Don't Be A Victim, Part 2

In this episode, we revisit an old discussion topic for a closer look. Glenn addresses more in depth how to avoid feeling like a victim when circumstances are out of your control such as illness, discrimination, and more.

Transcript

Welcome to Life,

Lessons,

And Laughter with your host Glenn Ambrose.

Hello.

Welcome to the podcast.

Today,

We are diving a little deeper into the question of or the topic of not being a victim.

So I did a podcast previously on not being a victim and a lot of it was surface.

It was kind of just the more obvious things and how to just look at yourself in a positive light and rise above things,

Stuff like that.

So what we want to do today is take it to a deeper level and touch on some of the things that are more difficult,

Things that we're kind of not in control of and things like prejudices.

And if somebody's acting prejudice towards you and then somebody says,

Well,

How can I not be a victim of that?

And really the or also like diseases and stuff.

If somebody has a disease and they go,

Well,

This is hindering my lifestyle.

So how can I not be a victim of that?

It's a fact that I have this situation.

And so that's the type of thing I want to discuss today and how to deal with those things.

So really to deal with that,

Obviously you have to go deeper because it's a deeper issue.

So you have to really come to the understanding that there's nothing wrong with us at our core,

At our truth,

The spiritual being that we really are,

The eternal being that we really are because that's the truth,

That's the reality of what we are.

And if you're going to deal with something as difficult as the things that I mentioned,

You have to get to the real core of the truth to be able to have any chance of making any sense of this.

So that's why I'm going right in and starting there.

So if you understand that God doesn't make junk,

A loving creator doesn't make junk.

The loving creator just has love to work with.

So he doesn't have a pile of junk over there to grab and say,

Well,

I'm going to make this person but I'm going to throw some junk in there too.

So you can't make a wood table if you don't have wood.

So there's nothing wrong with us.

There's nothing wrong with our soul.

And nothing that we experience can ever taint that.

It can never diminish our light.

It can never scratch or dent or damage our soul.

Our soul is fine.

It came into this world fine and it's going to leave this world fine.

It can't be damaged.

It's eternal.

So with that as an understanding,

Now on top of that,

We have our mind-made self,

Which is what we commonly refer to as our ego,

Not the old school ego that people think of like,

Oh,

I think I'm better than anyone.

What ego means nowadays is just your mind-made self,

Who you think you are on this plane.

Like for me,

I'm a male.

I've got brown hair.

I'm a father.

I'm a son.

I'm a life coach.

All these things are mind-made things that I've agreed to being in this lifetime.

So it's my role.

So that aspect of me can take hits.

If somebody takes a shot at me and my feelings get hurt,

Well,

That's what it's hurting.

It's hurting my sense of self,

My mind-made self,

Because my true self is fine.

It can't be hurt.

And there's a lot of spiritual teachings that touch on this.

And they're very deep.

They're very profound.

Like one of my favorites is the A Course in Miracles.

And it says that nothing real can be threatened.

Nothing unreal exists.

Therein lies the peace of God.

That's like,

I just love that.

After I say it,

I have to pause for a moment just because it's like,

Wow,

Man,

That's beautiful.

But it's true.

But that's the deep level spiritual understandings that we need to get to if we expect to be able to walk through these difficult situations in life,

The real tough ones,

The ones that really look like we're just standing here and we're not doing anything and things are coming flying at us.

So the first thing is to understand that we can't be hurt.

And there's some great teachings on this with Brene Brown,

Who's very famous from being on Oprah.

She's a wonderful teacher.

Well,

She actually got famous from her TED Talk that she did.

Then she went on Oprah and,

Of course,

Has taken off,

As everybody does that goes on that show,

Right?

But her,

She's a researcher by nature and who's also become a spiritual teacher because of what she's found in her research.

So she researched vulnerability and she found out that vulnerability is not opening ourselves up with the risk of being hurt.

Vulnerability is opening ourselves up with the understanding that we can't be hurt.

And that is the only place where true strength lies.

We do all these things and develop all these tools and things to defend ourselves and protect ourselves in the name of being strong.

And all of them are able to fail us at certain things except vulnerability.

It's the only thing that you can't lose if that's your source of strength.

It will always overpower everything if you do the work and really get to the understanding that you can't be hurt.

When you truly,

Completely open up to who you are and accept who you are and are comfortable with who you are,

Anybody can say anything to you and that's stuff that's going on inside of the person that says it.

It has nothing to do with you.

And you can understand that.

You can understand that if you're in that space.

And another spiritual teacher,

Michael Bernard Beckwith,

At the end of his movie,

He says something very beautiful.

He just says,

No matter how wretched people act and no matter how attacking they come at me,

They can't dig themselves out of my heart.

They don't have that power.

They can't dig themselves out of my heart no matter how they act towards me.

That is somebody who has gotten to this point.

And we can all walk in that direction.

We're not going to do it perfectly.

We got to cut ourselves a little slack because this is some real deep spiritual stuff.

This is no joke.

You land this stuff and you're going to be flying.

You're going to be experiencing a lot of peace,

Love,

And joy in your life because it's really deep core spiritual work.

So that's the basic outlook.

And there's some big spiritual teachings from different perspectives that can kind of back it up.

So what do you think about all that,

Ben?

Hey,

Everybody.

I'm here.

Did I just completely go off?

Yeah,

No.

That was almost 15 minutes.

Holy cow,

Man.

I had no idea.

I was in the zone.

Oh,

It was great.

I think that it's a very difficult subject to talk about because what you're talking about specifically in this episode are things that people have no control over.

So how are you not a victim?

How to not see yourself as a victim when by definition you are a victim of.

.

.

By a human definition.

By a human definition,

You are a victim of whatever it may be,

Something that you have no control over,

Systemic racism,

Disease.

And that's the core problem.

The core problem is that we're.

.

.

Somehow along the way,

We agreed that if somebody does something to us,

We're a victim of it.

And there's a problem with that statement.

When somebody does something to us,

When somebody does something,

That means there's something wrong inside of them.

There's something that they're struggling with.

There's something that they're not okay with.

So technically,

It's their issue.

Now,

When they do it to us,

If we take it on and agree with it,

Then that's our fault.

We don't have to.

There are people in this planet that don't do that.

And I mean the ones who do do it,

The ones who practice this well are the ones who change society,

Are the ones who are very profound leaders.

Nelson Mandela did it.

I mean,

If we want to sit there and list reasons why people have a right to be upset,

Well,

Nelson Mandela had plenty of them.

Martin Luther King Jr.

Had plenty of reasons to be upset and be a victim of,

But he chose not to be a victim of it.

He chose to stand up against it.

Just stand up against it and just say,

No,

This isn't okay.

Gandhi did it.

All the people who incited great change in this world,

That's what they did.

They got this.

And that's how the great change came through nonviolence,

Through just standing up and going,

No,

No.

It doesn't mean that if somebody's hitting us that we lift up our chin so they can hit us better.

That's not what I'm saying.

I believe that in spiritual practice,

If we are in the moment,

If we're able to be in the moment and action needs to take place,

Like to defend ourselves physically,

Then we will take that action to the best of our ability.

And it's just the mindset.

What we're trying to do is get the mindset of not being a victim.

Exactly how to handle every situation that comes up,

I don't know.

I'm not God.

There's no manual of how to handle every single situation.

And actually,

I wish I could remember,

I was just listening to a spiritual teacher talk on that very subject.

Actually,

It was Eckhart Tolle,

Who's arguably the number one spiritual teacher in the world.

And he said,

When you're in a situation and you're in the present moment,

You're connected.

If there is action to take,

You will just take it.

It will flow through you.

If there is not action to take,

That will flow.

You just won't.

You'll just know.

You'll act in the right way.

And that there is no manual.

There's no two situations that are exactly the same.

So there's no manual that says,

Well,

If somebody hits you in the name of racism,

Then you don't hit back.

There's no manual that says that.

So I'm not going to sit here and answer every question about how you're supposed to deal with very specific situations.

What I'm here to talk about is the mindset underneath that.

Because the mindset underneath that is what controls your peace,

Your happiness,

And the way you walk through this life.

As far as diseases,

Oftentimes,

It's a good example of nothing is either good or bad.

Thinking makes it so.

It's the acceptance of where you are and not struggling against the reality of the situation that you're in.

If you're in a situation,

If you have a disease that is holding you back from doing other things in life that other people can do,

I don't know why.

I don't know why.

But what I do know is that your truth,

Your spiritual center,

There's nothing wrong with it.

You're still a beautiful human being.

And if you focus on that instead of the limitations,

Then you can start looking at the things that you're able to do.

Maybe because of this situation,

You're capable of understanding spiritual truths deeper.

And maybe you can,

There's examples with every disability and every disease out there where somebody decided to not let it hold them back.

And next thing you know,

They're up on stage and they are inspiring millions of people,

Millions of people,

Because they are the ones that people really listen to.

If you've got somebody that really overcame something and can stand in love and stand up there on stage and shine in it,

That is an inspiration for all of us.

And maybe that's what that person's made to do.

I don't know again.

But it's about getting away from the judgment that this is bad,

This is bad.

Well,

It's just different.

It doesn't necessarily mean it's bad.

Sometimes it's painful.

But the suffering,

The resistance to it is just going to make it worse.

It never makes it better by focusing on how bad it is.

It never makes it better.

It's the story that you tell yourself.

Yeah.

So write a new story.

What do you focus on?

Yeah.

How you choose to view the situation.

Like I said,

There's people from every walk of life that have done this,

That have gone within and found the peace and the love that's inside of them.

And maybe that's what they're here for,

Is to be those beacons of light for everybody else so that they can look at it and go,

You know what,

If he can do it,

So can I.

That's a big deal.

That's what we need more of in this world.

We need love in this world and we need people who can usher it in.

And what's more powerful than somebody that's dealing with something very difficult to sit there and go,

You know what,

Love's the most important thing and I have found peace and happiness in this world.

I mean,

I can't think of anything that's more profound,

More fulfilling to do.

I guess that's why I do the work that I do,

Because I like heading in that direction.

To me,

It's everything.

There's other things that I could do,

But I try to go towards the core stuff because that brings the most happiness.

I told you about this last year and I talked about it a little bit on the podcast.

There was a musician,

A singer-songwriter who was very young,

Got cancer and was,

You know,

Obviously had all of the emotions that that brings and decided that he was going to have his friend who was a photographer photograph all of the stages of it.

And when he got through it,

Started writing songs and turning it into something.

And it became a musical,

A one-person musical that he's toured the country with and inspired hundreds of thousands of people that have watched the videos and bought it.

He did like a Google talk or something.

That's when it's written that God will take all our bad and all our difficulties and instantly turn it into something good.

And that's an example of that.

That's what happens when you have the internal shift and you choose to use this stuff for good.

That's what happens.

That's what happened to me.

For 20 years I was out there living a very destructive life and it was destructive.

But then when I shifted internally,

All that bad,

All that struggle,

All that difficulty that I went through all of a sudden became assets.

My strongest assets in which I can help others.

And then all of a sudden,

Not only is it a betterment and an asset to this world,

But it's also an asset to me.

So that's exactly what this guy did.

He went through a difficult situation.

There's no such thing as wasted pain.

What kind of creator is going to inflict pain on people just for the sake of pain?

I don't believe in a loving creator like that.

I know some people do.

I just don't.

And if you choose to,

That's fine.

That's your decision and I'm not going to fight you on it.

You have the right to live in that space if you so choose.

I don't know why anybody would want to because all it does is it makes sure you suffer.

That's all it does by living in that mindset.

So to shift that and to find the good,

That's the most powerful thing that we do.

And I think I just touched on another little piece of it.

People are so focused on fighting for their right to be miserable.

They don't even realize what they're fighting for the right for.

Why is this so important that we're looking at things realistically?

If it makes you feel like crap,

Don't look at things realistically.

Because what benefit is it?

Why?

Well,

Because we have to.

Because I'd be lying to myself.

Okay,

Lie to yourself then.

Lie to yourself.

That's okay.

So it's not that important to look at things.

It's more important what your perspective is on things.

And your perspective determines how you live your life,

Whether it's happy or whether it's sad.

I've been in those positions where I was completely depressed where every area of my life was falling apart,

And then a day later,

All of a sudden I was ecstatic and happy.

And nothing had changed except my perspective.

All of a sudden I had a shift and I went,

Well,

Yeah,

Okay,

So I don't have a job.

Okay,

Well,

I'll get one.

So this isn't happening.

Okay,

Well,

I'll fix that.

And all of a sudden the light came on and I had hope for the future and I started walking towards it.

That was just my perspective.

I hadn't solved any of my problems.

So your perspective is your reality.

So if you work on shifting your perspective a little at a time,

And if you've got a big issue like this,

It's not an overnight snap your fingers and everything's all better.

It takes some deep spiritual work.

So it's going to take a little bit of time probably,

Depending on how attached you are to it,

But if you do the work,

You can not only have the happiness for yourself,

But you can bring a whole bunch of it in for everybody else and be an inspiration for others to reach for it.

Also,

And I think that this might be an important thing to talk about.

It doesn't mean that whatever the issue is,

Is going to go away or that it's not a horrible thing.

A disease can always just be a horrible thing.

It can be a difficult thing to deal with.

It can and there can be pain attached to it,

Physical pain that's attached to it.

But it can lessen.

The more you focus on how horrible it is and how much pain there is,

The more pain you're going to experience.

If there is a solution,

You're not looking for it and you're not walking in the direction of it.

If it can be manageable,

Then you're more apt to find it if you're looking for the solution and you're open to a solution.

And if you're sitting in it,

Then you're going to miss a lot of other stuff.

Absolutely.

If I'm sitting here and I think everybody's experienced it because it's a spiritual truth.

So I believe everybody's experienced it to a small level.

So I'll give a small example.

Now multiply this times a billion and you might get to the place that some people are,

But it doesn't mean it's a different principle.

It's the same principle.

Let's say you stub your toe and it hurts.

And then all of a sudden you get caught up in doing something else and you forget all about it.

Your mind's off of it.

You're not even thinking about it.

And then all of a sudden you finish doing whatever you were doing and all of a sudden you notice your toes aching again.

You're like,

Oh my God,

That's right.

I hurt my toe earlier.

I completely forgot about it.

I didn't even notice the pain.

That's what I'm talking about.

And I understand that that's not always possible with extreme situations,

With extreme injuries and extreme diseases.

I get that.

But my point is,

Is it doesn't make it better by focusing on it.

It can lessen it slightly by not focusing on it.

And you might be able to find some sort of comfort in it.

And if you can,

The more you live in that space of comfort,

The better chance you have,

The less you resist it.

All suffering is resistance to what is on an emotional level.

Sometimes it's physical pain that we just can't escape.

But all suffering on an emotional level is resistance to what is.

Doesn't mean we have to like what is,

But if we accept it,

Then we have a chance at finding some peace and some serenity within the situation that we're in.

So what are like the small steps that you can take?

Actually I think,

And I could be wrong,

But.

Ben's going for it.

Yeah.

I could be wrong about this,

But I think that if you go back and listen to the last episode that we recorded,

There might be some helpful hints.

I think that a first step to getting out of this victim mentality,

Hood,

Whatever,

Victimhood,

Is to find other things that are not affected by this that you're grateful for.

So that you can start changing the story that you tell yourself.

Absolutely.

Stop focusing on what you have gratitude for and what you're thankful for.

You got it,

Ben.

That's a great first step.

And the acceptance.

Read books about this stuff.

The more you fill your head and your consciousness with different types of perspectives,

Then the more you can choose the healthy ones that work for you.

You don't have to believe everything that people say or write,

But if you just take writings and listen to people who are trying to have healthier perspectives on things,

You might just find one.

And you can Google so much of this stuff like Brene Brown's work on vulnerability.

You can Google that and get her basic ideas for free on the internet.

I mean,

This stuff's out there.

So you can understand these philosophies.

And they've been written about for thousands of years.

This is nothing new.

It's people that have been in difficult situations,

Extremely difficult situations since the beginning of time.

And since the beginning of time,

They've always been a portal for those to find deep peace and spirituality and happiness within themselves for those who have chosen to go that route.

So it's just,

I mean,

Heck,

If you're in a difficult situation,

You're there anyway,

Why not attempt to find something good in it?

Why not attempt to slowly start shifting the perceptions?

I mean,

If everything's that difficult,

You kind of got nothing else to do.

You might as well focus on attempting to shift things for the better and hopefully be a huge inspiration to the rest of us.

And I mean,

Of course,

This is a podcast.

So Ben tries to give a little Q&A and we try to have a little back and forth.

It's not the same as the back and forth between myself and a client.

That's going to go a lot deeper because it can handle your specific questions and it can get clarity in your specific way.

So that's the type of thing that you get from one on work with one on one with somebody.

So if you're interested in going deeper with this,

You can find me on my website,

Which is life-enhancement-services.

Com and shoot me an email or give me a call and we can have a discussion and see if we can bring some clarity into your specific situation.

And it doesn't matter where you are.

It doesn't matter where you are in the world.

I work by Skype and by phone as well as in person.

So if you're local,

I'm nearby in Rhode Island.

If you don't mind driving from Mass or Connecticut,

I actually have clients from Connecticut that drive.

It's not far.

But Skype and phone,

I just had a phone session with one of my clients,

My local clients yesterday,

I believe.

That had never done a phone session because they're always in person.

And at the end of it,

They were like,

I was wondering how it would go over the phone.

I was a little bit apprehensive of doing it over the phone,

But they were just in a situation where they couldn't leave the house.

And they were impressed.

They were like,

Wow,

It really worked just as good as being in person.

So yeah,

The work by phone is very advantageous.

So if you're interested,

Look me up.

Thanks for listening.

Thanks for helping,

Ben.

Thanks for recording,

Dave.

And the silent minority has spoken.

And that's going to do it.

I hope it helps.

And we'll talk to you soon.

That's the end of it.

Thanks for listening.

Reviews

Some really good reminders. Thanks Glenn, Ben and silent Dave! 💜x

Ahh life is rough and I'm gonna sit on the pity pot and proclaim how much I'm a victim! Nooooooooo thanks! I'll pass! I prefer acceptance and hope and peace! Gratitude turns what I have into enough!

Great ending for the first talk. Thanks Glenn.
🙏🏼🌺💐🐾🌸✨🙏🏽

Great one! Thank you!!! ❤️🙏🏻🌸🦋

Excellent. Thank you