Victim Mentality
Enjoy mulling over this lesson. I'm well aware that it’s long for a blog posting, but completely worth the read and application. I’ll not send another lesson of mine out until January 20th, so that should give each of you plenty of time to slowly work your way through the information I provided. This is a lesson that God laid on my heart and convicted me of as I worked on arranging it. I can’t pinpoint one particular event that sparked and initiated this particular sin in my life, but I’m thankful that the Lord brought it to the surface as He continues to refine me. I’m definitely beginning the process of repentance and application, and I’m already starting to see positive results from it as I press on. Feel free to work this lesson into a Sunday School / Small Group lesson as well.
All for His glory and for our growth in Him.
Practicing His Presence,
Nate

Condensed Version:
This lesson is on victim mentality, not victim-hood. If you struggle with a victim mentality, then hopefully this lesson will help you see how you can live out being an overcomer in Christ.

Self-Examination Time…Introductory Questions:

• Honestly work your way through the questions provided in the Extended Version to see if you possess the sin of victim mentality.

What are some ways in which victim mentality individuals can approach their current state-of-mind / given circumstance(s)?

• Here are some Biblical Examples of those who possessed this Victim Mentality…examples not to follow after:
  • The lame man waiting to enter the pool of water.
  • The Israelite's slavery and wandering in the wilderness.
  • The prodigal son’s brother.  
  • The 12 men who went to spy on Canaan.

• Consider the following Biblical Examples that God addresses in His word…godly examples to follow after who had every right to use their victim card yet chose not to:
  • The Early Church (dispersion and martyrdom)
  • The Apostle Paul
  • Jesus Christ

 
What are some common Potential Signs and Consequences of possessing a Victim Mentality…(Taken from the articles I listed below. None of these are in my own words except for categorizing them and adding a few verses. These are in no particular order, but are in the same order as listed in the Extended Version):
 
Proverbs 23:7 (KJV)  For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he:
Judges 8:21b (NIV) 'As is the man, so is his strength.'"

• Paranoid
• Always Blame Shifting
• Difficult to be around and deal with
• Refuses Counsel, Refuses Help and Healing, and is Unapproachable
• Resisting and Unwilling to Achieve Change…lacking personal responsibility
• Depressed
• Negative Personality
• Lonely (refusing accountability)
• Consumed Mind (thinks all day with a victim mentality and then can’t focus on that which God would have you to)
• Avoided by others because you’ve become a garrulous person around them.
• Garrulous (someone who won’t stop talking about it)
• Allowed and Developed Character/Lifestyle
• Developed a Cognitive Distortion
  • Ways in which our mind convinces us of something that isn’t really true.
  • A Wrong / Distorted View of God / a false theology.
• Paralyzed by Self-Pity
• Self-Dependent
• Trapped in an imaginary prison
• Limiting…keeps a person from living out their potential
• Inhibits (hinders/restrains/prevents) Spiritual Growth
• Bitter
• Unforgiving
• Cyclical Effect
• Narcissistic
• Loses or Shifts Focus / Self-Consumed (Prideful)
• Feeling Powerless / Enslaved
• Lacks Discernment
• Leaves little to no room for the Greatest Gift (Love)
• Lacks Trust and has Lost Hope / Numb to Everything
• Self-Defeated / Lacks Motivation
• Unrepentant and Blinded
• Complains Continually
• Becomes a Manipulator

 
Steps to Breaking Free from a Victim Mentality:
 
Pray to the God of the Bible:

• Philippians 4:6 (ESV) do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
• Specific Requests:
  • Specific Confession / Repentance.
  • Help me see what I have become blinded to.
  • Help me resolve grief and anger and bitterness and judgement.
  • Humble me.
  • Help me renew / change my way of thinking (my heart) and acting.
    • Enjoy the bullet point on Planting a New Tree…very helpful application.
  • Help me to have a correct perspective as to who You truly are.
  • Help me to stop thinking/living like a victim a begin thinking/living like a victor.
  • Help me to see how You’d have me to move forward.
  • Restore my community relationships.
    
    

Closing and Prayers:

• Closing…
  • Ask yourself, “Am I constantly living as a victim or victor?
  • If constantly feeling victimized is something you struggle with, then let me encourage you to take a look at the additional related articles below, and spend some time in prayer and honest self-examination.
    • Additional Related Articles are listed in the Extended Version.
• Prayers from others for you.
  • For your salvation if you haven’t already received Christ as Savior.
    • Give your life over to Him.
  • For confession, repentance and forgiveness of sins.
  • Freedom from slavery and sin.
  • Remove the barriers that previously existed.
  • To resolve the current and or past issues of your heart.
  • No more blame. Begin standing up, and taking hold of what God says about you. Hold on to and embrace the Truth.
  • To take ownership of all your ways and choices.
  • Turn from the old and Return to the Father.
  • For a change of mind and a change of heart…put on whole new ways of thinking and living.
    • Put off the victim mentality…confront any and all ungodly thinking. 
  • To no longer be isolated and distant.
  • Welcome help and counsel.
  • For healing, and restoration. Restore relationships, especially an intimate relationship with your Creator.  
  • For an open heart, and for an increasing awareness of God’s love.
  • That you would feel His presence.
  • That you’d represent your Savior well.
  • Become productive for Him.
  • Day by day meditating in the truth, rejecting the lies, evaluating your thoughts as they come in – Ask yourself, “does this line up with the word of God?”
  • Reject ungodly thoughts and ways of thinking.
  • That you’d be able to positively influence generations to come.
  • To remember that Christ can sympathize with you in your weaknesses.
  • To give God thanks and praise.

 
Extended Version:
Experiencing true victim-hood of varying degrees is a real deal and my points below are not stated with the intent to minimize or be insensitive to those specific and real circumstances. Traumatic events are very difficult to shake and sometimes seemingly impossible to forget. I would agree that, “There’s a fundamental difference between true victimhood and a victim mentality. A victim mentality is adopted, even when that person is not actually a victim of hurt or abuse. It is characterized by a ‘life is against me’ attitude. This mentality is limiting; it keeps a person from living out their potential.” How the Cross Defeats My Victimhood
I also want to point out that, “A victim mentality is a way of thinking. It's a way you think. It has to do with your thought life. It is a way of looking at life and interpreting it. It is a belief system in the heart, so it's a whole way of thinking and believing, the way you approach your life…So a victim then, a victim mentality is a mentality where the person - now notice this - they will not take responsibility. That's the bottom line. They refuse to assume responsibility. They choose rather to make excuses for why life is like it is and to find someone or something to blame. When you blame someone you put responsibility on them, you remove it from yourself and leave yourself powerless and resentful at how life sucks. This is a way of thinking, it's an internal choice in your heart.” Breaking Free from Victim Mentality
Therefore, please keep in mind that it is the victim mentality aspect that I’ve intended to be the focal point of this lesson. There are some who walk around like Eeyore and continually live in a victimized mentality state-of-mind and my goal is to help such individuals, myself included, who struggle in this area see how they can be overcomers in Christ…the way He intended for us to live.

Self-Examination Time…Introductory Questions:

• This may be hard to hear and receive, but choosing to possess a victim mentality is a sin.
  • Ask yourself before and after reading this lesson, “Do I possess the sin of victim mentality?”
    How would those closest to you answer that for you?
• Here are some additional questions to ask yourself and see how you’d answer them…I’m sure other questions will come up along the way, but we’ll begin with these for now.
  • “Do you have patterns in your relationships where they turn and go ugly? Do you have a history of hurting people, or being hurt yourself? I'm hurt, I seem to get so hurt in relationships - ooh oh, you've got a problem inside you. Okay then - do you blame yourself, or blame others? Do you find you've got a blame thing going on in your life? That usually means a victim mentality. Do you find you're often frustrated, angry, [and] resentful? You've probably got a victim mentality, and are not recognising you're operating out of: I'm powerless, I have no choices, when you really do. Do you feel smothered, or have you felt smothered and unimportant in your family life? Has someone ripped you off, someone hurt you, someone betray you? Who [here] would prefer to stay like the older brother [(referring to the Prodigal Son’s brother)] in the house, bitter, resentful, angry, twisted, unloving, cold, unable to connect with the JOY of what God is doing in other's lives?” Breaking Free from Victim Mentality

What are some ways in which victim mentality individuals can approach their current state-of-mind / given circumstance(s)?

• Here are some Biblical Examples of those who possessed this Victim Mentality…examples not to follow after:
  • The lame man waiting to enter the pool of water (John 5:1-15). Did he really want to be healed? Began to blame his ailment, but how many previous opportunities did he really pass up on?
  • The Israelite's slavery and wandering in the wilderness. Became complainers, bitter and angry. Began blaming Moses and God.
  • The prodigal son’s brother (Luke 15:11-32)…He was angry…he isolated, pulled away from relationship, pulled away from his father, pulled away from celebration, pulled away from connection and community. He acted as though he was right in his own mind (eyes), and began to blame the Father as the source of his problems.
    • I've been here all these years serving you. I never did anything like he did. You never gave me any of my goats [to celebrate anything I’ve done], I could have fun with my friends and a party with my friends [but I’ve been busy for you and you apparently fail to recognize that]. As soon as this son of yours comes [back home], [after he’d] devoured his livelihood with the prostitutes, you [welcomed and reward him and] killed the fatted calf for him. What kind of father are you? What kind of justice is this?
    • [The Prodigal Son’s brother] substituted works for relationship. He just worked hard for his father, but never knew his father. He had no emotional relationship with his father, and had no understanding of his father's heart. That's what his problem was. He substituted for relationship, being good and working hard. Lots of people do that to be loved. He developed a victim mentality in many areas of his life. When we substitute works for relationship, we are convinced we're right, and we can't receive the things we want to receive from God.
  • The 12 men who went to spy on Canaan. 10 of them felt inferior and saw themselves as grasshoppers in comparison to the giants in the land. The challenge in front of them was inconceivable / impossible. Began blaming God, not trusting His promises, and entertained the thought of running back to slavery (Egypt). In all reality they failed to trust God and resisted advancing the kingdom of God as He wanted them to.

• Consider the following Biblical Examples that God addresses in His word…godly examples to follow after:
  • The Early Church (experiencing dispersion and martyrdom).
    • It’d be good for us to recall that, “the early church suffered persecution, were victimised, hunted down, treated like criminals, were put on display, and fought with animals and destroyed by animals…the early martyrs, and people right down through history…gave their life for Christ…in the face of opposition, they never quit. They stood up for what they believed in…Some conquered nations, so the Book of Hebrews is full of people who by faith won victories, victories over lions, victories over enemies, victories of all kinds. The Bible abounds with people who dared to believe God, and broke through.” Breaking Free from Victim Mentality
  • The Apostle Paul.
    • One author points out that “Paul had some difficulties: beatings, stonings, shipwrecks. If God was on His side, you'd think that He could have at least told him to catch the right boat, but three times the boat he was on sank. He's there in the water, holding on to pieces of wood. Not nice [conditions at all] – but he never, thought like a victim. In prison, chained to a Roman soldier, he never, thought like a victim, or as one imprisoned. He said: In all these things we are more than conquerors! Whatever you're facing in your life, believe me, you have got it in you, you are more than a conqueror. Of course if you don’t believe that, if you think you’re a victim, you’re in trouble.” Breaking Free from Victim Mentality
      • In Philippians 4:11-13 (NIV) the Apostle Paul states that, “11 I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. 12 I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. 13 I can do all this through him who gives me strength.”
  • Jesus Christ Himself.
    • Hard to imagine, but “Jesus also had painful experiences. The Scriptures tell us that Jesus wasn't particularly physically attractive (Is. 53:2). The Evangelists constantly draw our attention to the fact that he was ridiculed by His brothers (John 7:3-5), mocked by his fellow church members (Matt. 9:24), forsaken by his disciples (Matt. 26:31; 56), falsely accused by powerful government officials (Luke 23:6-12)  and crucified with criminals (Mark 15:27-28). As a boy, Jesus was most likely scorned [or bullied] by His friends on account of the fact that his mother conceived out of wedlock--though she was a virgin (John 8:41). We can be sure that Jesus had many other painful childhood experiences. Yet, he never adopted a victim mentality. Jesus never played the victim card. He never allowed his past circumstances [to] keep him from pressing on in order to accomplish the will of His Father in Heaven. The writer of Hebrews brings the experiences of Christ to the forefront of the secret of Christian growth in grace when he tells us that Jesus ‘was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin’ (Heb. 4:15). On account of that, he can sympathize with us in our weaknesses. We have a great High Priest who was touched with the feelings of our infirmities. This is what qualifies Jesus to be the perfect helper in our time of weakness. No one will sympathize with us like Jesus. No one has power to change us but Jesus. Jesus became the man of sorrows in order to help His people in their time of sorrow. He never allows us to live in our sin, and never turns His back on us when we come to Him for grace and mercy to help in time of need (4:16).” Jesus and the Victim Card
      
      

What are some common Potential Signs and Consequences of possessing a Victim Mentality…? (Taken from the articles I listed below. None of these are in my own words except for categorizing them and adding a few verses. These are in no particular order.):
 
Proverbs 23:7 (KJV)  For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he:
Judges 8:21b (NIV) 'As is the man, so is his strength.'"

• Once something is locked into a person's heart, their life will begin to cycle around that.

• Paranoid:
  • The feeling like everyone / the world is against you.
• Always Blame Shifting:
  • You don’t take ownership for your own flaws.
  • Constantly blaming others for all that’s wrong with your life.
  • Constantly choosing to make excuses for why life is like it is, and to find someone or something to blame.
  • A victim has to blame someone, so a victim says: you're my persecutor, it's you. You did this to me. You're doing this to me. It was that boss of mine who did it - and so victims always have got someone to blame.
  • Usually when people have a victim mentality, they find a way to blame someone who is over them, a parent, a boss, a teacher, someone in authority anywhere, in their workplace.
    
  • Financial struggles, inability to find a job, and failed relationships are constantly someone else’s fault. If everything is the other’s fault, why try to change?
  • Never taking personal responsibility / ownership…it's become easier to play a victim than to be responsible.
• Difficult Personality:
  • Known as a difficult person to be around.
• Refuses Counsel, Help and Healing, and is Unapproachable:
  • No amount of friendship or counseling ever helps…wisdom falling on deaf ears.
  • Doesn’t really want healing / to be made well.
    • A lot of times people want the healing, but don’t want to embrace what a healed life looks like. That is what a victim promotes: rescuing with very little personal participation.
  • Victim mentality sabotages everything, and here's how it sabotages it. Because the thinking is: I'm the victim, it's not my fault you know. It's not my fault, it's someone else's fault, I'm right! That's the way a victim will think, I'm right, and I'd rather be right than have a relationship, so I'll be right and I'll have a breach, rather than actually be vulnerable and declare maybe I'm not right, and even if I am I really want relationship. So victims view life through someone else is the cause of their problems, and so they're the victim.
• Resisting and Unwilling to Achieve Change…lacking personal responsibility:
  • Change doesn’t happen because there is no personal responsibility.
  • Wanting to live as a victim in order to get pity, attention, and sympathy.
  • No matter how much preaching you get, you never break out or change your patterns.
  • Refusing to identify and change your heart beliefs.
  • Refusing to find resolution.
• Depressed:
  • You may be considered depressive with those nearest to you…unable to be motivated by any encouragement and reward.
• Negative:
  • Constantly pushing people away with your negativity.
  • You may be negative with those nearest to you, unable to be motivated by any encouragement and reward.
• Lonely (refusing accountability):
  • Struggling to form community.
  • Continually failing in relationships and life.
  • Cannot develop and or succeed in forming emotional intimacy in relationships.
  • Damaging meaningful relationships.
    
  • Isolating and withdrawing…As people leave, you believe this “proof” that no one cares about your situation and allow yourself to become further isolated from community.
    
  • No one can please God and grow in their knowledge of Him when intentionally separating themselves from His Church. Discipleship requires accountability, which is something a victim mentality runs away from.
• Consumed Mind (thinks all day with a victim mentality and then can’t focus on that which God would have you to):
  • Can’t think on anything else…nothing positive. Consuming your mind with the same negative situation(s).
  • Allowing these thought patterns to ingrain themselves into your mind, and blinded to the fact that you are doing it.   
• Avoided:
  • You’ve become the garrulous one that some avoid…they turn and walk the other way so they don’t have to hear your story over and over again.
    • Remember, they’ve offered help previously and that was rejected by you. If you didn’t listen to them then, then is your same situation and story worth their time? Time is precious to everyone…can you really blame them for wanting to avoid your unresolved negativity?
• Garrulous (someone who won’t stop talking about it):
  • Talking about these struggles ad nauseam (To a nauseating or sickening degree. Having been done or repeated so often that it has become annoying or tiresome). Wiktionary Definition
    • Rehearsing over and over again. Stewing over it. Repeatedly bringing it up. Refusing to close the book and put a period on it. Continued chapters littered with unhealed pain…carrying that story into many different situations, projecting it onto future encounters [what I’ll call Progressive Victimization].
• Allowed and Developed Character/Lifestyle:
  • It becomes your recognized character.
  • The victim mentality becomes your personal identity…it’s become your lifestyle.
• Cognitive Distortion:
  • “Cognitive distortions are simply ways that our mind convinces us of something that isn’t really true. These inaccurate thoughts are usually used to reinforce negative thinking or emotions — telling ourselves things that sound rational and accurate, but really only serve to keep us feeling bad about ourselves…[Noticeable in 15 different ways:] Filtering; Polarized Thinking (or “Black and White” Thinking); Overgeneralization; Jumping to Conclusions; Catastrophizing; Personalization; Control Fallacies; Fallacy of Fairness; Blaming; Shoulds; Emotional Reasoning; Fallacy of Change; Global Labeling; Always Being Right; [and] Heaven’s Reward Fallacy.” Complete Article on what are Cognitive Distortions
  • Developing distorted perspectives and limited thinking.
  • A Wrong / Distorted View of God / a false theology.
    • Over the years I have seen many, many believers let go of God, because in the circumstances of life, their heart did not embrace God in His truth.
    • You say you believe in the power of Jesus, but not His power over your particular situation.
    • The feeling of being separated from the love of God.
      
    • Internally your heart measures up your life experience against what scripture has to say, and you conclude something is wrong here, between what you experience and what scripture is saying to you.
      
    • You begin to judge God.
      
    • You begin to reject and disbelieve Him.
      
• Paralyzed by Self-Pity:
  • Rather than experiencing growth in grace, you paralyze yourself by nurturing self-pity.
  • Oh it's not fair, life isn't fair, and life is too tough…Woe is me.
• Self-Dependent:
  • Instead of going to the Scriptures and to Christ, you form an unhealthy dependency on others.
• Trapped:
  • Feeling [like a mime] trapped in an imaginary prison.
• Limiting:
  • Such a victim mentality is limiting; it keeps you from living out your potential.
• Inhibits (hinders/restrains/prevents) Spiritual Growth:
  • You gradually push the Holy Spirit aside.
  • Resists growth…looking for the easy way out in all the wrong places.
  • Hampers your walk with the Lord and inhibits your own spiritual growth.
  • You’ve become satisfied and content with being Stuck Spiritually.
    • Not wanting to unlock your full potential and fulfill the destiny that God has for you.
    • You just put up with something less than what God intended for you.
      
    • Failing to want to receive all that God has prepared for you.
  • Feeling Unloved and Unlovable…is Resentful. Relies on works and not relationship (the lifestyle of the Prodigal Son’s brother):
    • Trying to find approval and love, that you didn't feel you had, and so you had a wrong belief inside you that went something like this: If I just work hard enough, I'll be noticed and approved and loved - and would you believe it, there was another belief in there as well: I'm unlovable. So no matter how hard I work, I'm never going to get the love I want. So year after year you work, work, work, work, work, work, work and you never have the emotional connection with your father that you were longing for, and you hoped would come with the work, because here's what had happened. When you thought you'd done really well, he would look at what was wrong, and see it could be better. What it does is it increases the pain, and then leads you to view life in a certain way. Did I know God loved me? I had it in my head, but the problem is, it's not in your head that it counts, it's in your heart. If your heart is programmed with I'm unlovable, you will remain a victim, and you'll always look and see all the reasons why things don't work out. You'll have every kind of excuse, every kind of reason. You'll blame everyone and this and that, even blame the devil. The devil will be the persecutor, Jesus is going to be the rescuer. You have a whole victim cycle operating in your life, and you don't learn to grow and become a son, who learns how to partner with God in life.
    • Now a victim mentality will steal your Godly inheritance…If you [choose to] stay in a victim mentality, there is no way you can rise into, and experience, the things God has planned for you.
• Bitter:
  • Instead of looking for a solution, instead of reaching out positively to God in expectation of a solution, the bitterness of your victim state rises up…
  • Your heart remains frozen in the bitterness and judgments and the lies of your past.
• Unforgiving:
  • When you play the victim role, you’re deciding to hold onto bitterness and anger and the certainty that you’ve been wronged — often without even investigating what the other's intention may have been. Poisoning your own experience with resentful thoughts.
• Cyclical Effect:
  • Similar emotions and consequences keep resurfacing.
  • By claiming the victim role, you are intensifying your pain. With victim identity in play, you’re not only suffering because of whatever happened, you’ve now added to that suffering the fact that you don’t get what others get, because you’re cursed, life and everyone in it is out to get you [(paranoid)], and basically the universe hates you.
• Narcissistic:
  • The belief that the universe (and other people’s behavior) revolves around you. Everything happens for, against (mostly against), and in relation to you. And you simultaneously think that God, and other people, share a primary intention to punish you.
  • Keeps Track…Provides a list of reasons as to why everyone is against you.
• Loses or Shifts Focus / Self-Consumed (Prideful):
  • Shifts our focus (our “worth-ship”) off of Jesus and onto ourselves. You’ve replaced God with yourself…you are what you consumes your life with.
  • We consider our story supreme to what Jesus did on the Cross.
  • Pride and self-focus take two different forms: Self-love and self-deprecation. In either case, you are focused on you, not on the strength and love of Almighty God. A victim mentality is ultimately self-focused, and you cannot live a life of eternal impact while thinking in this way.
  • Inability to tolerate or respect others discomforts.
    • The biggest reason you are disconnected is this: you've got blocks in the heart from being able to love, and you need a revelation of God's love, and a removal of the blocks.
  • Priority Shifts to Self:
    • Your priority becomes your situation, your past, your baggage, your story, with no room for Christ’s overcoming power.
• Feeling Powerless / Enslaved:
  • Feeling a sense of powerlessness and then projecting that onto the other, who becomes the one intentionally dis-empowering you.
    
  • You continue to think like a slave in bondage/chains.
    
• Lacks Discernment:
  • Jumping to your own conclusions / license to judge.
  • You often fail to investigate what the other's intention may have really been.
• Leaves little to no room for the Greatest Gift (Love):
  • Seeing all of life as a victim provides no room for love, hope and faith to operate fully in your life. (1 Corinthians 13:13…greatest of these is love).
    
  • Your love begins growing cold.
• Lacks Trust and has Lost Hope / Numb to Everything:
  • You've blocked off from your heart the true issues of your heart.
  • Carrying unbelief denies the possibility of your situation being changed. You lose hope and believe the lie that you have no more options.
    
  • You begin to substitute turning to God with medicating the pain.
    • Romans 8:31 (NIV) What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
      • Let’s face it…sometimes we’re our own worst enemy…sometimes we’re against ourselves and don’t want to see anyone, God included, as being for us.
• Self-Defeated / Lacks Motivation:
  • You end up defeating yourself from the inside out.
  • You’ve become an Eeyore…Woe is Me.
  • Thinking that life just ain’t fair.
  • Living life as a victim, rather than a victor.
    
  • Easily overcome by the subtle and mundane challenges. Nothing like what the early church experienced.
    
  • Failure to see difficult times as opportunities to see God’s goodness through it all.
    
• Unrepentant and Blinded:
  • Refusing to renounce the sin of a victim mindset.
    
  • Victim mentality is a way of seeing yourself, and a way of looking at life. A victim mentality is a mindset, and a heart belief system. If it was just the way you think, it would be easy to deal with. In fact you could go on the Internet and find some keys that are very, very helpful. However it's deeper than that, it goes right into the heart. So a victim mentality has to do with heart beliefs, and ways of thinking that continually sabotage your life and relationships.
    
• Complains Continually:
  • One of the first evidences of victim mentality, is complaining. Complaining puts you fair and square in the mentality of a victim. When people complain, they are just pouring out their grievance, injustice, and hurt, and not taking the responsibility that they could do something about this situation. Sometimes it's easier to complain, than to look what could I do about this? What are my options?
  • Complaining is toxic / infectious / a cancer. When you hear people bitterly complaining, you know they're infected with this kind of mentality. It brings disaster on people…if we don't shift mentality, we cannot enter all the good things that God has planned for us.
• Becomes a Manipulator:
  • Attempts to manipulate others to help you out of your mess.

 
Steps to Breaking Free from a Victim Mentality:
95% of the points below came from the following articles…
Breaking Free from Victim Mentality
How the Cross Defeats My Victimhood
https://psychcentral.com/lib/15-common-cognitive-distortions/
 
Pray to the God of the Bible:

• Philippians 4:6 (ESV) do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
• Specific Requests:
  • Specific Confession / Repentance.
    • “Please forgive me for ________.” (Clearly state what you’re requesting forgiveness for…not “if I sinned, then please forgive me,” but for what you did).
    • Repentance is a change of heart view, of heart belief, of heart approach. God has many things for us, but repentance, changing our belief system, is crucial to entering it. It's not about an external performance; it's about the heart welcoming truth, embracing it, and experiencing it.
    • When a person shares what's in their heart they're revealing their beliefs, who they really are. They're actually being quite open and transparent.
  • Help me see what I have become blinded to.
    • Ask God to help you to uncover what lies there. He’ll bring it to surface so He can refine you.
    • Make me aware of the pattern…the patterns of my thinking and believing.
      • And then help me to recognize and confront old patterns when they come back.
      • When you feel yourself being drawn back into that victim mentality, look to the cross.
      • Write a list of the ways you can change the bad situation. When you feel like a victim, you convince yourself that there’s nothing you can do to change your circumstances, but that’s almost never true. Get busy with how you can try and improve the situation, even if it feels impossible.
        • Writing often times helps you mind sweep. Communicate with God through writing (a journal), and possibly that’s a way to leave the issue(s) at His feet without continually mulling over those thoughts.
          • Writing it down will also help prevent you from seeing and writing the same words over and over again. Starving that garrulous characteristic.
  • Help me resolve grief and anger and bitterness and judgement.
    • I've got to resolve this stuff, or it’ll just keep operating in my life.
  • Humble me.
    • I take ownership of my way of thinking and actions.
      • Take every thought captive.
        • 2 Corinthians 10:5 (ESV) We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,
      • Stop blaming. When you hear yourself going into blame stories, whether against other people, the world, life, whomever... say “stop” to yourself out loud, and actually turn your attention away from your blaming thoughts.
      • I have power to choose what I do with my life; I can humbly grow through the experience and become a better person. I can change my life around, and I can shift what's happening.
      • The root issues are mine, and I'm going to take and embrace the process of change.
      • I take full responsibility for my personal life, my thoughts, beliefs, emotions, responses, words and actions. No more blame game - me!
      • We start by acknowledging our part. We cannot control the actions of others, but we can control our response. We do not answer to God for how people have sinned against us, but we do answer for how we acted in their wake. Rather than live in perpetual bondage to what others say and do, we commit them to the Lord and acknowledge anything we have done to offend His grace.
  • Help me renew / change my way of thinking (my heart) and acting.
    • I must shift the way I see life. I must shift in my heart and in my mind, in my words and in my actions. I must make a choice to change.
    • There's a place of healing, connected to people and connected to God, where we can actually resolve it, through talking about it, releasing forgiveness, repenting of our reactions…spend a bit of time renewing how you think, and how you act.
    • Cut off/Shut up/Refute the negative talk/attitude/thinking over and over again:
      • When someone comes near with negative words and a negative attitude, it's very easy to wrap them in our arms and hug them and love them and get into agreement with it and the spirit behind.
      • The negative thinking will slowly diminish overtime and be automatically replaced by more rational, balanced thinking.
      • Realize that negative words and negative attitudes are infectious like a plague. They're like a spiritual disease. Avoid negativity at all cost. Squelch it...pour water, not gasoline.
      • Replace negativity with positivity. Develop a positive mentality.
    • Once God consumes my mind, then I begin to talk right, it just comes out of me. I talk in a way in which He’d have me to.
    • Cut down the Old Tree and begin Planting a New Tree that’ll have fruit-filled branches (mind sweep was mentioned earlier, which is a similar idea)…Now there's been some research done on thoughts, and thinking processes, and here's some interesting things you may not have realized. I don't have a picture I could show you but thoughts…can be measured. In other words they occupy space in your head. A thought is not a nothing. See, a thought is something. A memory is something. We don't tend to think that way, but it is something. Now what is it? Well it's actually neurons going through a path. There are chemicals released, and there's some pathways formed in your mind, so there are electrical impulses, neurons, and chemicals released - see for example, if I just got everyone, now it's nearly half past eleven now, so if I got everyone beginning to think about a beautiful lunch - oh, there it is. Chicken, ooh, I can see it now. I can see the gravy on it, all that seasoning, and the potatoes and - oh it's looking good. Now immediately I'm starting to feel hungry. [Laughter] My body - now notice this, I want you to get this - my body and feelings responded to my thoughts. So as I began to think, there was something happened in my body and emotions, same with yours.
      If you begin to think about a painful experience for a little bit, and you begin to remember that experience, begin to imagine it and picture it, very soon there'll be feelings come, emotions will come, and you'll begin to enter into that experience - sometimes tears come. I found one certain piece of music I just played the other day, as I played the music, I found tears come. I thought that's strange. The music is triggering off thoughts, and they're connected to emotions. Because I've got emotions, I must have thoughts; I wonder what they are? So they're all interconnected. Now here's the interesting thing. They've been able to study the brain, and here's the interesting thing that happens. When you think, thinking involves electrical impulses, neurons connect, and you form like a tree in your brain.
      Can you imagine a tree with lots of branches? Now the more you repeat certain kinds of thinking, the bigger the tree grows in your brain - so if you begin to think say, negative thoughts about yourself, and continually repeat them, there grows like a tree in your brain, of neurons connected to one another, and the connections grow thicker and stronger and deeper. It becomes set in your brain. So a person for example who continually looks at pornography begins to develop in his brain memories or trees, neuron trees, which grow thicker and thicker and thicker, and there are paths. It triggers off chemistry in their body. That's how God has designed us, it's a physical thing - and so God designed us. Now here's the thing. If a person begins to change how they think, they've observed on the electron microscope, that the trees that hold the memory or the patterns of thinking begin to shrink and dissipate, and if you stop thinking those thoughts they eventually vanish, as though they were never there. Isn't that amazing? They've discovered that in science. I was reading it in a book recently.
      If you start to develop different ways of thinking, then new neuron paths form up, and new trees begin to form within your brain - so imagine that, that within your brain are registered the ways you've thought all your life. If you will stop thinking certain ways, and begin to develop new thoughts, there will be new neuron paths formed, new connections formed, and old ones will wither and die away. Think about that. Isn't it amazing? Now here's the thing about those thoughts. They are connected to emotions, so if your thoughts are negative, you unlock bad chemistry in your body; it affects your DNA and your health. So our body is not wired to cope with things like bitterness, judgments, resentments, self pity, unforgiveness. All those toxic thoughts create memory trees, neuron trees in your mind, that every time you go there they get stronger, and they unlock toxins in your body. Think about that - so what is very true is this: You can be transformed totally, as you will renovate your mind.
      You'll be transformed totally by the renovation of your mind. Now I wish I could have you come up and lay hands on you, and renovate your mind [laughter] but as you all know with renovation, you've got to remove and strip out the whole room, everything that's in there, and systematically replace it with something else, systematically replace it with something else. What we have to do is called renewing of the mind, and Joshua was commended to do it before he went into the land. One of the biggest instructions God gave him is this: meditate, ponder, picture, imagine, get into the feelings of My word, so My word begins to build neuron trees and begins to shape the way you think. Declare My word, because that'll reinforce it in your life. Begin to act on My word - notice what He says - you will make your own way to prosper. In other words prosperity outside us, begins with change inside us.
      Kingly manifestations outside, begin with kingly thinking on the inside, and no one can do it except you - so that requires these sorts of things, becoming aware of how you think. In other words, notice what you feel, because behind a feeling is a thought, or a belief. Evaluate it, judge it. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians 10:5, bringing every thought and every imagination into captivity, these things that exalt themselves against knowing God. So many of us are limited in our experiences and knowledge of God, because we have thoughts that resist and oppose and continually frustrate God's revelation flowing into our life. Renew the mind and it begins to change. How do we do it? We need to picture, imagine the truth, see the truth, begin to imagine what that feels like, the truth: God is in me. When Clark was here he shared a brilliant message, just of what it took for him to meditate that Almighty God was in him. This God that made creation in me, every day meditating on it, so wherever he went he could minister the power of God, because he felt immediately the presence of God with him.
      Meditate, ponder, imagine, picture, begin to let it affect your feelings, begin to speak it and embrace it, declare it over your life, begin to live out and act according to it, and you'll begin to find old memory patterns start to shift, new memory patterns start to form, and your life begins to change. I've determined in this coming year to work on some different areas of change. What about you?
    • The state of “Oregon requires landowners to replant trees after harvesting timber from forestland.” Reforestation
      • Replacing the old with something new...2 Corinthians 5:17 (NIV) Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!
      • Grafted; Renewed; Reborn.
        • John 3:1-21 (ESV) You Must Be Born Again (Reborn)
        • Romans 11:11-31...Disobedient/Unbelieving Branches Broken Off & Obedient/Believing Gentiles Grafted In
      • Seeds of thoughts planted, watered and growing.
        • 1 Corinthians 3:6-8 (ESV) I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth. 7 So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth. 8 He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor.
      • Description of Fruit-filled branches.
        • Galatians 5:22-23 (NIV) But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
        • Matthew 21:18-22...Jesus Curses a Fruitless Fig Tree
• Help me to have a correct perspective as to who You truly are.
  • To know that He loves me no matter what.
  • God is loving, God can be trusted, God provides. He’s proven Himself and never failed.
  • I'm connected to God Almighty, who loves me, is with me, means good for me.
  • Allow God to define Himself through His Word. We live in an age where everyone wants to make God into their own image; their own idea of what He should be. Fortunately God has already defined Himself in His Word, and that’s where we should begin.
• Help me to stop thinking/living like a victim a begin thinking/living like a victor.
  • Battles are won and lost in the mind and heart. The battles of life are won and lost in the minds and the hearts, because the Bible says - Proverbs 23:7 - as a man thinks in his heart so he is. Now that word 'thinks' is an on-going present continuous word. In other words, as a man is continually thinking in his heart, then that's how his life is working out. Why? Because of the thoughts, and what thoughts do. I want to share with you something I discovered through a little bit of research just recently. As you continue to think, you are building your life, so your thoughts are building the life you'll have on the earth. Your thoughts are like bricks, and you're putting them in one after another, and so the way we think and view life begins to build into us, and program in us, how we're going to be in the future. You have to understand that.
  • There is hope in Christ Jesus.
    • Psalm 62:5 (NLT) Let all that I am wait quietly before God, for my hope is in him.
    • Romans 5:1-5...Peace and Hope
  • Jesus died not so you could live in defeat, but so you could have abundant life. Life free from the burden of unforgiveness, bitterness, and isolation. Life full of thriving community. The enemy wants to strip this away, and he does so in the battlefield of your mind. So fight back! In Christ, you are not a victim. You are an overcomer
  • You personally make that decision. You can see the mountain, the river, the giants, the land, and the lions, but how you choose to respond is key. By faith I can move the mountain. God will provide dry land for me to cross the river. God will provide a way to shut the mouths of the lions, to defeat the giants in my life and overtake the land as He did for Daniel, Caleb and Joshua.
  • Remedy…the solution to victim mentality is a revelation of God's love and the healing power of the cross…revelation I'm not a victim and I can respond in faith and be delivered and healed and restored, and develop a positive mentality, and experience resurrection life.
  • Wandering in the wilderness was about getting their heart clear. It was about an opportunity to get freed up of the baggage of the past.
  • This is a winning team! God, Almighty God, who never lost a battle in His life, is with me! Emanuel.
  • I can do this, I can do it, I can do it because God is with me. I can do it. I am an over comer.
  • Hey listen, the devil tells you you're a loser every day of your life, 24 hours of the day. He's always telling you you're a loser. He wants you to believe you're a loser; God wants you to believe you're a winner. You've got to choose who you're going to listen to. You've got to listen to God and what God says: you're a winner! The same spirit that raised Christ from the dead is within you. You must be a winner! That same spirit energizes your body. You don't have to be tired when the spirit of God is available to flow through your body. Come on, think about this. See, we choose our attitude when we get out of bed. Ooh, another day, oh no. [Laughter] Oh glory! Another day! It's an effort and a discipline.
  • Colossians 2 tells us very clearly that Christ has disarmed principalities and powers so you would not fear spirits but rather walk in dominion over them. You've got to believe it though, have to believe the truth, repent of the old stuff, the unbelief that stops you from getting the victory.
  • We can't lose - and even a setback is just that, it's a setback. Even a failure's just a setback. We can't lose. We can't lose, because why? Because God said it, and God doesn't lie. See, He's based on the truth. Remember they'd all seen the glory, they'd all seen the miracles, all seen fire. They'd seen all manner of things, but what they needed was faith in their heart - which comes by believing the word and character of God.
• Help me to see how You’d have me to move forward.
  • Walk by faith, not by sight…it requires faith to inherit God’s promises.
  • In your initial Christian experience, God shifts a lot of things out of your life, but then it's to prepare you so you can begin to walk with Him, begin to dream and explore desires, begin to discover your destiny, and begin to flow with Him into fulfilling your destiny.
  • He has called me to represent Him on this earth and to extend His kingdom, so my prayer is: Father, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, they will be done on earth in me and through me just like it is in heaven.
    
  • Emanuel God, You are with me [not against me], and I'm aware of You, and I can work with You, and we'll do some things together. I need to know it experientially on the inside, to feel that truth, God is inside me. Almighty God is with me. Wherever I go, You are with me. I'm not alone in life, I don't have to struggle in life. God, my Father You are with me, the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead is in me.
    
  • Be thankful.
    
    • Practice gratitude. Victim mentality causes you to focus on your suffering, specifically what you’re not getting. Try flipping your perspective and focusing on something that matters to you, that you do enjoy, and that you do "get." Shift your attention from what you’re missing to what you have.
    • Man, have we got a good life ahead. God is providing for me, bread, milk and honey!
  • Turn your focus to helping others. When you’re in victim mentality, the whole world is about you and your pain. Acknowledge your suffering with kindness, and then consider how you can help another being. As counterintuitive as it may be, the more you feel deprived, you more you need to give. Offering kindness is the surest antidote to “Poor me.” 
• Restore my community relationships.
  • Put yourself into community. Stop comparing, stop assuming, stop putting insecurities on the people around you. Accept people for who they are; risk trust and love like God commanded (Matt 7:12). Community will always be imperfect, but good news! So are we.
  • I pray that by changing my thinking and believing that my previous friendships will be rekindled. Changing in my heart will prayerfully change what's outside of me.
  • Practice forgiveness. When you play the victim role, you’re deciding to hold onto bitterness and anger and the certainty that you’ve been wronged — often without even investigating what the other's intention may have been. Instead of poisoning your own experience with resentful thoughts, try practicing compassion and understanding for the other. Start a new habit: make dropping resentment and trying out forgiveness a daily practice! Become influential once again because of the shift change in my life. 
  • Practice empathic listening. When listening to other people, try listening with the intention of feeling what they’re saying from inside their heart. Stop focusing on what you need to do about what they're saying, what you think about what they’re saying, or anything else that has to do with you. Listen as if you were just ears hearing, without putting yourself in the way.
    
    

Closing and Prayers:

• Closing…
  • Ask yourself, “Am I constantly living as a victim or victor?
    • One author reminds us that, “Peter teaches us that saints are not ‘victims’ but ‘victors’ in their suffering. The ‘victim’ mindset has become a dominant note in our society. We look to our past, and to the abuse of others, or to the ‘genes’ passed on to us from our parents as the cause of our sin and suffering. Peter turns our eyes toward God and toward the shed blood of His Son, in whom we have not only forgiveness of sins, but victory in Christ. We were not saved merely to cope with life; we were called to be conquerors in Christ. We are overcomers, especially in the trials and tribulations of life. Let us believe and behave accordingly.” Suffering: Victim or Victor? (1 Peter 1:1-6a)
  • If constantly feeling victimized is something you struggle with, then let me encourage you to take a look at the additional related articles below (not an exhaustive list, but one’s I glanced over for this study and found might be helpful to each of us), and spend some time in prayer and honest self-examination. Enjoy, and let me know if there’s anything I can help walk you through. Here for each of you.
    Nate
  • Additional Related Articles…
    • Jesus and the Victim Card
    • How Jesus Addressed the Victim Mentality
    • Hope for the Heart
    • In Christ you are a Victor, Not a Victim
    • How the Cross Defeats My Victimhood
    • Are You Ready to Stop Feeling Like a Victim? Break free from the "poor me" mentality
    • Breaking Free from Victim Mentality
    • Complete Article on what are Cognitive Distortions
• Prayers from others for you:
  • Father, we thank You for Your amazing love, where with You have loved us, and given Your Son, and hold nothing back from us. Father, we open our hearts here - just close your eyes for one, two more minutes. I wonder is there any person here who's not yet received Jesus Christ, and positioned yourself, opened your heart to have your sins forgiven, and receive a flow of the love of God from heaven. Well this is your day to do it. This is a great day to do it. Jesus said: to everyone who received Him, He gave power to become a child of God. Is that you today? Why don't you put your hand up and say Pastor, I'm going to give my life to Jesus today? Perhaps you may have fallen away from the Lord, you say I need to come back to Him today, I've got lots of other things in my heart. That fire is no longer burning.
    Perhaps today God has spoken to some of you about isolation and distance. You may not have understood all I said, but when I talked about being isolated, and working hard but never feeling you're good enough or making it, something registered with you; just raise your hand, say that's me. God bless, many hands. When I began to talk about thinking like a victim, and it's not my fault, always someone else's fault, and when someone tries to help you and adjust you, you just react to them and say: you're attacking me. Why are you attacking me, why are you putting me down? And all they're trying to do is help you see something you can't see. If that's you, you've got troubles. Why don't you say: God, You're speaking to me today? That's right, God bless, God bless.
    Father, I just thank You for each person's responded today, there would come a revelation, a river of Your love to bring healing, restoration. Father, we want to live in the love of God. Whatever our circumstance, whatever's happening, we open our heart for an increasing awareness of Your love. I can feel His presence just coming upon us right now. I could feel it from the beginning of the service. Just lift your hands, open your heart, just do something, say Father, I receive Your love. I receive Your love. Whatever blocks me from receiving more, show me, show me. I want to journey into intimacy with You, knowing You, experiencing You, becoming secure so I can actually represent You well. I don't want to be dysfunctional in my relationships, blaming, accusing, [and] reacting. I want to be whole. Lord, I receive Your love. I can feel His presence and love here right now.
    Musicians are just going to sing that song they're doing now. What I'd like you to do is reach out to someone next to you, and let the love that God has given you flow out of your heart into their life. Don't be stiff or awkward, just: can I pray for you? Ask their permission first. If they say no, respect that. It makes it safe for them. If someone doesn't want you to pray that's okay, you don't have to. You need to respect them, but just ask the person: can I pray for you? I'd really love to pray for you and bless you. I want you to know God loves you. Breaking Free from Victim Mentality
    
    Let's just close our eyes right now. The core of it is repentance, a change of mind and a change of heart, and that's where every one of us stands today. If we want to see more of the kingdom of God in our life, let's turn from old, unproductive thinking. Abandon it, reject it and put it off, and let's be renewed in our mind, and put on whole new ways of thinking and living that make us productive and fruitful, and make us think like a king, talk like a king, act like a king and experience kingly advances in our life.
    Just while our eyes are closed and heads are bowed is there any person here today doesn't know Jesus Christ? This would be a great day for you to turn from an old way of thinking, an old way of life, a life in bondage, slavery and alone, into a life connected to Jesus Christ. At the cross Jesus died and broke the power of sin in your life so you could be free.
    Is there anyone here today right at that place of decision? I wonder how many others today, as I've spoken today you realise that much of what you're experiencing in life that makes you unhappy, is a result of wrong thinking, of issues in the heart unresolved, and God's been speaking to you today about putting off the victim mentality, dealing with the victim issues of the heart, and beginning to put on a kingdom mentality - no more blame, standing up, and beginning to take hold of what God says about you. Day by day meditating in the truth, rejecting the lies, evaluating your thoughts as they come in – [(Discernment)] does this line up with the word of God? If it doesn't - I reject that thought, it's an ungodly thought. I hold the truth in my heart, I confess the truth, meditate on the truth, embrace the truth, until I see it manifest in my life.
    I believe there are many people today, God's speaking to you about that. Would you raise your [hand] and say: God's really challenged me to have a kingly mentality. Father, I just thank You. Father, I pray today for your grace to flow in the house of God, to break old victim mentalities, and to begin to raise up a new breed and generation with kingly thinking, thinking like a king, thinking as You've called us to think, standing and confronting ungodly thinking, rising up to do new things. Father, we just honour You today. We thank You, You've made us one with You, and Jesus, we give You the honour. Shall we give the Lord a clap today? Breaking Free from Victim Mentality