I’ve been reflecting on a moment that quietly changed the way I think about avoidance.

At first, I assumed it was procrastination. Someone I spoke with mentioned repeatedly putting off GP appointments, and my initial thought was that it was just one of those things people delay. Life gets busy, appointments feel inconvenient, and we tell ourselves we’ll deal with it later.

But as the conversation continued, something deeper came up.

They shared a fear of injections and then spoke about a past experience with blood tests that had been really painful. In that moment, my understanding shifted. What I’d first seen as procrastination began to look more like what we often call self-sabotage — not in the sense of making bad choices, but as a way of avoiding fear and discomfort.

What they were doing hadn’t changed. What changed was how I understood it.

Avoiding appointments wasn’t about not caring about their health. It was about protecting themselves from going through something that had been upsetting before. What looked like avoidance was actually a learned way of staying safe.

This reflection reminded me how easy it is to get behaviour wrong when we only look at the surface. When we slow down and really listen, we often find that what we label as self-sabotage has a history behind it. Shifting from judgement to curiosity creates space for empathy — and sometimes, that shift alone can make all the difference.