Episode 8: Can Stored Trauma Cause Self-Sabotage in the Body? (Part 1) with Dr. Arielle Schwartz
- THA Operations
- 6 days ago
- 4 min read
When You Keep Getting in Your Own Way
You know what you should do. You understand your patterns. You can see yourself sabotaging relationships, opportunities, and success. And yet you keep doing it.
You start projects and don't finish them. You push people away when they get close. You create chaos right when things stabilize. You choose partners who hurt you. Again and again.
Everyone says you're self-sabotaging. You agree. You promise to stop. But the pattern keeps running.
Here's what you need to know: self-sabotage isn't a character flaw. It's stored trauma in your body creating unconscious patterns.
Your nervous system perceives signals you don't consciously register, and those signals drive your behavior. Until you address the stored trauma, willpower alone won't stop it.
I talk with Dr. Arielle Schwartz, licensed clinical psychologist and author of six books on mind-body approaches to PTSD. We explore how trauma gets stored in your tissues and why building body awareness is the path to healing your mind.
Trauma Lives in Your Tissues
Most people think trauma is a memory problem, something that happened that you can't forget. If you could just process the memory, reframe the story, and understand what happened, then you'd be free.
But trauma doesn't just live in your memories. It lives in your biology.
Your cells hold the story. Your tissues remember what overwhelmed you. Your fascia, your muscles, your nervous system all store the protective responses you couldn't complete.
This is why talk therapy helps but doesn't fully resolve symptoms, you can understand your trauma intellectually but still react intensely, the body keeps responding as if the threat is still present, physical symptoms accompany emotional trauma, and cognitive insight alone doesn't change automatic reactions.
Dr. Schwartz explains how traumatic experiences get encoded at the cellular level. The body remembers the threat and stays prepared to protect you, even when the danger is long gone.
Your tissues are holding patterns from experiences your mind has already processed.
The Biology of Self-Sabotage
When trauma is stored in your body, it creates protective patterns. Those patterns helped you survive and kept you safe when you were small, powerless, or overwhelmed.
But now they show up as self-sabotage.
Your nervous system learned that closeness leads to abandonment, so it pushes people away before they can leave. That's not weakness but protection.
Your body learned that success brings danger. Maybe visibility wasn't safe in your family. So you unconsciously derail yourself right before breakthrough. That's not fear of success but stored trauma.
Your system associates relaxation with vulnerability, so it creates crises to stay activated. That's not drama addiction but a nervous system that learned calm meant danger was coming.
Common self-sabotage patterns rooted in stored trauma include procrastination before important deadlines as a freeze response, starting fights when relationships deepen as a flight response, creating chaos when life stabilizes because hypervigilance needs justification, substance use or numbing when emotions arise to avoid overwhelm, and perfectionism that prevents completion as control against helplessness.
These aren't character flaws but survival strategies still running in your biology.
Building Body Awareness Changes Everything
Here's where healing becomes possible: noticing what's happening in your body creates new options.
When you can sense the activation before you act on it, you gain a choice point. When you can track the tension, the heat, and the constriction, you can intervene before the sabotage pattern completes.
Body awareness means noticing sensations as they arise, tracking where activation lives in your body, recognizing early warning signs of overwhelm, identifying the moment choice becomes possible, and learning your body's language of safety and threat.
This is how you interrupt automatic patterns—not by controlling them with your mind but by becoming aware of them in your body soon enough to make a different choice.
Dr. Schwartz explains how working with both mind and body accelerates healing, why integrating somatic work with psychological insight matters, and how the body leads the way to freedom from self-sabotage.
Awareness of sensation gives you choice, and choice gives you freedom.
This Episode Is For:
✓ People who keep sabotaging themselves despite knowing better
✓ Anyone frustrated by repeating the same self-defeating patterns
✓ Those with incredible insight but unchanged behavior
✓ Practitioners working with clients stuck in self-sabotaging behaviors
✓ Anyone whose talk therapy has stalled at insight without change
✓ People ready to work with their body, not just their mind
✓ Those wanting to understand the biology of self-sabotage
What You'll Learn
Listen to understand how stored trauma drives self-sabotage at the unconscious level. Discover why cognitive approaches alone can't shift these patterns. Learn how body awareness creates the choice point that makes change possible.
Your self-sabotage isn't who you are but what your body learned to do to keep you safe.
Disclaimer
This podcast is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical or mental health advice, diagnosis, or treatment. The information shared reflects my clinical expertise and research, but every person's biology and healing journey is unique. Always consult with qualified healthcare providers before making changes to your treatment plan or starting new interventions. If you're experiencing a mental health crisis, please contact emergency services or a crisis helpline immediately.
Join the Conversation
I'd love to hear your thoughts on this episode. What resonated with you? What questions came up?
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