Do some people have a need to fail? Have you known someone who will sabotage their own self prior to a good?

Question

outcome? Is there anywhere you can read up o this type of behavior?

Actually a counselor described this about an employee . . . I had never thought of this possibility before.

Answer 1

Sure, it's more common than you think. It's not deliberate.

It's not really a need to fail. But, greater than a fear of failure is the fear of success. You will find it usually goes hand in hand with low self esteem, or feeling undeserving. Kind of like a co-dependency thing if you get what I mean.

Sorry, I don't have sources for you right now but I'll check later and see if I can track something down.

Answer 2

self sabotage is actually the opposite of self care; its an ingrained belief that one does not deserve good to happen to them, for reasons far underlying the simple "need to fail". this is an old and common issue for many clinicans and clients in the field of psychology, most self sabotage is done on a rather subconcious level and chances are that most everyone has done at least one act of self sabotage somewhere in their lives and although not always a mental or emotional issue for everyone, for some people the reasons for repeated self sabotage is often a long and winding road tracing back to the early formative years of life

Answer 3

I think fear of success and self-sabotage are more common than we realize. It's difficult to explain, but some people are so used to not doing well or failing, they come to expect it, and are afraid of the change, even a good change like being successful.
Most people have a very strong fear of change (even if they don't realize it).

Answer 4

Yes. I think in certain situations some people do have a need to fail themselves instead of their good outcomings. For eg, my father and my elder brother are both great chess players. And once by coincidence they had oppose each other during the finals of a local chess tournament and my father lost intentionally just to give the pleasure of triumph to his son...... :-)

Answer 5

It is not that they so much have a need to fail, they do not want people to know what they are really capable of so they sabotage their efforts or downplay them.

On the job, I have seen people do it just so they fit in with the rest of the mediocre crowd so they dont get talked about.

Answer 6

It's possible, but it's something you do subconsciously. I did this all my life until I gained some self-esteem. It could be the result of a parent constantly making a child believe he is worthless and will never succeed at anything.
I call my memoirs "Shooting myself in the foot".
I haven't seen it documented, but I'd be willing to answer questions.

Answer 7

...there is a condition known as; "self-fulfilling prophesy" where an individual will intentionally manufacture a predictable outcome pertaining to a specific life event...it can be for either a good or not-so-good result...for instance; a person may believe "i can't do anything right"...and then do things in such a way that they will in fact, not come out right thereby giving credibility to his percieved belief that whatever he does will not come out right...

Answer 8

Sometimes it is not the fear of failure that motivates, but the fear of succeeding.

I am one of those people. My mother was never happy with the A+ on the report card, it was just never good enough for her and I was punished for succeeding so it was easier to be mediocre.

Answer 9

some people who have felt like failures their entire lives have nothing more to expect. they don't aim for anything and don't expect anything for themselves because they don't think they can do it. they're easy to quit because they've never suceeded. it's just like how a girl who has grown up being abused by her father, will most likely grow up to find a man who will abuse her too. even though she may realize that abusive relationships are bad, she doesn't know anything else or she doesn't think she could get anything better.