The 6 Satisfaction Blockers
Fear
Fear is the number one satisfaction blocker because it is the most crippling, debilitating, and it often overrides willpower and all good intentions to make something happen. Addressing this blocker tends to create the most rapid results.
See if you have the Fear blocker at play by answering “yes” to any of these questions:
Do you have feelings of anxiety or dread when you get out of bed in the morning regularly?
Are you afraid to fail? Do you start a lot of things, to never complete them?
Do you spend a lot of time learning and growing to never feel “good enough” to deserve your dreams?
Do you avoid activities and escape into food, TV or video game binges, regularly? (does your body have mechanisms at play to keep you “safe”?)
Are you afraid of people really seeing you and judging you?
Are you hard on yourself or others?
Do you struggle to make and keep commitments to yourself or others? Like the energy cannot be sustained.
If you answered “yes” to one or more of these, you likely have some underlying fear overriding your efforts to change making it almost impossible to sustain anything.
Anger
Anger is the second satisfaction blocker, in part because it just doesn’t get an adequate voice in our society. Most people are afraid of their anger (think about that for a minute)…. And in general most of us don’t spend the time letting ourselves be angry. We jump over it onto something more socially acceptable like “frustration.” The truth is, most of us have a right to be angry and need to give it a voice to keep it from sabotaging us.
See if you have Anger blocking you by answering “yes” to any of these questions:
Have you been told or do you feel like you have a “short fuse”?
Do you have road rage?
Do you lose patience easily with others easily - your children, partner, or customer service workers?
Do you easily “get jealous”?
Are you quick to judge others, but inside come down harsher on yourself?
Are you easily put into a bad mood and find yourself searching for an excuse to be annoyed?
Do you search for an easy release for your anger? Do you need a regular release to manage it?
Are you afraid of what would happen if you really let yourself be angry?
If you answered “yes” to one or more of these, you likely have wounds that need to be healed on a deep level that are probably limiting your progress and causing you to self-sabotage, or let your inner rebel take over.
Misalignment
Misalignment of values and current life is the 3rd blocker. Sometimes over the course of life values and decisions add up to make a life that doesn’t “feel like” yours. The truth is, if you are constantly marching towards a life you don’t agree with, you’re going to have a hard time. Looking at these alignment factors can be really impactful in terms of addressing the root cause of your life burnout.
The Misalignment blocker shows up for you if you answer “yes” to any of the below:
Are you confused about how you got here in life?
Do you feel stuck or lost? Like you are going through the motions but searching for more?
Are you comparing yourself to others, wondering how they have so much zest for life?
Are you lacking spiritual or recreational fulfillment?
Are you disengaged at work when you used to find it exciting? Are you feeling burned out?
Do you feel like “work life balance” is a laughable concept?
Are relationships feeling more challenging to you lately? Are you noticing others are a drain, or struggling to make and keep plans
Has there recently been a change in your boss or company that impacted you?
If you answered “yes” to one or more of these, you would benefit from realigning some elements of your life to better serve your natural motivation and value set (= happiness).
Self-Sabotage
Self-sabotage is a hard one for people to spot because it comes from a place of protection. Often, our mechanisms serve us in some way - keeping us safe. Addressing root causes of Fear and Anger often calms the inner sabotour but as they say, “old habits die hard,” and some of these mechanisms have been at play for so long, they can be huge energy and time sucks, limiting our ability to be fulfilled in the present.
See if you’re at risk for Self-Sabotage by answering “yes” to any of these questions:
Procrastinators, I see you! Do you struggle to get started or complete things?
Do you put yourself in a bad mood by complaining?
Do you waste time in an unproductive mental or physical place, but you just can’t help it – you have to escape?
Do you struggle to say no?
Do you put others needs before your own
Are you judgmental or critical of yourself or others?
Do I have imposter syndrome? Is your biggest passion learning but you struggle to put your investment to good use?
If you answered “yes” to one or more of these, you likely have some underlying fear overriding your efforts to change making it almost impossible to sustain anything.
Inner Rebel
The Inner Rebel tends to rear its head powerfully as other blockers are addressed because it is resisting change at a primal level. It doesn’t like to be told what to do or how to do it. This part of us wants to say “no” for the sake of it and often has a lot to do with our relationship to our authority figure - which translates into our relationship with ourselves, with work, partners, bosses, kids, etc. - pretty much anything that might require responsibility.
See if you have an Inner Rebel block by answering “yes” to any of these questions:
Are you often on the wrong side of your boss?
Do you resent others for not meeting your needs but might struggle with asking for what you need directly?
Do others tell you that they experience you as stubborn or hard headed?
Do you struggle to keep commitments to yourself?
Is will power lacking or inconsistent for you?
Do you set yourself up for responsibility and then resent it?
Do you avoid certain activities you know you need to get done?
Do you have a lot of “rules to live by”? Do they cost you energy?
If you answered “yes” to one or more of these, you likely have wounds that need to be healed on a deep level that may be limiting your progress towards satisfaction.
Limited Resources
The final satisfaction blocker is limited resources. These can be real or perceived, it doesn’t matter because at the core of this is usually a limiting belief related to how we feel about scarcity and our role around responsibility. Sometimes in work and in life, we get overwhelmed feeling like we can’t “keep it all together” when in reality our system has just been bogged down and needs a “reboot”.
Most people think this is going to be the first thing to address in terms of treating Burnout. But its usually a symptom of all the other blockers - and really easy to clean up once you address the other stuff.
Identify this as a blocker for you by answering “yes” to any of the below:
Do you regularly feel like you don’t have what you need to get your to-do-list done?
Is “work life balance” a laughable concept to you?
Are you known for always being busy but wonder why you aren’t more productive?
Are you known for being an “yes person”?
Do you struggle with the concept of self-care and how to implement it in a way that actually makes a difference?
If you answered “yes” to one or more of these, you might have a habit of putting yourself in situations that cause you to be a resource in demand. From one recovering do-it-myselfer to another, you can make this a million percent better (and yes, people will still love you and be your friend) .
There are a few things I’ve noticed from the last decade of researching burnout & spirituality and practicing functional psychology.
To summarize:
Most of our dissatisfaction comes from
these 6 core issues;
And most of our core issues require resolution in the mind, body, and “soul.”
Fortunately, with EFT we can address all 3 at once! ;)