myself first")
Step 5: You Sabotage
You miss the deadline, push the person away, relapse, quit, ghost, or implode the opportunity.
Step 6: You Feel Relief... Then Shame
Immediate relief: The exile's pain is no longer triggered. The protecting part succeeded.
Then shame: Other parts of you that wanted the success then step in to judge and criticise harshly. These critical parts themselves are likely protecting younger parts that felt the pain of failure. Other parts are confused and frustrated that you keep doing this. Other parts are likely to make internal promises that you will never do this again. But then….
Step 7: The Cycle Repeats
Next opportunity arises → exile gets triggered → protectors sabotages → temporary relief → shame → repeat.
This protective - shame cycle is why willpower doesn't necessarily stop self-sabotage.
You're not fighting laziness; you're fighting a protective system that genuinely believes self-sabotage is keeping you alive.
How IFS Therapy Heals Self-Sabotage
Now that you understand the protective logic of self-sabotage, let's explore how IFS actually changes these patterns.
Traditional therapy often tries to:
Stop the sabotaging behaviour through consequences or accountability
Replace self-sabotage with "healthier coping skills"
Build self-esteem so you "feel worthy of success"
Expose you to success gradually to desensitise the fear
These approaches do have merit and evidential support from psychological studies. And they also don’ always work for everyone.
IFS takes a different approach: Instead of fighting the sabotaging parts, we befriend them. Instead of forcing change, we understand the fear. Instead of overcoming resistance, we listen to what the resistance is protecting.
To illustrate how IFS is different, let’s look at an example.
An Example of Working with IFS for Relationship Self-Sabotage
The Pattern: James always dates people who are emotionally unavailable. When someone emotionally healthy shows interest, he:
Finds reasons they're "not right"
Gets "too busy" to see them
Becomes cold and distant
Picks fights until they leave Then he wonders why he can't find a good relationship.
From an IFS perspective the sabotaging part is protecting James by pushing away emotionally available partners.In working with James in therapy, it becomes clear that this part is protecting a young exile (around age 5). The experience of this young exile was that James's mother was unpredictable. She was sometimes loving, sometimes rageful and abandoned him for days. He never knew which mother he'd get. The pain of hoping she'd be loving and then being rejected was unbearable.
This painful experience led to the belief: "If I hope for love and then lose it, I'll be destroyed. Never hope. Never get close. Disappointment is worse than loneliness."
When we understand the pain that is held, we can also understand the logic of the part that avoids relationships. If the protector could speak it would say: "I'll keep you safe by ensuring you never get close enough to be devastated by loss. Unavailable partners are safe because you can't lose what you never fully had. Available partners are terrifying. They could actually matter, and then leave."
In IFS, we first work to understand and bring compassion to the protective self-sabotaging parts. Over time, and with the cooperation of these protective parts, we help relieve the young parts (the exiles) of the original pain and beliefs they took on. This creates inner change, including greater calm and courage to be present with available partners.
When to Seek Professional IFS Therapy for Self-Sabotage
Self-sabotage responds well to IFS therapy, and professional support is important. Consider IFS therapy if:
Your self-sabotage is significantly impacting your life:
You've lost multiple jobs or opportunities
Relationships consistently fail due to your sabotaging behaviors
Your health is suffering
You're unable to complete important goals (degrees, projects, etc.)
The consequences are escalating
You can't identify or access the underlying parts:
You've tried self-exploration of parts but don't understand what you're protecting
You can't identify any exiles or childhood wounds
The sabotaging parts won't respond to your curiosity
You feel blocked or stuck
Trauma is involved:
Self-sabotage patterns started after trauma
You recognize childhood experiences that might be driving it
You have C-PTSD or significant trauma history
The exile parts carry overwhelming pain
You're overwhelmed by the work:
Exploring the sabotage triggers intense emotions
You feel flooded when you try to understand it
You don't feel safe working with it alone
You need co-regulation and support
TLDR: Self-Sabotage Is Protection, Not Pathology
If you've been beating yourself up for self-sabotaging, here's what I want you to take away:
Self-sabotage isn't a character flaw. It's a protective strategy developed by parts of you that are trying desperately to keep you safe from pain they believe you can't survive.
Those parts aren't your enemies. They're trying to help by using the only strategies they learned when you were young and vulnerable.
Every self-sabotaging behaviour is protecting something. When you discover what exile lies beneath (what pain, what belief, what fear) the sabotage makes perfect sense.
Healing Is Possible
IFS offers a path to heal self-sabotage at its root by:
Understanding the protective intention
Befriending the sabotaging parts
Healing the wounded exiles underneath
Allowing protectors to relax naturally
Developing Self-leadership
You don't have to fight yourself anymore. You can understand yourself, and that changes everything.
Your Next Step
If self-sabotage is impacting your life, consider:
Start with awareness: Next time you sabotage, pause and ask: "What part is doing this? What is it protecting me from?"
Journal with the part: Write a dialogue between you (Self) and the sabotaging part. Ask about its fears.
Seek professional support: If self-sabotage is significantly impacting your life, trauma is involved, or you feel stuck, book a free 20 minute connection call with me to explore if I am the right therapist for you.
Be patient and compassionate: These patterns developed over years or decades. Healing takes time. Your parts are doing their best.
You deserve to stop fighting yourself and start understanding yourself.
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