My past self is super guilty of this and for a decade now working on it—I’m a younger brother, and being unable to do a thing was a sure way to get someone else to do it (i.e. someone older), so I’d make myself unable to do it (through making myself tired, hurting myself in the process by doing it recklessly or other not-quite-conscious but actually beneficial to me strategies). It’s a pattern I noticed at 16, but didn’t fix until 23 or so, and I still find a part of me scheming to do similar stuff. An issue I have now is that my 2 year old has absolutely learned this—he wants to roll up his sleeves, he gives it a horrible effort, and starts crying at the failure, waiting for us to fix it. Instead I guide him to do it since he can do it with patience and effort, and he seems happy to do it, and for some things he just learned it and is now not having the pattern—but it doesn’t generalize, he does it for new challenges. It’ll just take time, but it really starts early.
My past self is super guilty of this and for a decade now working on it—I’m a younger brother, and being unable to do a thing was a sure way to get someone else to do it (i.e. someone older), so I’d make myself unable to do it (through making myself tired, hurting myself in the process by doing it recklessly or other not-quite-conscious but actually beneficial to me strategies). It’s a pattern I noticed at 16, but didn’t fix until 23 or so, and I still find a part of me scheming to do similar stuff. An issue I have now is that my 2 year old has absolutely learned this—he wants to roll up his sleeves, he gives it a horrible effort, and starts crying at the failure, waiting for us to fix it. Instead I guide him to do it since he can do it with patience and effort, and he seems happy to do it, and for some things he just learned it and is now not having the pattern—but it doesn’t generalize, he does it for new challenges. It’ll just take time, but it really starts early.