Every day in each decision, people assume one of two positions, which give way to what will be their success or failure: living as responsible or living as victims, that is, blaming others for what happens to them or assuming that what we collect is due to what we sow. Keep reading.
For biological reasons, humans have resources that allow us to relate to the world in a very particular way. Four of those resources whose form of use affect our lives in different areas are: language, interpretation, memory and imagination. Let's detail:
Language, learned in society, is limited by the form of culture we learn and allows us to name people, objects and situations. If we do not have a name to express situations or experiences, we may feel confused. Language also allows us to use these assigned names to describe what we experience, even if we describe them prejudiced by previous learning. We do the interpretation with thoughts or verbalizations and it consists in making rational sense of things, giving opinions about them, deciphering what they mean in our personal code.
As for the other two resources, memory and imagination, we will say that memory, a higher faculty linked to the brain, allows us to store and remember experiences and interpretations, while imagination serves to think about what does not exist and visualize what it will be like. or it will happen.
We use these four resources to form a complex opinion about ourselves, which we know as self-image, the basis, by the way, of all our social performance. This self-image arises according to the way we have been treated, what we have experienced, how we have interpreted our experiences and the considerations we make about what we can or cannot do, achieve and enjoy. There is talk of negative or positive self-image, if the way of perceiving ourselves is favorable or unfavorable, which affects all our self-esteem.
We strengthen and protect this self-image fiercely, most of the time without noticing it, through various defense mechanisms, among which I will only mention the projection mechanism. The projection, a concept used in principle by Sigmund Freud, suggests that people resort to the mental strategy of placing outside, in the outside world, something that really belongs to them or is creation. It is a mental operation through which the person refuses to take responsibility for an experience or situation caused or lived by it, and places it as caused by other people or things. Here, when it becomes habitual, what we might call the personality of the victim arises.
The personality of victim or victimhood, then, consists in defending myself from possible situations of discomfort, through the non-recognition and external projection (towards another person or thing) of a certain situation. If a person is late for work, they will say that the cause is automobile traffic, rain, someone else, or a certain eventuality. You will not think that the delay is due to not being organized, a habit that you have not noticed that you have, a bad calculation of time, or a metaphorical protest against the boss, the job or the company.
Although the existence of people who feel powerful and privileged and who take advantage of their role or their ability to impose abusive behaviors and methods against others less privileged politically, economically or socially is a frequent reality, it is also than the existence of those who use victimhood to gain attention or compassion. These are weak and mistreated to find the support of others and avoid having to make the efforts that their life situation, natural or acquired imposes on them.
A rabid form of victimhood is annoying that others are not like us or how we want them to be. In these cases the tendency is to attack them, accuse them, label them to harm them morally, emotionally or physically. This demonstration of exclusive intolerance, which through spiritual unconsciousness and ignorance, is usually protected by ideologies and creeds that hide what is really nothing more than plain and simple pathological behavior.
We have all acted as victims: children, youth, adults and the elderly, men and women, blacks, Indians and whites, poor, rich. There is no exception to this rule and the reason is that, except for some privileged, people do not know how their mind works, how they create a false reality based on irrational thoughts that generate conflict and suffering. And what would be the solutions?
- Accept that you usually live from a victim position, without denying or avoiding it. Decide to live from a new mental position, the responsibility of cause, which consists in accepting that in some measure and sometimes totally, you are responsible for everything that happens and you accept that happen in your life. Ask yourself: What am I doing to make this happen to me? Accept the new premise that you do not react to events, situations or people, but to your interpretation or opinion about them. It is not what you do without what you think you should or should not do that affects you. Discover the list of people and excuses you have for victimizing yourself. Stay alert and relaxed, to avoid reacting automatically. Ask someone close to you to tell you if you are being victimized.a close friend or partner who shows you when you are victimized.
Take these reflections, work on them, and rise above the functional mediocrity of going through life blaming others for what each of us has chosen to think, feel, do, accept and encourage. Observe yourself, know yourself and transform yourself. Thanks for reading me.
