Self-Defeating Behaviors: Free Yourself from the Habits, Compulsions, Feelings, and Attitudes That Hold You Back

The uncanny knack of these authors to address the “foregone conclusions” that everyone, even organizations and governments face, as well as individuals, as they process the mission and objectives that motivate them offers a new avenue of change – for both undesirable habits and desires, but also for those we rarely think about within this context, like sex, like racism, like self defense mechanisms, etc., and other “impressions” of expectations rooted in concrete memories.

The “default” excuse is typically that “we do what we have to do” heard from the mouths of many men and hierarchially conditioned sources. The authors suggest that not only is this not true, but it is obviously false, an attempt to rationalize our way through life.

The authors do acknowledge, however, that even by stripping away all defense mechanisms and achieving what could be called an “elusive perfection” of self control, and self discipline in adaptation, life may not be better, healthier, or more comfortable, but the goal of form over substance is apparently enough to conclude that doing so may be worthwhile. There are many who would disagree given the nature of the world today, and the probability of humans being poised strategically upon the brink of insignificance. The survival mechanisms that mankind has invented to appease the spirit may be well rooted in the recognition that perfect individuals cannot exist, and that more perfect ones are often seen as aloof and arrogant, the result of marketing the potential of a too healthy, too perfect a society.

Though the process of self inquiry is limited by the authors to obvious ones associated to bad habits such as smoking, drinking, and excesses that require control to overcome obsesity-oriented conduct, for example, they hint at the greater altruistic value of examining our conclusions that perform traditional self defense like challenging our presumptions of race, age, gender, disability, etc. that may provide new avenues of progress.

Worth the read just to question whether self defeatism is not a part of general society as we are born into it, and whether or not it must be that way. Most will see that the effort to fix it may not be worth the cost, however, especially when the perceptions we challenge are those created by society throughout history rather than by specific individuals themselves to deal with that society. In the growing income disparity of America, this “Big Fish” book may not offer the kinds of solutions that overcome such systemic problems of society for which unhealthy and sheeplike behavior has been adopted to use as that self defense.

Rating: 5 / 5

I absolutely loved this book. I keep it and re read it every now and then. It has helped me tremendously with issues and bad behaviors I have conquered. I would recommend this book to anyone seeking self help.
Rating: 5 / 5

This book is written in a way, that makes it hard to follow, but the basic message is coming across. Everything written in this book seems to make sense, but it’s a different story when you are supposed to apply them to your actual life.
Rating: 2 / 5