No rest for the RESTLESS
In this one, I’m discussing restless saboteur.
Restless never rests and is constantly in search of greater excitement, the next activity rarely at peace or content with the present. Always having to be doing something, restless busy themselves to escape dealing with pain, anxiety, or other unpleasant emotions. Restless can feel extremely busy while accomplishing nothing.
There is a high chance that you have a restless saboteur if you find yourself often
easily distracted and scatter-brained,
for you multitasking is just regular tasking, and you are constantly juggling many tasks and plans
You escape unpleasant feelings by moving onto the next thing
You often suffer from fomo
Others have a difficult time keeping up with your frenzy and chaos
You have a hard time building anything sustainable.
You get impatient with others and abandon projects with them.
These are some thought patterns that restless has:
How much longer do I have to do this?
I wonder what’s next…
This is boring, there must be something more exciting to do…
Why is everyone else so slow?
I don’t have to finish this, there is nothing else to learn here
How does all this sabotage us? Underneath the fun and exciting surface lies anxiety based escape from being present. Only choosing the highlights of each thing cuts off the lows and perhaps some unpleasant parts of it. Restless is afraid of jumping into the deep waters of life. The price of engaging only on the surface is that it is shallow… Restless robs us of experiencing the depth of human experience. Putting in sweat and hard work results in the highest appreciation of whatever one is doing. The more time and effort we put into things, the more we appreciate them.
Those that struggle with restless saboteur are often:
Open, curious, spontaneous,
High in energy and vitality in a great breadth of pursuits,
Capable and creative.
Their enthusiasm and appreciation of life are contagious
They energize and engage others in co-creation.
Feel your negative emotion for full 90 seconds!
How to intercept your restless? Here are some tips:
Write down every time during the day when you create busyness as a distraction from your feelings.
Learn to notice when restless takes over. When you notice it, don’t give into it, instead rub your fingers together and focus on feeling your body.
When you feel negative emotions, let yourself feel them for full 90 seconds - do not busy yourself to try to escape them.
Train yourself to become fascinated with the ordinary through mindfulness.
Feel sensations on your body - and in your body - taste, smell, sound, touch.
Set timer for yourself to access deep work time without distractions. Work for 30 minutes then take 10 minutes off.
Presence, slowing things down and paying attention to what is, disempowers the part of our brain that doesn’t wanna go deeper and achieve greater meaning.
If you have a restless saboteur and would like to work on it, check out my 8 week program mental fitness positive intelligence in the link below. To see which saboteurs you have, do the sab test.