Why Do I Keep Repeating the Same Patterns?
The Work of Staying Close to Your Authentic Self
Have you ever found yourself thinking:
Why am I doing this again when I know where it leads?
Perhaps you repeatedly end up in relationships where your needs come second. You avoid conflict until resentment builds. You work incredibly hard but never quite feel good enough. Or you understand intellectually that you don't need everyone's approval, yet disappointing someone still feels deeply uncomfortable.
One of the frustrating things about recurring patterns is that insight alone doesn't always change them.
We can know that a response isn't particularly helpful and still find ourselves doing it. Understanding why this happens is an important part of therapy.
What do we mean by a recurring pattern?
A recurring pattern is a familiar way of thinking, feeling, responding or relating that tends to appear across different situations.
For example, you might notice that you:
put other people's needs ahead of your own
find it difficult to say no
become highly anxious when someone feels distant
avoid asking for help
expect a great deal from yourself
withdraw when relationships become emotionally close
feel responsible for keeping other people happy
repeatedly question whether you are good enough
avoid conflict even when something is important to you
become very self-critical when you make a mistake.
These responses can feel like part of your personality. But often there is more happening underneath.
What is a schema?
In Schema Therapy, a schema is a broad and deeply held pattern involving beliefs, emotions, memories and bodily experiences relating to ourselves, other people and relationships.
Schemas are thought to develop through an interaction between temperament, our early experiences and whether important emotional needs were adequately met. PubMed Central (PMC)
You might carry an underlying sense that:
My needs aren't as important as other people's.
People I love will eventually leave.
If I make a mistake, I've failed.
I need to keep everyone happy.
I can't really rely on other people.
Something about me isn't good enough.
We don't necessarily walk around consciously thinking these things. Schemas often operate more quietly, influencing what we notice, how we interpret situations and how we respond when something activates them.
Why do schemas develop?
One of the things I find important in therapy is moving away from asking:
What's wrong with me?
and becoming curious about:
How did this way of responding make sense?
Many patterns that become difficult in adult life began as understandable ways of adapting to earlier environments.
A child who learns that being easy-going keeps the peace may become very good at putting their own needs aside.
Someone who experiences inconsistency in important relationships may become particularly sensitive to signs of rejection or distance. A child who receives recognition primarily for achievement may learn to place enormous pressure on themselves. Someone who learns that vulnerability isn't safe may become highly independent and uncomfortable relying on others. This doesn't mean every difficulty can be traced neatly back to childhood. Human behaviour is much more complex than that. But understanding where a pattern may have developed can help us see it differently. Instead of viewing it as a personal failing, we can begin to understand the function it once served.
Why do I keep repeating a pattern when I know it's unhealthy?
Because knowing and responding are not always the same thing. You may understand intellectually that setting a boundary is reasonable, yet feel intense guilt when you do it. You may know your partner isn't abandoning you, yet notice your body becoming anxious when they seem distant. You may recognise that perfection isn't necessary, while still feeling deeply uncomfortable submitting work that feels less than perfect.
This is one reason therapy often needs to go beyond simply identifying irrational thoughts.
Our patterns can involve beliefs, emotions, attachment experiences, learned coping responses and bodily reactions.
Changing them often means working at more than one level.
What are coping styles?
Schema Therapy also looks at the ways we learn to cope when a schema becomes activated.
Broadly, people may respond by giving in to a pattern, avoiding situations or feelings that activate it, or overcompensating by moving strongly in the opposite direction. These responses may have been protective at one point but become restrictive when they continue automatically in adult life. PubMed Central (PMC)
For example, if somewhere underneath is a fear of rejection, you might become very accommodating in relationships.
Another person with a similar fear might avoid emotional closeness altogether.
Someone else might try to maintain control so that they never have to feel vulnerable.
The underlying vulnerability can be similar even though the behaviour looks completely different.
Why do patterns often show up most strongly in relationships?
Relationships have a remarkable ability to activate our most sensitive places.
Closeness involves trust, dependence, vulnerability, needs, boundaries and the possibility of disappointment or loss. Attachment research has long examined how differences in attachment security, anxiety and avoidance can influence responses to stress and intimacy in adult relationships. PubMed Central (PMC)
This can help explain why you may feel calm and confident in many areas of your life but react very differently when an important relationship feels uncertain.
It can also explain why certain dynamics seem strangely familiar.
Sometimes we aren't consciously choosing the same relationship again. We may be responding to familiar emotional patterns without fully recognising them.
Can schemas and recurring patterns change?
Yes, patterns can change, but usually not through self-criticism.
Change begins with awareness.
We need to recognise when the pattern is happening, understand what activates it and become more aware of the thoughts, emotions, physical responses and coping strategies that follow.
From there, therapy can help create different experiences and responses.
Schema Therapy specifically works with early maladaptive schemas, coping styles, emotional needs and different “modes” or states that become active at different times. Research supports Schema Therapy particularly in the treatment of personality disorders, while evidence for its effectiveness across some other conditions is promising but remains more limited. PubMed
I think that distinction is important. Therapy doesn't need to promise that one model explains everything in order for that model to provide a useful way of understanding ourselves.
A few questions you might ask yourself
If you notice a pattern that keeps returning, you might become curious about:
When does this pattern tend to appear?
What am I afraid might happen if I responded differently?
What do I tend to believe about myself in these moments?
What happens in my body?
What do I usually do next?
What might I actually need in that moment?
Where did I learn that responding this way was necessary?
You don't need to have immediate answers.
Sometimes learning to ask different questions is the beginning of seeing the pattern differently.
How can therapy help with recurring patterns?
In therapy, we can slow these patterns down. Rather than simply focusing on the behaviour we want to stop, we can explore what sits underneath it.
That might include understanding your schemas and core beliefs, attachment experiences, emotional needs, coping strategies and nervous-system responses.
We can then work towards developing new ways of responding — setting a boundary, expressing a need, tolerating disagreement, allowing vulnerability, responding differently to your inner critic or recognising when an old fear is shaping a present situation. The aim isn't to eliminate every difficult reaction.
It is to develop enough awareness and flexibility that an old pattern no longer automatically decides what happens next.
Psychotherapy and counselling for recurring patterns
I offer psychotherapy and counselling in Mullumbimby, supporting clients across Byron Bay and the Northern Rivers, as well as online. Recurring patterns, self-esteem, attachment, boundaries and relationship difficulties are some of the areas I work with.
My approach is integrative and draws on Schema Therapy, ACT, IFS-informed work, attachment and family-systems perspectives, and somatic and body-based approaches.
