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Self-Care Tip #245 – Our feelings begin and end with Me.
Are we victims of victims? I know I blame people and am not above a good rant on all the why’s “I feel this way!”…. However, the cleanest air I’ve ever breathed is when I’ve stepped out of that space and started naming myself responsible for my own feelings.
Slavery comes in many ways. Thinking about being a slave by our own design is an odd twist but choosing the victim role does it. Choosing freedom to self-care is liberation by the same government. This is a cornerstone of understanding the “Five W’s and One H” of self-care.
Victims also generate victims not only of themselves but also of others. Somehow the emotions, heavy, immobilizing, irritable, angry, coming off of the person in the victim role are absorbed by others if those others aren’t seriously insightful and vigilant against them. Considering this, we can understand the difficulty of being present, in the moment and not either running away or trying to change the person in the victim role. (Remember the 3 C’s?) Anyone porous to them is at risk. Too often, we all find ourselves pointing, pounding, pity-party preaching victims – none of us naming ourselves responsible for our own feelings.
We know that we are more prone to personalizing things when we suffer different emotional illnesses. In this case, we can’t help but catch the familiar features of depression. There are other illnesses of course with these symptoms, but an irritable depression is one of the most difficult to endure for all parties. Sometimes, simply gaining insight into our coping skills can make us better friends to ourselves. That is such a relief.
Too often however, being the victim is not fully under our control. Too often being the victim is a symptom of the disease process that came without an invitation. Also, just as often or more, the person in the victim role doesn’t have insight into any of these aspects – their choice into slavery, their influence on others, their medical condition generating these symptoms or their options to gain healing.
I could easily tell you a number of word-pictures, maybe describing the before or after treatment, maybe letter-layering the innumerable ripples that self-care made on the world after treatment or maybe I will more easily just not. All these stories bring me, at this late hour of our week, too close to those contagious emotions and I’d just rather not. Maybe you’d like to share though?
Questions:
- When you started owning your feelings for things that you never thought had anything to do with you, what were your thoughts? How did it ripple out of you and affect others?
- What do you see at the cornerstones of self-care?
- Please tell us your story!
Related Articles
- Recovering From the Victim Identity (psychologytoday.com)
- Patient on Patient Crime – Our Response to Our Own Illness (friendtoyourself.com)
- Be Aware of Your Feelings and Your Body Function When Getting Friendly With Yourself (friendtoyourself.com)
- Victims, Victimizers and Victimization (fatthenfitnow.wordpress.com)
- What Does Calling Someone a “Victim” Mean? (psychologytoday.com)
- If You Love Me, Give Me Less But Give To Me Bigger and Better (friendtoyourself.com)
Define yourself! Amen sister!
i can hear the gospel music! whoohoo!
Someone once told me that being a victim is a conscious choice, wish I could remember her exact words. I guess self care equates to self love?
let’s just say its you 😉 saying it!
It is a wonderful feeling when you start owning. I love …we all find ourselves pointing, pounding, pity-party preaching victims – ….it not only feels good on the tongue but is so dead on!
Chris
thank u chris.
When I was well enough to search back through my parents’ lives, I discovered why I thought I was a victim. Understanding where they came from – what their lives were like; how they perceived loving and being loved, caring and being cared for; how their parents treated them – I began to understand that THEY were the victims because they didn’t understand, or care to understand, who or what they were. Self care began for me when I began to care for myself not as a victim but as a person with emotional problems. Owning my own problems rather than blaming them on my parents was a HUGE step in my healing process.
this was really a lovely share nancy. appreciating u. keep on.
I began to see myself as a verb. I did the thing(active voice) or it got done to me(passive voice). It was the beginning of discerning what I owned and what was not my business to develop a self identity while interacting with the external world. Unfortunately and much to my chagrin (and to the same for most people) I wound up owning stuff that I did not want, did not buy, and could not sell or give away. Self care has helped me dis-own somethings imposed upon me. Not too many takers out there for my junk, however.
too cool. great take. awesome in fact. verb is tangible, visual, basic as well as complicated.
…let us know what your junk is and we’ll see if there r any takers ;). keep on.
one of the corner stones i have seen in self care is i am ending up in hospital less and less not tole wiped out but still better and another it seems to take less time for me to recover one day i might be recovered completly
time to recovery as a point of reflection/mile-marker – nice kev. thank u for sharing w us kevin. keep on mr. courage.
Great post. I came to realise a long time ago after my 1st marriage ended in divorce that I had to take responsibility for myself when I was on my own. I was stuck in victim mode for quite a while after & it wasn’t until I realised that I had to put that victim thing aside before I could move on. I am now a firm believer in accepting consequences for your own actions as too many people regardless of the circumstances often refuse to look within themselves to see why their life is heading the way it is. It’s all too easy to blame others for our problems. for example on I often hear when someone is booked for a traffic offence is “the cops are just revenue raising” or some other excuse that they put back on the police rather than simply accepting that they got booked for breaking the law, a consequence of their own actions. Oops sorry I am rambling on…
hello tony! what a treat to connect w u here. i’m so grateful that u r sharing these bits of your story. many need to know they are not alone and hearing u helps. i luv your take on victims too! keep on.
I’ve found such power and freedom in taking responsibility for how I feel. It’s not always easy to own my part for how I’m feeling because doing so means I have to make a couple of choices and possibly take action. I ask myself a couple of questions:
1-What am I feeling
2-Why am I feeling this way
3-What do I need to do to change the way I’m feeling
4-Am I willing to do this
If I’m not willing to take action then I suck it up and don’t complain-it’s my choice.
this is awesome kaily. what a woman u r.