Are you stuck in a job you hate? Afraid to make decisions? Unable to climb the corporate ladder? Here's expert advice on how to live up to your potential.

FIVE YEARS AFTER GRADUATION, an economics major still temps as a bookkeeper. A legal secretary has dropped so many evening courses over 20 years that she still doesn't have her bachelor's degree. An audio visual technician finds himself in one dead-end job after another. These men and women share a common enemy, themselves. By procrastinating, missing deadlines and engaging in other self-defeating behaviors, they routinely undermine their chances for success.

"Everybody ducks out of one challenge or another," says psychologist Kenneth W. Christian, author of Your Own Worst Enemy Breaking the Habit of Adult Underachievement. "But if you're a chronic underachiever, whenever you run into difficulty, you want to curl up and suck your thumb. You seek comfort rather than hard work. You make excuses to avoid facing your fears. And you end up with a life that's unfulfilling, because you miss out on the satisfaction that only comes from tackling something hard." Underachievement-failure to live up to potential-exists in every age group, at every job level and in every field, from sales to sports.

The more times you answer "yes," the more likely it is that you are getting in the way of your own success.

Christian estimates that one in four adults has the problem. But sufferers should take heart, notes psychologist Pamela Brill, author of The Winner's Way. "Underachievement isn't a permanent condition," she says, "but a mind-set-a behavior pattern that you can change."

The Roots Of Self Sabotage

The key, psychological research reveals, is how much control you think you have over your life. "High achievers tend to assume responsibility, attributing positive results to their own actions,” says psychologist Susan Battley Stony Brook, NY Underachievers may feel very little control over their lives, so they may not have the same motivation to work to make things happen. They like to believe things will turn out the same, whatever they do.

Although underachievement can start in grade school, adults usually don't sense a problem until their late 20s. "The Bart Simpson, underachieving-and proud-of-it thing isn't cute after a certain age," says Christian. "Often, young adults who don't want to leave behind the world of adolescence, where anything is possible, won't commit to any one job or career. They just drift along.” Other underachievers hit a plateau in their 30s and see younger colleagues advancing faster. As their self-defeating behavior continues, they sink deeper into disappointment.

"It doesn't take long before underachievers lose confidence that they could perform well even if they tried their best," Christian adds. “Instead of pursuing a path leading to a sense of meaning and delight, they lower their expectations and settle for less. Before they know it, they're 40 and at the edge of depression, or 50 and having a midlife crisis.”

At any age, self-sabotage seems from fear ̶̶̶ ̶ both of failure and of success. “If you’re afraid of what success will bring, you’ll find a way to fail,” says Noah St. John, author of Permission To Succeed. “ Success may bring higher standards, more work, more responsibilities.