Are We Victims?
I did have a discussion on this very subject yesterday and we did repectfully agree to disagree.
A close friend did say that i had acted like a victim a few days prior, but he had faith...he knew I was not.
After thinking about this, I did say that I do believe we ARE victims. He would say that we choose to be. In my opinion though, when we are neglected, abused or subject to all the unhealthy dysfunction our parents (or others for that matter) learned when they were young, That is what does shape us into those victims.
Getting to know him over these past few months, I do understand that he has overcome and become very direct and determined and will do whatever to get past these "restrictions" we have allowed to be put on ourselves. If I understand correctly, I think when we do retreat and hide and decide not to take a risk or chance at an opportunity, is when he refers to "our chosing". That I can definitely understand. And unfortunately I am sometimes guilty of this, but usually when I get overwhelmed and am feeling all alone and helpless. The thing is, these days, there are more times where I do still take steps forward that I do realize I have to or I will be stuck forever in the empty sadness completely unsatisfied. I think this may be where we all do fall short. When we continue to hope and pray, but do not ever try anything or take a chance for fear of more of the same ....this is when we do stay a victim
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I think when we choose to not evolve from our experiences, we just become martyrs. I am guilty of this behaviour. It's not something that changes over night, it definitely takes work.
I think if we want it bad enough we do have more moments of decisions and chances we do begin to take. The scary thing is if they do not turn out to be beneficial. Actually, I do think that even without the desired outcome, there is a lesson to be taken away from and room for personal growth. At least that has happened for me so far.
I never thought of myself as a victim but a survivor and a fighter. I refuse to take ownership of their bad behaviour and attitudes. When my ex tried to put me down, I would say really, takes one to know one. and walked away. You can do it. It takes time and practice. If we think of ourselves as victims, them we will let other people treat us as bad.
I think those experiences from our childhood and how we are raised shape us and affect us but there is a difference to me between playing the victim and actually being a victim. By playing the victim we use the past to lament unfairness or as an excuse for why our lives aren’t what we had hoped. I think as adults we have a choice whether to make peace with and accept the past happened, and then move on from it and not let it become who we are today. If we don’t I think that is self victimization, or playing the victim. I believe moving on and replacing the learned stuff from our past with new information is completely within our control. I think to not do it leaves us bitter and unable to really be whole and happy.
My thing is everything is a choice, how we react, respond, move forward, evolve, all of it. Obviously you didn’t choose to come from a dysfunctional family. But you can choose to learn from that, choose to rise above, choose to put it in perspective.
I came from a really dysfunctional home, alcoholic parent and poverty as I’ve mentioned before. It affected how I navigated the world and relationships and how I felt about myself for sure but I think making peace with it and accepting it happened removes the victim aspect from it. I don’t mean this to sound so casual, but it really comes down to putting our big girl panties on and just getting in on with it.
I do think sometimes we hold on tight to how we were raised or what was expected because it’s very safe in a way and we don’t have be accountable. We can just blame stuff on our upbringing when things get tough. But that stops working after a while. I think it can also prevent having good relationships because we want to blame stuff on our past and just want to commiserate on how we were wronged we were by it, like we just can’t help how were are, It gets old after a while.
Rmb....I think that is what he was trying to say.... That how we chose to react (or rather not ) is how we choose to be victims.
(Self victimization as you said.)
Occasionally I slide back down when I am feeling over whelmed and panicked. Still that work in progress. But I continue climbing my way back up
I get it. That stuff still, STILL, manages to sneak in our thoughts or cloud our view of things. To me it’s taking a second to realize it’s just a trick in a way, like our mind reminding us of that old way of thinking. We don’t have to believe it. We can let those thoughts pass by instead of reacting. That’s what I try to do. Sometimes not always successful but I try!
I think we are victims only if we choose to identify with victimhood.
What I do is focus on the present and I can get alot accomplished but when I think of the past, I am contaminating the present with negative things and then I can't get nothing done.
When I learned to love myself and look upon every day as a gift and a new adventure in my life....it changed everything, and made me a much happier person!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_YXdpDMnNI
I love the windshirld comparison near the end of the above video.