Are You Playing The Victim In Your Life?

We all have ups and downs, and it’s no secret that life throws hard things into our path. After all, why do you think the saying, “Bad things happen to good people,” exists? Yet, when those hard things occur, how we connect to them and how we fix our mindset plays a significant role in the moment and our overall life satisfaction. It also impacts one other major element in our lives. Can you guess what it is? If you guessed inner peace, you are right. So, let’s take a dive into our mindsets and whether or not you play the victim in your daily life. This is an extensive conversation about identifying the small daily behaviors and habits that create the biggest divide between feeling empowered and feeling negatively impacted. We'll pull it all together to change course from victim to victor.

Transcript

Have a seat,

Grab your pen,

Grab your paper.

Let's have a massive conversation.

I know each week when we meet to talk,

I always say we're having a massive conversation,

But this really is one of the elements that I see active day to day and they have no idea it is active and impacting their life.

That sounds dramatic.

I know,

But trust me,

I see these behaviors so often and that's why I wanted to sit down and have a conversation about playing the victim in our lives.

Now,

Before we get started,

And we're going to talk more about this in depth in just a minute,

But there is a difference,

A massive difference between being a victim of something and playing a victim in our lives.

And we're talking about playing the victim and I'm going to hand over a set of behaviors and I'm going to offer some workarounds to those,

But small,

Just get you started kind of things.

But the whole point of this conversation this week is to really get into a space where you're identifying how you are showing up in your life.

The truth is,

And I'm going to say this over and over again,

Is we cannot change what we do not know is present.

We cannot change what we do not witness.

We cannot change what we do not understand.

And so if we have some understanding about how we're showing up,

That can help us shift into a place where we do have inner peace,

Where we can find self love and we create a groundedness in our lives.

So to start us off,

I'm going to ask you a few questions and really what we're doing here is gauging our mindset.

And when I ask these questions in private session,

A lot of women will look at me and say,

I don't understand.

Yes,

I do all of those things,

But what's the problem?

And we'll talk about the problems in just a moment.

But here are the questions.

Number one,

Do you find yourself buckling to most of your daily challenges or do you find yourself crafting solutions to overcome them?

This is very important.

Be very honest.

And if you're writing it down,

A yes or a no is fine.

Or you can really go into a more in depth answers,

Whatever works for you.

Number two,

Do you find yourself easily defeated?

Yes or no on this one.

And then the next followup question to that is,

When defeated,

Do you find yourself easily tanking in your emotional stability?

Meaning you may be diving into stress or having a sense of anxiety or feeling really unbalanced,

Right?

Most of us know what it feels like to not have emotional stability.

So answer yes or no.

Number three,

Do you readily take responsibility for your role in the things that occur?

Yes or no.

Most people will say yes,

But that's actually not the truth.

So be really honest right now,

Right?

This is just your paper,

Your answers,

Your situations.

No one else is going to be looking or asking for your answer.

So be really honest right now.

Number four,

Do you blame others for your problems?

Number five,

Do you hold long lasting grudges?

Yes or no.

And the last question,

Do you engage in self pity?

That sounds like,

I don't understand why things always happen to me.

I don't understand why my life is so hard.

I don't understand why whatever it may be,

Then turned towards why things are not working out for you.

If you're shaking your head,

If you just threw your pen down on your paper and said,

Screw this,

I'm not doing it.

You may be a little triggered or shaken.

And guess what?

That's okay.

Take a deep breath.

You know,

Like I said,

Many of us live in this experience and don't even realize it.

And don't worry,

We're going to dive in and I'm going to help you undo all of these behaviors that really don't work for us in the end.

But before I want to give you yet another quick warning,

The following conversation is one that I've had with so many women to help them identify.

And it does often spark a wide range of emotions.

So if you feel emotions rising now,

I want you to just sort of be aware of them.

You know,

I've seen everything from being royally pissed off,

To shock,

To anger,

To feeling exposed and seen in a way that they don't want to be seen,

Then upset and,

You know,

Finding the sense that many hours,

I mean many hours have been wasted in lines of thought that will never,

Ever serve you.

I've seen it all.

And whatever arises for you,

Please remember,

We can't use knowledge that we do not possess,

Which of course is the reason why I do these podcasts in the first place,

To hand over things that you may not even realize are situations that are keeping you from where you want to be.

All right.

So we know that.

Let's talk about actually playing the victim.

It is absolutely only fair for me to say real things happen.

And when real things happen,

Big,

Small,

Out of control,

Out of your control,

It's natural to want answers.

It's natural to find yourself upset.

It's natural to want others to take responsibility.

This is very real.

It's very natural.

And it's how we sort of put things into perspective,

Right?

And that is completely okay and also necessary in so many ways.

But when we play the victim,

Our inner peace really becomes rocked.

And if we looked at our inner peace from a scale of zero to 10,

10 being the greatest inner peace to ever be achieved and zero being none,

When we play the victim,

A lot of times we're straddling the line between zero and one.

And if that's the place that we're in,

We cannot fully engage in our lives before we do the thing that we do here and give the definition of what we're talking about today about playing the victim.

Let me go back to something I just said a few minutes ago.

And I said,

Being a victim is vastly different than playing the victim.

I want to put this on the table right now.

Let's get clear of the conversation because I do not want any hate mail,

Right?

No hate emails or DMs about how you've had this really traumatic experience and how I made you feel bad about it or how I made you take responsibility for it.

That is not what I'm saying.

That will never be the way that I show up,

Think,

Or even would believe,

You know,

Witnessing or acknowledging or feeling that you have been a victim of abuse,

Trauma,

A crime,

Or something that has caused you to experience a host of physical,

Mental,

Emotional,

Even spiritual or financial upheavals or concerns is totally different than playing the victim.

Are we clear?

Please,

Let's be clear.

We all have trauma.

We all have things that have been very difficult.

We're not talking about those things.

We're talking about playing the victim.

There is a difference.

So what does it mean?

What is our definition of playing the victim or handing over or playing the victim card?

As it's often said,

This is where we justify our responses.

We manipulate others to feel a certain way or see our situations through the lens or the frame of thought that we have.

We attention seek,

Diffuse responsibility,

Justify why our life behaviors and reactions are the way that they are.

Through negativity or often upsetting,

Uncomfortable situations.

Let me hand over a few statements that are often said when someone is playing the victim card.

You would act like this too if such and such happened to you.

That's a big one,

Right?

We've all heard someone say that we may have even said that ourselves.

Another one,

I can't help if this happened to me or my life would be different if so-and-so would stop doing this or that.

My life is always so hard.

Nothing ever works out for me.

Another spin on that.

I swear this world is out to get me.

Another one is can't you just place yourself in my shoes?

This is a statement.

Can't you just place yourself in my shoes that we often use when we're trying to help someone identify with our path,

With our perspective.

But when we use it,

When we're playing the victim card,

We're actually twisting it in hopes that someone will understand that we have it worse than they do.

And for those that played the victim,

They often get really irritated when they're handing over these statements and someone tries to identify with them.

This is a big,

Big issue for people who are playing the victim card,

Right?

They feel unseen and unheard.

And here's the deal.

We are all wired for connectivity,

For connection.

You've heard me say that before.

And the way we relate to any moment is through our personal experiences.

Oh yeah,

I've done that.

I understand that.

I understand the way you're feeling.

But when people are playing the victim,

They feel like there is nothing that is working for them.

And so those statements feel like personal attacks.

They feel like people aren't listening to them,

That no one cares,

That they're alone.

And we often say all this person or that person wants to do is talk about themselves.

They don't care about me.

They only care about themselves.

And when we get there,

My dear,

We are in full victimhood.

I know you've done it.

I know I have done it.

We have all done that.

So let's look at some common signs that we are doing that on a daily basis or over a large majority of time,

Right?

Because even though we all do it doesn't mean we all stay there.

And we want to look at these pieces that can really help us move from having constant issues with where we are to where we can look at solutions and change our behaviors.

And these are just a few pieces.

Okay.

Just a few things because we'd be here for like 15 hours if we had a real in-depth conversation about this.

So let's kick it off.

All right.

First thing that I see the majority of people who are in victimhood do is to refuse to take responsibility.

That lack of responsibility,

Believing that nothing is ever their fault or they do not play a role in the things that occur to them,

Through them,

Or because of them.

It's really never their fault.

When playing the victim,

A person will often refuse to take responsibility because it's just not comfortable,

Right?

It's easier to point a finger to make other people feel guilty or to blame them or simply ignore your impact on or within any situation.

But here's the thing.

In everything that you experience,

You have a role.

Sometimes we are the dominant person who creates the problem.

Sometimes we are the reactor to the problem.

Sometimes we're just present.

And in the presence of moments,

We generally don't fall into victimhood.

It's these big things that we do actually have an active role in that we say,

Nope,

Not mine.

And we have to remember that the experiences,

Behaviors and activities that we are in don't just happen to us,

Right?

We are involved in them.

Just as I said,

I want to give you an example of that,

Even though it's pretty clear,

Most of us know what it's like to take responsibility.

And it's interesting because when we're pushing against responsibility,

Again,

Sometimes we don't know it's present.

So last year I had this lady come into session and we're going to call her Jill,

But she was one that did not really understand that responsibility and rejection of responsibility can truly upset your life,

Especially when we fall into victimhood.

So Jill found out that her husband of 15 years had been having an affair,

A long standing affair,

Right?

And it wasn't his first.

In fact,

He had been with several women longer than he had been with her.

And together they had built this life that she thought was really stable and comfortable.

After their first child was born,

This woman came to Jill and said her husband wasn't the man that she thought he was and that they had been having an active and long-term affair that also resulted in another child.

Jill was rightfully angry and she responded.

And I mean she responded.

I do want to say that she gave me full permission to use this story because things are completely different now,

But this is what happened in the very beginning.

Well Jill knew that this woman that came to her was a youth pastor at one of the local churches and it stood to reason that an extramarital affair would go against the church standards and probably her employment contract.

And so she marched right up to the head minister one Sunday morning after sitting in the pews and bam,

You can guess it.

The woman that her husband was having an affair with was swiftly fired.

You can probably guess that both the woman and her husband were pretty angry with Jill.

And the other woman ended up having to move out of state because she was essentially blacklisted from all the other churches and Jill didn't care.

She really didn't care.

In fact,

She was happy that the woman was out of the picture.

And when Jill's husband asked her what her problem was,

She said,

It's not my fault.

Maybe you shouldn't have had an affair.

Now if you're cheering for Jill right now,

Stop for just a moment.

Okay?

Because Jill's lack of responsibility ended up taking things to another level.

She fell into the,

Why is this happening to me and I'm going to get revenge.

She held a grudge.

The two of them ended up getting divorced,

But because it got so nasty between the two of them,

Family court got involved and guess what?

Both parents ended up losing parental rights because of their behavior.

Jill thought she was totally justified.

She did nothing wrong.

She was not sorry for her actions and she wallowed in self-pity.

I mean,

It was bad.

It took a lot of time,

But after exploring the entire event,

She realized that she did have a role and that she had spent a lot of time wallowing in self-pity.

And when she learned to take responsibility,

She also really began to understand that she did not have a lot of responsibility in her life.

And that playing the victim was a lot easier for her than really getting into a place where she owned responsibility for who she was and what she was doing in her life.

Of course,

This is an extreme example,

But it happens every single day.

And sometimes we have small things that happen and we push and we respond and say,

I'm justified because if you hadn't done this,

I wouldn't have done that.

This is lack of responsibility.

This is action with nothing to follow up on it.

We cannot live this way.

We cannot play the victim card in hopes that our life is going to be wonderful,

Right?

We can't view things that seem like a personal attack or insult at every single turn and have a good experience,

Not only in our inner peace,

But our self love,

But just in our daily lives.

So what's the remedy,

Right?

How do we do this?

How do we take responsibility?

And most people understand what it means to take responsibility.

And I really want you to get into a space that we're not talking about a rational thought here.

We're talking about an irrational action,

An unlogical frame of thought,

Right?

Because if we're playing the victim,

We're not using our logical mind.

We're using our feelings to justify our behaviors.

Again,

So I asked,

What's the remedy?

It's knowing that every situation,

Every circumstance,

And every event in your life offers you an opportunity for growth.

When things occur,

I want you to ask yourself,

Have I somehow contributed to this moment?

This is a really beautiful way to get into a stage of looking at exploring responsibility.

It would be great if you did this before reaction.

It's not likely,

I get it.

But if you can ask yourself that one question,

Have I somehow contributed to this moment?

You invite the rational thinking to the table.

We leave the feelings off to the side and you invite a more mature,

Reasonable thought process into the moment.

And it also asks us to look inside of ourselves.

Playing the victim is really an easy way to avoid looking at ourselves and making changes that we must.

Ask,

What am I avoiding?

Why don't I want to see and own the roles that I'm playing?

You know,

Sometimes it's because we're fearful.

Sometimes it's like Jill where she never had to take responsibility and she didn't really know what accountability was.

You know,

I know people in my personal life that have never been held accountable and it's frustrating as hell.

And so I want you to ask yourself is seeing my true behavior troubling to me?

If you can easily point a finger at someone else,

You have to then point the finger at yourself.

You must take personal responsibility for all actions to realize that success,

Inner peace and balance starts with you and your daily decisions.

Taking responsibility means staying committed to the truth,

To yourself.

Even when things are tough,

Everything starts and ends with you.

If you can come to the conclusion of why you will not hold yourself accountable,

You can make a change.

To take responsibility,

We have to look at the events.

We have to break down our actions,

Our responses and our reactions.

We have to examine the why to our behavior choices,

Decide if that's how we want to show up or not,

Make the changes and then declare responsibility where responsibility lies.

Being accountable in your life means that you're in the driver's seat.

That's scary for someone who is in victim mentality.

But if you want to actually move into a grounded life,

Doing so bursts the bubble of victimhood.

Okay?

So let's move on to the next.

Those living in victimhood often believe that they are at the mercy of everyone and everything around them.

It's here that many will begin to use their struggles as a way to justify why they're not making progress or advancing in their life.

It's here that we feel disempowered and that word stuck finds its way into our vocabulary.

Yes,

Often being stuck can be a part of the victim mentality.

Does that mean it's always a part of it?

No,

But it definitely can be.

If you came in and I saw you in this thinking or in this behavior,

I would ask you,

Why do you feel like life is against you?

And it's likely here you would hand over a laundry list of reasons of why things don't work out or why you're stuck.

And there will even likely be a crossover from the first behavior of not taking responsibility into this.

So we begin to blame,

We blame your boss or your parents,

Your ex,

Your spouse,

Your upbringing,

Whatever.

And then we say we're stuck because of them.

The real sticking point here is that the person will not necessarily be able to tell you what they have in the works or a plan to get them out of this behavior and to be able to progress in their life.

If you've heard me say life is happening for you,

Not to you,

The people that are thriving in this piece of victim mindset completely disagree with that notion,

Right?

Life is happening to me.

It's not happening for me.

Have you seen my life?

Do you even know what's going on?

You have no idea.

Right.

So how do we fix it?

How can we move into true understanding that life is actually happening for us?

We have to get out of the idea that we are not in control.

Of course we can change small little things to have really big results.

Is there something that you can do to really identify that you are laying down this thought pattern that,

You know,

Everything is happening to me.

I have no control.

In order to establish control,

To see that you actually do have those wins in your life,

I will often ask the women to make a small achievable list of what helps them see that they do have control and power in their lives.

You know,

It helps you really find that you do have things that you're accountable for and to and vice versa.

And it also helps us see that we have an active role in everything that we do.

Right?

So it really is a list of,

I do this and that I'm responsible for this or that,

Whatever it is so that you can see that you do show up in your life,

That you do have an active role.

Yes.

Again,

Things are going to occur,

But we do not have to fall mentally,

Emotionally,

Physically,

Spiritually,

And even financially to them.

We are in charge of improving our lives.

So what are you going to do?

Are you really stuck or are you really just believing that you are at the mercy of everyone else?

I will often hear women come in and say,

My relationship is failing.

I hate my job.

I don't know what to do.

I have no control.

And it is,

Do you not have the ability to go find a job that you do love?

Do you have the ability to step up and try to fix your relationship or end it?

If that's what is needed,

You do have control.

Get into a place where you can look at how you are showing up and that you have full physical ability to find your way into a new path,

Into a new solution.

Okay.

Let's talk about the next thing.

And that is playing the victim means we often hold grudges,

Old grievances,

And that the idea of forgiveness is sometimes a joke.

But this is a big thing.

This is a huge topic.

And it's one that I actually plan on doing a much more in depth episode on because grudge holding is one element that keeps us from self love.

But for now we can touch on it and have a little work around,

Right?

I have this dear friend of mine who this is their method to showing up in life.

She will often return to a hard moment,

Bring up this one specific memory and event in which granted she was legitimate hurt,

But she uses it as the reason to really justify why her life is always falling apart.

She has anger,

Right?

She literally carries those moments around like a weapon and the minute she's called to the table asking for accountability,

She uses those moments to say,

You know what?

No,

I don't have to do this because of this situation.

That is a grudge,

Right?

She's using it to justify her actions.

We have to deep dive into these experiences and really look at what is creating this response in us.

Trauma is real.

It is very real,

But it doesn't have to be our weapon.

The truth is that the people that are in our lives now that may have not been present when the grudge was really first in full motion,

We don't have to have those people carry our burdens.

They are not required to roll around in our old wounds.

We have to realize that when we feel like this,

We often ask people to care for our current experiences and our past and those grudges really do a number on our relationships.

We cannot actually fully thrive in a relationship because we're still stuck in what hasn't happened for us or what has happened to us.

So how do we move forward?

The first thing that we do is we have to look at accepting.

We look at how these moments,

How these experiences have impacted us.

We look at what behaviors have come from it,

Both good and bad,

Right?

Because hard things often give us the experience to have good reactions to,

But we have to drill down and look into what is going to give us freedom.

From this experience and from there,

We create a plan from A to Z for ourselves,

Right?

It's the path to free ourselves from these things that we think are always going to hold us down for the rest of our lives.

When we recognize that we have the power to free ourselves from all of these things that are no longer working for us,

This is where we decide.

This is where we give ourselves permission to step into our power and create self-control.

This is where those big questions that I often ask come into place.

You know,

What do I need from this situation?

What was it trying to teach me?

What do I want to extract from it?

What do I want to throw away?

How do I want to feel now that I'm allowing myself to step back into my power and into my control?

What am I going to do about this moment from here on out?

This is big,

Necessary work.

Now,

This next sign of playing the victim is something that I have found in many people for many different reasons,

But those people that play the victim often struggle to trust others.

And this issue goes beyond not trusting others because the bigger problem is is that most people that play the victim don't actually believe that they are trustworthy themselves.

When we find ourselves in victim mode,

We tend to make assumptions.

One is that no one can be trusted because of your experiences.

The other is that you can't trust yourself because of how your experiences have gone,

Right?

So it's a double edged sword.

And when we do not trust anyone,

We tend to fall into this idea that everyone has negative intentions and therefore the world at large feels like it's rather untrustworthy.

Now,

This is one of those places where being a victim and playing the victim card really come into play,

Right?

It's very natural for something to occur and for us to have this wall that goes up that says,

I can't trust anyone,

Right?

I can't trust my experiences.

That is a byproduct of having a bad situation occur.

However,

Here where we're talking about playing the victim card is where this thought process of a lack of trust dominates everything and we shift into that negative frame and we have it in everything that we do think about and feel.

So to get to a place where we can resolve a lack of trust,

We have to look at the facts,

Right?

This is where I talk about all the time,

Removing the emotion and looking at what really is the experience.

We have to examine the evidence of the experience.

I often start with the question,

Are there people in your immediate circle that you can trust,

Right?

Because this helps us establish trust.

For most people,

The answer is yes.

And if that is the case,

I ask them to tell me all of the reasons why they trust them and why.

They trust those things.

It's very important because again,

We're building evidence,

But sometimes people will answer no.

And then we deep dive into why.

Why don't you trust the people in your closest circle?

And if you don't trust them,

Why are you giving them a front row seat in your life?

And we really begin to identify that on some level,

On the most basic level,

We don't have trust issues across the board.

We have trust issues with certain things.

I trust that my mental health is safe with you.

I trust that I can be seen with you.

I trust that my feelings will be validated and heard,

Right?

So we get down to what is the trust factor really about?

And then we really move through old assumptions and the mindset that we can experience people in a positive way.

It sometimes helps us also to break down our circle piece by piece and identify in those people,

You know,

Who don't we trust and why don't we trust them?

And then we can help ourselves get into a place of connectivity and out of victim mode by saying,

You know what,

This particular relationship is not working for me and it's actually exacerbating how I feel.

And so that's the place that we look at maybe releasing things that are not working for us.

Now let's move on because we still have quite a few to go.

And here we're looking at a behavior that is,

You know,

It's one that a lot of people struggle with even when they're not in victim mode,

But when victim mode is in full action,

Not knowing when enough is enough is a big problem.

In relationships,

Those that play the victim really have no sense of limitation,

No sense of boundaries.

They don't know when to say enough is enough because they have a hard time with those boundaries.

Like I just said,

Both for themselves and other people.

And this may sound counterintuitive,

But you know,

When we're on the lookout for all the things that are not working for us,

We often will move the boundary line out in the sand,

Right?

If this happens,

It's okay because it's not as bad as X,

Y,

And Z.

And we can't live our lives like that.

You know,

If the world is already filled with things that we don't really want to address,

We have to get out of victim mode by placing our boundaries in a firm and clear way.

And so we have to know what is enough.

I love to ask this question.

So I'm going to hand it over to you because if you struggle with not knowing when enough is enough,

This is one element that you can begin to ask yourself to,

You know,

Get into a space of maybe cleaning this up a bit.

But I ask,

What is the maximum?

What's the maximum behavior?

What's the maximum feeling that you're willing to take in or endure in any relationship or any given situation?

You know,

What's the max that you're willing to put up with?

I bet if you do some deep diving,

You're going to find that your max is a lot narrower than what you're currently accepting.

This is so important because knowing your limits as you are right now,

Not yesterday,

Not tomorrow,

But right now helps us get into a space where we can start finding inner peace.

If we don't know when enough is enough,

When we don't know where our boundary line is,

Guess what?

Those things cannot be possible for us.

Inner peace is way out the door.

So what do you need to do?

What is the maximum you are willing to take in or endure in a relationship or any given situation?

This next piece goes hand in hand with not knowing what enough is enough is.

And it's that when we are in victim mode,

We tend to argue a lot.

You know,

That person in your life that you'll say something to,

And they have a point for everything,

Right?

They want to argue.

They really have trouble choosing their battles because every battle to them feels like a war.

They feel constantly under attack and they literally want to be heard.

And so they do it in a way that is just disorienting,

Disregarding and really pretty nasty most of the time because they feel like everything is against them.

You know,

When someone offers their good opinion,

Air quotes,

Right?

How they feel,

How they would show up.

A lot of times I can feel like a stab in the back when in actuality,

It really isn't.

It's just someone else's perspective.

But because we're always on the defensive,

On the attack,

We feel like it's a big problem pointed at us.

So what's the basic remedy here?

Because this is one that really long-term needs to be worked through and talked about and handled.

But what's the basic workaround?

We need to realize that not everybody's opinion or every piece of criticism is about us.

We have to break it down.

That starts by asking ourselves,

Is this moment about me?

Is this reaction by this person,

These words from this person truly about me,

Or are they reacting to the experience based on their past?

Right?

Is this about me?

We can break down the moment and we can also ask really great discovery questions.

I love doing this.

What did you mean by that?

That is a great discovery question.

I'm sorry.

I want to make sure I understand you correctly.

What do you mean?

Instead of arguing,

Instead of jumping to,

You know,

Really borrow trouble,

Ask yourself and that person,

What does that mean?

We can break down each other in big moments,

Or we can really move our mindset and create great relationships by asking discovery questions.

Now the next one,

At the very beginning,

I said not taking responsibility is the top behavior of playing the victim.

And while I believe that is true,

I believe there is another behavior,

This one we're about to talk about that could really give it a run for its money.

And that is self pity.

Oh,

We all know those people.

Woe is me,

Right?

The people that live in this experience have the habit of really pitying themselves.

It's almost as if the mirror that they stand in front of every day reflects a child that can't fend for themselves.

It reflects someone who has not only seen hard days,

But every single thing in their life is a problem and nothing ever gets better.

They pity themselves at a level that is so incredibly unhealthy.

It impacts everything.

When I have asked women,

Why are you pitying yourself?

They will often tell me that they don't feel like they have anyone in their life that can offer them sympathy or empathy.

And they're just trying to give it to themselves.

And on one level,

That makes sense,

Right?

It makes sense.

Like I'm trying to make myself feel better because no one in my space is willing or has the capacity to do it for me.

However,

However,

When we get into a place of playing the victim and we say,

Everything is bad,

Everything is hard.

No one loves me.

No one cares for me.

We fall into the negative mindset.

We fall into the negative pity of life and it doesn't make us feel better.

It just makes us see everything that we experienced through that lens.

Wow,

This problem is really going to get bigger and my life sucks.

So wow,

Poor you.

And you can't live a positive life like that.

You cannot get into a space where you are living at your highest self through feeling like everything is hard and nothing will ever be good.

Rationally,

We all understand that we have tough experiences and bad days.

Even the luckiest air quote,

Right?

Experiences unfortunate things.

To get out of self pity,

We have to step back and look at the experience from a different perspective,

From a different angle.

Was this moment as bad as I think it was?

Is my mindset impacting and influencing the way that I see my moments?

If I feel sorry for myself or sad for myself,

Would it be a different experience than if I felt good and happy for myself?

Here,

We have to offer ourselves perspective.

Doing so helps us get out of self pity and really keep it at bay.

Now,

Next up,

This is one that I see all the time.

I see it with trauma.

I see it with the victim.

I see it with so many things and it is the direct enemy to inner peace and self love.

And it is that the victim mode mentality will have us constantly comparing ourselves to others.

Here,

We struggle with the habit of comparing ourselves to others in a way that is often very negative.

The truth is that we think that if we compare ourselves,

We're going to make ourselves feel better,

But oftentimes it has the opposite effect,

Right?

How come their life is so hard,

But I feel the way that I do when my life is not as hard.

What's that going to do?

Is it going to make you feel better?

No,

Of course not.

We have to really look at our train of thoughts.

Is comparing ourselves really going to help us be better?

No.

You can admire something and strive to achieve that,

But the comparison really just helps us stay in victim mode.

We have to recognize that everyone has good qualities.

Everyone has different experiences and we use those to our best benefit.

Comparing how our life is to someone else only gets us into a state of lack.

If we are in a state of lack,

What does that mean?

It means that we are going to constantly complain and compare because there's something missing.

Instead of these behaviors,

Instead of comparing and getting into lack,

You have to lean into gratitude and count your blessings.

I know that sounds like positivity in the,

You know,

Mode,

But I'm serious.

A person who is in victim mode needs to treasure each thing that they have in their life and develop a habit of seeing what is good.

And every single day there is something that you can be grateful for.

You hear me ask people all the time at the end of the interview episodes,

What's good in your life?

Give me three things.

You can use this in your daily life.

What is good?

What are three things that are working for you?

When you lean into this,

Guess what?

Lack doesn't exist.

Also we have a greater tendency not to compare because we already know what's working for us.

Right?

So there are two more in this conversation.

Of course there are many more,

But let's talk about this other piece of victim mode.

And it is that they think perfectionism will save them.

I'm telling you,

I don't know how many times you've heard me say this,

But I myself am a recovering perfectionist.

Right?

And ironically,

When there's a chance that a victim could be caught in an error,

Right?

In something that makes them look less than perfect,

We suddenly become more perfect.

We try to strive for the perfection on a greater tendency,

On a greater scale.

We tend to list all the reasons why we did everything we could and how great those individual pieces were.

But if we suddenly feel like that person that we're handing all of these great aspects over to don't believe us,

What do you think is going to happen?

We fall back into victim mode.

How could they not see my effort?

How could they not see how much I gave of myself?

How perfect this experience was?

They don't appreciate anything.

Sound familiar?

Perfectionism is a big problem because perfection doesn't actually exist,

No matter how hard we try.

Even the things that are measured perfectly still have some standard of error,

Right?

Or have some standard that is manmade.

And because of that,

Is there a definition of perfect?

Not really.

Instead of thinking this way,

We have to remove the word perfect from our vocabulary and sub it for the word acceptance.

We are what we are.

We are human and that means that we are naturally imperfect.

If we give ourselves permission to be imperfect,

We allow ourselves to do the same for our lives,

For our feelings,

Our thoughts,

And our experiences.

We have to allow that.

So lastly,

This is a big one.

This is different than releasing people from your experience because of trauma or because you can't get along or because they're not healthy for you.

But people who are in victim mode will often cut people out of their lives.

Now,

Again,

Not necessarily a bad thing,

But when we're doing it because we don't want to be uncomfortable,

That is a problem.

Highly emotional behaviors create chaotic relationships.

Okay?

And when we cut people off,

Instead of looking for resolutions,

We create our own source of chaos.

Now,

Again,

Cut the people out of your life that are not good for you.

But if you're just doing it because you don't want to take a sense of responsibility,

Because you don't want to be uncomfortable,

Because you don't want to actually,

You know,

Engage,

That is a space that is not going to work for you longterm.

It is full victim mode in action.

So how do we handle this?

You have to weigh your relationships.

Is this relationship worth leaning into and fixing?

Or is this relationship a surface situation that was never worthy of my time to begin with?

Is the other party willing to help me come to a conclusion?

That's a big thing.

If it is a space where,

You know,

Yes,

I do actually value this person.

Maybe you're in victim mode and you need to resurface to a balanced place so that you can actually address a problem.

It's hard to know sometimes,

You know,

Am I cutting people out because I don't want to deal or am I cutting people out because it's not really what's working for me?

But you have to identify it.

You have to get to the bottom line of it.

What's the relationship?

How does that person make me feel?

Is this worth it?

The bottom line is this,

Playing the victim,

It's never going to get you anywhere.

You are going to end up facing painful consequences in your life that,

You know,

Will keep you from inner peace,

Will keep you from self-love.

It will keep you from positive actions and tensions and emotions.

As with anything,

Ask yourself,

What's the opposite of this moment of this behavior,

Of this feeling?

To stop playing the victim,

You have to acknowledge the way you're showing up.

Alternative options are always there,

Right?

What's the opposite?

You've heard me say it a million times.

You have to look at where you are and get started from there.

Playing the victim can and does cost you everything.

Like I said,

It costs you your peace and your love,

But it also costs you your balance.

We always have the power to reel in the things that we're doing and make changes.

We always have the power to step into a new path.

So if you're playing the victim,

Are you willing to look at yourself to look at your behavior and ask,

Is this really what I want?

And if it's a no,

Ask yourself,

What changes do I need to make to get to that place?

That's going to be wonderful,

That I'm going to have peace,

That I'm going to have self-love,

That I'm going to have balance.

You must engage in your life through a true and balanced mindset.

Thank you for taking the time to listen to this episode,

Which originally aired on the Get Your Life Together Girl podcast.

Please take the time to review this conversation and follow me here on Insight Timer for more courses,

Meditations,

And additional conversations.

Until next time,

Be kind to yourself and others.

Reviews

great information and guidance. I especially like how you broke it down in a different categories. I’ve worked so hard on my victim mentality, but by breaking it down into categories, I can catch myself quicker.before going down the victim path 🌞🌙✨🌞🌙✨🌞💛🌙✨💛

Simply amazing. The right words at the right time.