Why We Sabotage Endings

On this week’s podcast, Dan continues a series on endings by discussing the role of sabotage—the moment when celebration gives way to indulgence and we sabotage our ability to enjoy our endings, potentially undoing everything we have just accomplished.

“Endings are meant to be an experience of delight. The dilemma is the delight is so ephemeral—it passes almost with the first awareness of how sweet it really is. Delight at completion is something so utterly other than what our normal, day-to-day existence is like.”

Endings are meant to be an experience of delight.

Dan challenges us to reflect on the major endings in our lives. What happened in the hours and days immediately after? Have you ever exchanged the pleasure and delight of an ending for an over-satiated suffering that is somehow more familiar?

“We don’t know how to hold pleasure and to allow the fullness of that pleasure to sweep in and over and around us.”

Next week, Dan will continue this series by reflecting on how to end well. In light of what we know about procrastination and sabotage, how can we delight in and celebrate our endings while at the same time being able to let them go?

“I would love for you to begin to consider how afraid we really are of delight, how deeply anxious we are in the presence of delight, honor, glory.”