The Victim in ‘Me’

The Victim in ‘Me’

How we use words and what they reveal about us is fascinating. The words we use reveal much about the thought processes and emotions within us. Equally interesting is the fact that the words we use can in turn impact our emotions and our thinking. Thoughts and emotions evoke words and words can in turn evoke thoughts and emotions.

Consider the following statements. You make me so mad. She drives me crazy. Nobody likes me. Woe is me! Why me? All these declarations demonstrate the victimization of ‘me.’ Everything is happening to ‘me.’ ‘Me’ has no ownership of anything. ‘Me’ is the simply the submissive receiver of all these actions and emotions. ‘Me’ is powerless in all these interactions. When we use ‘me’ we tend to make passive statements about what is happening to us and unfortunately we all too often turn those declarations into negatives. We create the narrative of the victimization of me.

Now consider these proclamations. I get mad when you do that. I feel crazy when says those things. I feel like I am disliked. I feel desperate. I don’t understand what’s happening. These mean essentially the same as the previous statements but in this case ‘I’ is making declarative statements about themselves and their thoughts and feelings. ‘I’ is not passive. There is ownership in the declarations. For better or worse, when we use ‘I’ we are making pronouncements about ourselves: who we are and what we are doing. Strangely, we seem to protect the pronoun ‘I’ making excuses like “I didn’t know,” and “I thought that was correct.”

So it seems that we frequently paint ‘me’ as a victim and then we protect and exonerate ‘I’. This mixture results in our feeling and thinking like we are unwilling martyrs to life and the universe. Currently, our entire culture supports this perspective. Popular speaker and advertisements soothe your ego by telling you that none of your troubles are your fault. Your circumstances did this to you. Read this and buy that and you will entertained and you will feel better. Yet these hollow offerings leave us feeling out of control and deprived. In this state we can be most easily manipulated into buying products, ideas and beliefs. That is how most businesses and governments want us to be. This state of mind is not accidental.

There is an alternative to this programmed victimized thinking. First and foremost, verbally and in thought, do not use your words against yourself. Unless you can make your declarations positive then avoid ‘me’ in your thinking and your words. When the word ‘me’ does appear in you words pay attention to how you are using it. Do your utmost to avoid martyring ‘me.’ Next, own your life with ‘I’ statements. Do not try, wish or want. State what you *are* actually doing and what you fully intend to *do*. When speaking or thinking of the past make sure that you do not belittle your actions by stating what you did not know, understand or do.

When you make identifying statements ensure that they are affirming. Declare positively who you are. Own your emotions and feelings, even the negative ones. It’s okay to say that you are angry, sad, upset, confused, frightened or anxious *and* it does not need to be someone or something else’s fault. Let go of fault and blame; they hold no value for you and only work to create further victims in others. Let each one own their action, thoughts and feelings. Seek to understand how all those elements worked together to create the outcomes that followed. Exercise grace towards yourself and others, again in thought, word and action. Through practice of such mindful thinking we can turn the victim in ‘me’ into a champion and ‘I’ can learn to grown and overcome all the tragedies that befall us!

©2018 Scott D. Wilson

Choose Your Pain

Choose Your Pain

“Growth is painful.
Change is painful.
Yet nothing is as painful as staying stuck Somewhere that you don’t belong.”
–Author Unknown

In this life, there will be pain.  Some of that pain will be unavoidable.  The loss of loved ones, tragic accidents and unforeseeable disasters are just part of living.  Other pain will be optional.  Being honest helps us to prevent the shame of being caught in a lie.  Acting in a timely manner helps to evade the pain of regret. Living a sedentary lifestyle avoids many physical pains, at least in the short term.  However, many life decisions carry pain on both sides.  Avoiding relationships can avert the pain of rejection but it can lead to the ache of loneliness and solitude.

So in reality, life is careful balance between the pursuit of pleasures and the avoidance of pains.  It is in pursuing this balance that we can fall into grave errors.  Too often, many of us avoid short term discomfort and thereby forego long term benefits.  Growth and change are positive actions that grant long term benefits.  However, growth and change usually involve some painful and unpleasant situations.  Looking back on honestly on our failures, mistakes and errors in order to understand them and learn from them is a very humbling and uneasy process.  However, failure to perform such reflection on our actions results in our suffering the repetition of these same behaviours an incurring the same agonizing results.

Likewise, our desire to maintain our comfort keeps us in places that eventually create anguish and distress.  Abuse of credit to keep a certain lifestyle will ultimately lead to a tormenting situation in the future.  Physically being sedentary is enjoyable for many years but eventually that lifestyle will lead to suffering and illness.  Our bodies were designed to be active and proper activity comes with some inconvenience and discomfort.  If we unwisely ignore the future results of our choices then our decisions to avoid pain or to pursue pleasure will end in unexpected sorrow.

So this is our daily challenge:  Choose your pain.  Accept that life will have some pain.  You cannot avoid it all.  Hedonism will ultimately have to pay the piper one day.  We cannot avoid paying the eventual cost for either our negligence or indulgence.  Pick your pain wisely.  Understand both the benefits and the cost – short term and long term.  Ask if what feels good now will hurt in the future.  Question if the pain that you are avoiding presently might have some ultimate benefit that you require.  Learn from the pain of that past and use that learning and experience to shrewdly pick your pains today so that tomorrow you might evade significant agonies and instead harvest the better pleasures that you so greatly desire.

“Life is pain, highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something.”
― William Goldman (“The Princess Bride”)

©2018 Scott D. Wilson

The Greatest Power

The Greatest Power

“How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world.” -William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice

As an engineer and scientist, I have studied power. Gravitational, nuclear, electrical, chemical, thermal and magnetic forces are just a few of the many cosmic elements of power in the material realm. Science defines power as force acting upon objects to do work. And so it is in mankind’s societies and culture. Worldly power is the ability to influence people to do things.

In science, work is force applied over a distance. Another way of looking at that is to say that work is power applied to make changes in the state of physical objects. Thermal power applied to a pot of water makes it boil. Electrical power applied to a motor makes it turn. The power of an idea applied to people’s lives can change their actions and the very nature of their existence.

It has been my experience that the greatest power in the universe is the power to change a single life. Obviously, this power can be both wisely used or foolishly abused. A harsh cruel word can cripple a soul. A kind act or even a simple smile can soothe a wounded spirit. If we use the power of our choices and actions wisely we can alter the course of a life for the better, and like a droplet of water upon a still pool the effects can radiate outwards into the world touching countless other people and their existences.

Truly, the power to change a single life has an unimaginable impact on the universe. We can never know the extent of the effect across time and space. No one is an island. One life touches so many others throughout bot time and space. With our limited viewpoint all we can personally see is the one existence that we may have changed. Yet our simplest actions could yield effects across many lives and generations.

The question arises: Knowing this now, how does one choose to act upon it? You personally have the greatest unimaginable power to change a single life: your own! Many thoughts will enter your mind today. Will you entertain the positive, constructive and loving ones, or will you dwell upon the dark, fearful and destructive ones? Will you treat yourself with kindness, gentleness and respect, or will you allow yourself to act carelessly inflicting harm to your body, mind or spirit? Will your actions today foster feelings of belonging, joy and peace or will they lead to the poisonous emotions of envy, greed, bitterness and anger.

Many seem to crave power in the hopes to use it to work a change of state in their outer lives. Oddly, these same folks usually fail to use their existing power where it will have the greatest impact working change upon the state of their inner existence. If you truly want the power to shine light upon this marvelous yet weary world in which we live then do it wisely starting with a single life: your own. Begin your good deeds within, that they may then shine forth into all the world through every life that you encounter.

©2017 S.D.Wilson

Are you offensive? Yes, good!

Are you offensive?  Yes, good!

By Scott Wilson

“Action Offends the Inactive” –Chris Shugart

I have covered an aspect of this subject once before using the analogy from the film ‘the Matrix’ and becoming unplugged.  However, my focus was more about projecting our own expectations upon others than about their reactions towards us.  I would like to cover here something that surprises so many people who seek to make improvements in their lives.

If you have set a goal and you are visibly putting in the effort daily to achieve that goal then I have news for you:  You are offensive to many of those around you.   Yes, you heard me.  You are a thorn in the side of some of your friends, family and acquaintances.  You are going against the flow.  Who do you think you are?  What makes you think that YOU deserve something better than everyone else?  What makes you special?

Sure, the people that you know may not actually make these statements but their words and actions will reflect the sentiment.  A colleague will make sideways comments about your improvement efforts.  A loved one will subtly discourage you from proceeding with your commitment to better yourself.  There will be some strong push from peers to go along and conform to the norm.  It surprises many people that the ones that are closest to them are often the source of their worst discouragement and temptations to quit.

You see, if you are successful in your efforts then others who see you will ask themselves “Why can’t I do what he or she did?” That is a very uncomfortable question.  If you can improve and succeed then that means that they will need to take responsibility for any lack of success and improvement in their own lives.  You are and they aren’t.  In effect, you actions are pointing an accusing finger at their inaction and that is offensive.

Most people want to live relatively comfortable lives free from blame and responsibility.  They are where they because that is where everyone is and that is okay.  Their environment is responsible for all that they have or do not have.  They merely react in response to what is around them.  They did not ask to be born into the life that they are living.  They are simply doing the best with what they have.  Only the special, the lucky, the fortunate and the blessed get anything different.  Good and bad happen by chance and so they are content to be in the middle above the poor and suffering but also below the few prosperous and successful.  Average is just fine for them.

There is nothing wrong with this.  Living a passive life is quite acceptable and billions do it successfully every single day.  Most of the services and systems of our society are geared towards the average person and so this quiet acceptance is encouraged.  However, if anyone wants to leave this comfortable middle ground their efforts are questioned by those around them.  Why unnecessarily risk failure?

Another reason for people’s negative reactions towards you will be fear and resistance to change.  People like to label things.  It makes life easier.  Much of our identities are tied to the labels that have defined us.  Change upsets that.  For example, if you have always been conservative and down to earth and suddenly you start behaving in an excessive and risky manner this will confuse people.  So it is also when we seek to improve.  It will evoke fear to those closest to you.  They will wonder if they truly know you.  They may be concerned that this new and improved version of you may not want to be with them anymore.  They will then act and speak out of this anxiety either consciously or unconsciously.

Whether it is a poor reflection upon themselves or a fear of your changes, those who know you best can be expected to be a source of difficulty for you when you start following a dream or pursuing a goal. This is normal. Accept that you have become offensive to them through no fault of your own.  Don’t be hurt by their comments or actions.  It is a reflection of their own insecurities.  In truth, their responses have very little to do with you.  Instead, take such poor behaviour as proof that you are going in the right direction.  Use such potentially discouraging incidents as fuel to keep you moving on the better path.

Cheers!

©2017 Scott D. Wilson

Seeking Change

Seeking Change
By S.D. Wilson

"What is necessary to change a person is to change his awareness of himself."  ― Abraham H. Maslow

So you want to be successful?  You need to change and improve things in your life?  Anyone who has ventured down this path knows that self-improvement is difficult.  Changing habits and behaviours that we have lived with up to now often proves challenging.  Abraham Maslow knew this too, as he had studied many people who were successful in changing themselves.  He realized that when embarking on personal change that one of the first things we must change is our awareness of ourselves. 

Each of us walks around with an image of ourselves in our heads.  This image has formed over time and it is an accumulation of views that were given to us by family, friends and society as we grew up.  In addition to their views we have formed our own ideas about ourselves based on life experience in general.  Unfortunately, all of these views have a measure of error in them.  Unless they are significantly challenged then we treat these images as if they were fact.  It reminds me of the words of American philosopher William James:

"Whenever two people meet, there are really six people present. There is each man as he sees himself, each man as the other person sees him, and each man as he really is." 

James used the image of two people meeting to illustrate the difficulties of interacting with our world based on erroneous perceptions of ourselves and others.  This is the root the trouble when we seek self-improvement.  Who is it that we are changing?  How do they think?  How do they feel?  What makes them tick?  If our answers to these questions contain errors and assumptions then our efforts will meet with frustration and ultimately failure.  

You cannot change what you do not understand.  Most of us do not understand ourselves very well. We are somewhat unconscious or unaware of our own make-up.  We have emotions but we do not understand them.  We have thoughts but we do not know what to do with them.  We perceive things and we do not comprehend them and their context.  It is no wonder that most spiritual practices pursue enlightenment, awakening, wisdom, illumination or transcendence.   So valuable is this understanding of oneself and one's environment that people have used every method imaginable to obtain it:  mediation, contemplation, exercise, physical deprivation, dangerous exertion, long journeys, psychedelic drugs, tests of pain and endurance and much more.

Many would mock these people for their efforts.  They would question the payout of their labours.  Yet the value of any success has spurred many people onward in these pursuits for thousands of years.  To succeed in a better understanding of ourselves makes the task of self-improvement so much simpler.  To know who we are and who we are not is powerful.   To understand our strengths and weaknesses, our virtues and our vices, allows one to see and avoid many pitfalls.  By changing our awareness of ourselves we are able to focus our energies where they are most effective and we are less prone to being blindsided.

When you realize that you are naturally impatient then it does not surprise or upset you when you catch yourself being impatient; you can laugh and say "Hello, old friend." When you recognize that you deeply enjoy helping others then you can craft your life so that it fulfills this pleasure more often.  When you come to understand that you respond to boredom and fatigue by seeking the comfort of foods then you can learn to address these stresses with healthier options.  You can uncover your fears and face them.  You can discover your true joys and pursue them.  In short, if your self-awareness changes then you are able to truly make positive changes in yourself.

So if you are seeking improvement and change in your life don't neglect yourself.  Know that changing your self-awareness will make your path to improvement smoother.  Pay attention to your heart, your emotions, your thoughts and your senses.  They will teach you more about yourself than about the people and things that surround you.  Invest the time to get better acquainted with yourself by whatever means work best for you.  Walk, sit, meditate, dance, pray, laugh, sing. find your personal classroom of self-discovery.  Take heed of the wise observations of a man who studied successful people and change how you look at that person on the mirror before you embark on a project to change them.

"One can choose to go back toward safety or forward toward growth. Growth must be chosen again and again; fear must be overcome again and again." ― Abraham H. Maslow

©2017 Scott D. Wilson

I Have Fat

I Have Fat
©2015 Scott D. Wilson, P.Eng.

I love language. It is just one way to communicate but it can be used to convey so much more than information. The words that we use and how we use them can reveal a lot about ourselves and our thought processes. Even punctuation can have a powerful effect… it can even save lives. There is a huge difference between “Let’s eat Bobby!” and “Let’s eat, Bobby!”

All kidding aside, we use words and language every single day but we rarely reflect on our language and understand how it influences us. Language affects our emotions, our thinking and even how we see and perceive the world around us. Words like Nazi, holocaust, pedophile, rape and 9-11 have powerful emotions attached to them; most people have significant feelings evoked when they hear these words used in speech or see them written.

How words and language affect out thinking and view of the world is more subtle by nonetheless real. I am privileged to be fluent in two languages: English and French. I can tell you that when I am speaking in French I am also thinking in French. Translating on the fly from English to French is too slow; this only happens when one is still in the early stages of learning a language. I explain this because I can tell you that French thinking is not the same as English thinking.

Here is a simple example that I like. In French, many of the states of being are possessive verbs instead of identifying verbs. In French, I have cold and I have hunger so one does not identify oneself as being cold or hungry but rather having these states. In English we say “I miss you.” This statement speaks about one’s own thoughts and emotions towards the absent party. In French we say “You are missing from me.” This phrasing evokes a much deeper connection to the other person; it is a statement of incompleteness.

Some might argue that this is all mere semantics but I must firmly disagree.  The statement “I am…” is a very strong statement of being and identification.  Possession is not mentally the same.  I can easily have or get something and then give it away or lose it.  It is much harder to change who we are or an identity.  When someone states “I am fat,” how does this person stop being fat?  How and when can the person change state from fatness to non-fatness?  In English we often identify ourselves with a transient state of being.  No wonder so many of us struggle with poor self-esteem and self-image.

I suggest a revolution of language.  Reimagine your use of words:

• I am not fat.  I have fat.
• I am not angry.  I have anger.
• I am not depressed.  I have depression.
• I am not afraid.  I have fear.

If you have something undesirable then you can work to eliminate it or reduce it.  Free yourself from identifying with your detrimental physical and emotional states.  Something as simple as changing your language can alter your thinking and help you to move from victim to victor!  Stop being a casualty to these words.  You have the power to change these things.  They do not define you and who you are.  Change you words.  Change your mind.  Change your life. And yes, even begin to change this world!