Cycles and Shifts: Identifying your personal patterns
...and once again she shuddered with the evidence that time was not passing, but that it was turning in a circle. —Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude
The definition of insanity is repeating the same thing again and again and expecting a different outcome. —Anonymous
Have you ever felt a little groundhog-day ish when it comes to certain events and people in your life? I’ve a friend who somehow always attracts (so she says) the same carefree, jovial sort of man, who is good at laughs, but not so much life itself. Is she repeating her father trauma? Her father wasn’t much of a provider though he thought he could.
It could be financial. Another client find himself facing a third bankruptcy in yet another business venture. Boom, and bust.
Or mundane. Somehow one client’s managers at work is always a promising mentor who “almost is” — in every company she’s ever worked at. Then the rose glasses fall off, and she is floundering at work. Is it her boss, or is she repeating the disappointment in maternal figures she’s experienced in childhood?
every new experience or relationship feels familiar, as if it happened before and you didn’t like it the first time around. These experiences are the result of your patterns.
Patterns emerge everywhere, in nature and in life. Patterns bring structure to the universe and give it order.
And we repeat the patterns we subconsciously imbibe in childhood to re-enact the structures of our life. Whether at work, in relationships, and even with our children.
Until we break out of it.
Spotting a pattern is liberating. It means you get to finally address questions materially:
How am I contributing to my own misery, disappointments, unhappiness, setbacks, or lack of achievement?
Before that question can be illuminated, you ask: What ARE my misery, disappointments, unhappiness, setbacks, or lack of achievements?
List them.
Categorise them. Your appearance? Relationships? Work place? Career choices?
Reflect on them. Discomfort is expected! Looking at our charts astrologically helps us figure out harder to spot patterns in our lives. Or those that we don’t even think are problematic!
James Clear calls this “a natural drift in life” —Reflection is great as it allows you to course correction. Nobody sets out to make a mistake, or do something against their values…but…
As life goes on, we find ourselves in situations where we are not doing the optimal thing anymore.
What am I actually trying to achieve? Does this drain me, or fill me with energy?
Does the attention I give this, worth it?
Can my current habits (patterns) carry me to my desired outcome?
How can I create an environment to make a new pattern? Physical, social, daily routines, etc.
These questions help reveal patterns that keeping you in a destructive cycle. For example:
Self-sabotage takes many different forms, including a lack of follow-through and, on the other end of the scale, a misguided idea of perfectionism.
Responsibility vs blaming. Blaming yourself is as destructive as blaming someone or something else for your own misguided efforts.
Denial and bad choices. When you’ve eaten a bad meal, it doesn’t take long before gastro issues Show up; you might even start vomiting. Likewise, when you meet someone romantic who is completely wrong for you, your heart — a strong chakra field — will let you know. Yet, people remain in dead end relationships for years, thinking they (1) just need time to change, (2) just need more info to truly justify ending the relationship.
Denial can become a pernicious pattern, a way of getting by in difficult circumstances and avoiding confrontations.
Another pattern is addiction. This is obvious. What do you indulge in, to your detriment? Addicts who aren’t accountable for their addiction haven’t taken the crucial first step in the hard emotional work involved in recovery. Rather than face up to what they’re doing to themselves, they lean on alcohol or drugs.
Biological factors can exacerbate addiction, as your body becomes physically incapable of resisting the addictive pattern.
addiction to anything is a deeply entrenched pattern of behavior—it’s a destructive way of coping with the difficulties life sometimes tosses at us.
Observe how you interact with others in your life.
Do you find any of these behaviours?
Awareness will invite trigger events for you to finally end the pattern, and grow into better behaviour patterns. This will take you to success in your goals and values, rather than send you into repeating your despair.
Quotes from are the excellent book Breaking the Pattern: The 5 Principles You Need to Remodel Your Life by Charles Platkin PhD (2015)
Also lots of inspiration from James Clear’s book Atomic Habits (2018).