116. James Oliver - How to Overcome Victim Mindset and Take Responsibility For Your Life

James Oliver is a Self-Leadership Coach and Men’s Work Facilitator from the UK. He works with impact-driven men from around the world, to help them overcome resistance, self-doubt and shame, so that they can live freely, joyfully and in pursuit of their highest potential and purpose.

In today's episode, James and I talk about how to overcome victim mentality and embrace radical responsibility. 

Expect to learn

• the difference between victimhood and a victim mindset 
• Consequences of a Victim Mindset
• How Shame and the Victim Mindset intersect 
• Patterns of Victim Mentality that show up often with Men
• practical tools and mindsets to help you reclaim your personal power. 
• and much more 

Connect with James: https://jamesoliver.co/ & https://www.instagram.com/iamjamesoliver/

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Shownotes

00:00 Understanding Our Contribution to Pain

01:10 Welcome Back to Unhooked

01:54 Exploring Victim Mentality

03:13 Personal Reflections on Victimhood

11:30 Consequences of a Victim Mindset

16:24 Helping Others See Their Victim Mentality

26:17 Patterns of Victim Mentality in Men

30:31 The Burden of Responsibility in Relationships

32:13 Recognizing Victim Mentality

34:38 Empowerment Through Acceptance

36:57 Inspiring Stories of Overcoming Adversity

45:36 Actionable Steps to Overcome Victim Mindset

50:15 Final Thoughts and Resources

Transcript

  📍 the idea that we have contributed to our own pain is so challenging and so potentially painful to imagine. Because. If we contributed to this experience, how else or what other experiences in my life could I have unconsciously or subconsciously contributed towards in terms of the pain that I've felt during my life? There's an incredibly overwhelming amount of responsibility that it can be really, really confronting to start  📍 considering.

It   📍 Shame and blame, they disconnect us from our power.

And when we're disconnected from our power, we do become. In a in ways helpless or powerless because we just don't have access to it. We don't feel like we can change our experience or our outcomes. Things are going to keep happening to us. We're going to keep staying in the same patterns. We're going to stay  📍 stuck.



  📍 We're stuck in a victim mindset, we're actually allowing that story to completely disempower us from exploring all other avenues or possibilities or opportunities. We're going straight there. And that's all we're considering. We're not thinking about other opportunities, other choices, other  📍 options,



  📍 I will never shame anyone for being in a victim mindset ever. Because to me, it's,   📍  📍 

 all right, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of Unhooked. I'm your host, Jeremy Likowitz. And we're back joined again by my dear friend James Oliver. James, welcome back to the show. 

Thank you so much for having me on my friend. It's great to be great to be back. And, um, yeah, great to be connecting after we finally got to meet in person a couple of months back when you were in London. So, um, yeah, feel like times past our relationship has blossomed. You know, we spent some time together and, um, yeah, it feels lovely to be back having another conversation with you, bro.

Yeah. You are now in the rarefied air of, uh, being a repeat guest. I believe there's only one other person who I've had on

twice, you and, and Yord. Um, 

I'm honored, honored. Thank you. Great company. 

 you were on, we talked about, a lot about shame and it's, you know, such an important topic in recovery, in men's work. And today, really hoping to talk about victim mentality and, and playing the role of the victim.  I've, I was reflecting on this and I know that both have played a big role.

a big role in my own addiction.  And I was just reflecting on the ways that they played a role and in some ways they're almost opposite ends of the spectrum or two sides of the same coin of ways that I give away my power. You know, the ways when I'm in shame, I'm kind of not taking responsibility, I'm giving away my power, not realizing I can actually make a change.

And the same with the victim mentality, the way that I'm not taking ownership and again giving away my power. I'm curious, why is this such an important topic for you? 

Yeah, uh, you know, when, when you?

invited me back on and I was, I was really excited, you know, we were talking about which topics were potential, you know, potential Yeah, potential points of discussion for us. And  the, the, topic of kind of victim hood and victim mentality, um, you know, both, both closely knit, but some key differences between those, um,  has been very present in, in my life.

It's been present and something that I've had to explore and kind of deeply, yeah, deeply inquire about. And, uh, you know, having done a lot of work on, on my own awareness of,  first of all, my victimhood, where, you know, like everyone can, everyone can be a victim of circumstances in life, victims of poor behavior, trauma. Um,  yeah, we are all victims at a certain point. And,  you know, I  reflected, uh, I was doing, doing some work reflecting on my kind of relationship with where I had been a victim of people, life circumstances, upbringing. You know, I think when we start figuring out whether it's, whether we're doing some healing work or whether we're doing personal development work,  we can bring these experiences, our traumas, our conditioning, the things that happened to us when we were growing up or the things that didn't happen to us when we were growing up.  You know, this stuff can come, come into our awareness and suddenly we become acutely aware of all of these things that potentially impacted our perspective and the way that we see things, the way that we see ourselves. So,  you know, I've spent probably the last four or five years doing  quite a deep amount of intentional work around that space.

And  I also became aware of how.  the impact of where I was victimized and certain things that I did or didn't happen to me growing up or in relationships or in my parenting, whatever it might've been, how that had created a victim mindset and a victim story  and how that then was impacting my relationship with myself, my  perception of how in control of my life, my decisions, yeah, choice, um, actions, outcomes that I had any degree of influence over. And so, yeah, it was,  like I say, it's something that I've  kind of been  muddying my way through and kind of exploring intuitively for quite some time. But I think in the last six months, um, in particular, it's really come to the fore. Uh, and I've become very, very consciously exploring it. Um, I've also seen examples in relationships, close relationships, parents, uh, partnerships, friendships, where One, I'm recognizing people who are also stuck in the same state  and the impact that it's having on, for example, my ability to connect with that person, to have a relationship with that person, to understand or support those, you know, that person. Um, but also where  they  effectively, as I'm trying to break free of my own victim story and victim mindset, and I'm Really kind of doing the work to come back to self and feel more empowered and have that power to make decisions, to put myself first, to actually feel in control of the outcomes in my life, how that has created tension and friction and almost, yeah, just, it's really, um, it's been very jarring for certain people.

It's created a lot of tension in relationships, and it kind of made me realize how we not only. can get stuck in a victim mindset ourselves, but also that other people can be stuck.  With you. Their perception of you is that you are that victim mindset. So they get actually quite attached to it or comfortable with it, not consciously, but sometimes as you begin to change that narrative of how

you own your decisions, how you take control of your life, that can be quite difficult for people to comprehend to see those changes within you.

So, yeah, very long-winded answer. But yeah, it's just been something that's been been, I've been playing around with for some time.

Yeah. Well, it's,  I'm really glad you're bringing this up because it's actually, it's a thought that I never had and a way of looking at the narrative that  the victim mentality, not only is it yourself locking yourself in that prison, but in some ways you're locking other people in that prison with you.

in terms of how they view you and you're kind of locking that story in, in terms of the, the interpersonal relationships you have with others as well. It's not just affecting yourself.  I'm curious if you could just speak a little more about  the difference between victimhood and victim mentality.

Yeah, 

that

for sure. So when  Discerning the difference between the two. It's really important that we get clear on this right. The difference between victimhood and victim mentality is that when we're talking about victimhood, we're talking about experiences that have caused us a genuine harm, uh, injustice, trauma, uh, they are things that happened to us, you know, likely without our consents that have had a lasting impact that have hurt us, harmed us. caused us some sort of physical, emotional, uh, negative impact. And, you know, everyone can be, everyone will be, either has been or will be a victim in their lives. Things will happen to you that you didn't want, didn't choose. Um, you know, this is part of a human experience. We are not in control of every aspect of our lives and the things that happen to us or around us.

So  we will all be victims of people, circumstances,  ourselves. Sometimes we can harm ourselves when, you know, operating from a wounded place or operating with limited awareness of what we're doing or why we're doing it.  The victim mindset is really  the  When we get stuck in a victim mindset, this is where we are staying stuck in the story of the pain or the blame  that was kind of inflicted on us as a result of being victimized. And what happens is, you know, this is quite, I guess it's quite heavily tied to, you know, the impact of shame, for example, is that when we are hurt, we internalize that experience and we, effectively make it about our sense of worth. When it comes to a victim mindset, this would be a really great example of the impact of something like that, because we're basically  seeing the example of where we were victimized, where someone hurt us, or someone rejected us, abandoned us to cause us harm. And  That has an impact on our perspective are the lens through which we start seeing the world or the experiences that are happening around us. So, effectively, what we're doing is we're taking the experience that we had of being a victim where we were genuinely victimized. And then we are projecting it onto our current events, current circumstances, current conversations, uh, current relationships. And we're seeing  through that kind of distorted, harmful lens, we're only seeing a story.  That is effectively perpetuating that feeling of I'm a victim. I'm not in control. Life happens to me. I can't change my circumstances and it becomes a really, really disempowering, really hurtful, very difficult way to move through the world and to experience life.

So, yeah, I would say that  the kind of key differences. Okay.

know, there's,  I've noticed in my own life, you know, the times that I've really dropped into that victim mentality. And for me, it also seems situational. There are times where shame is really the main driver. And then there are certain types of situations where I can fall into more of a victim mentality.

Uh, and it's interesting for me to notice how there, They're kind of different triggers for these things, um, but I, you know, I have someone in my life who I'm thinking of now who I care about really deeply and who this victim mentality is just such a strong, component of their life and it really is holding them back from, connection, from love, from growth, and it really, it, it could be, you know, so destructive, when it takes over your whole life.

So, 

   What are the consequencess of 

the victim mentality?  

I think one of the, the biggest consequences of evicting mentality is a false perception of helplessness. Mm. So what I mean by that is we have a perception or a belief, you know, rather than it being factually true, it's kind of this flawed belief that we don't have the ability to create  the desired outcomes we, we want to achieve. We wish to have in life. So whether that is a certain relationships to be fulfilling, deep, connected, fun, safe, uh, we don't have the ability to create friendships that are meaningful and fun and again, fulfilling, we don't have the ability to, uh, create the lifestyle that we deeply desire. It could be  the job that we want or the career or the business that we want to build.

This kind of perceived helplessness  is, it becomes this kind of insidious, toxic, really harmful way of moving through the world because we end up, like I say, the feeling of being completely helpless and powerless means that we, we, kind of just,  we end up just going through life with this genuine belief that things just happen to us and we cannot change those outcomes.

And naturally when we are, you know, the human condition is to, you know, we have, we all have certain needs. We all have needs for safety, connection, love, uh, fulfillment, joy. Yeah. All of these things. And if we,  if we believe that we don't have the ability to  influence or have an impact.  To create those desired outcomes and get those needs met. The likelihood is, is that we are going to create situations, circumstances, relationships, where we are number one, potentially we could be victims of  people who are Maybe, you know, in our powerlessness, it's likely we will attract people who, maybe in a shadowy way themselves, will be looking to exert power over others to make them feel like they're in control. So we're going to end up in harmful relationships and harmful relationship dynamics and friendships. Um,  I think that's, yeah, I think that's definitely one of the biggest. Um, I think one of the other consequences of a victim mindset is that we.  I'm never able to truly take responsibility for our  actions, decisions,  when we believe, for example, that we are helpless.

If we're helpless, then we're saying that even the things that I do, I'm not really responsible for because, you know, I'm just a victim of life. I'm a victim of my circumstances. And that in and of itself is also incredibly dangerous because you're going to potentially,  you could cause harm. You could hurt someone, upset someone, traumatize someone. And when confronted with that, if you believe that life just happens to you,  you're, you're going to actually blame your behavior on your victim, on your victimhood,  your perceived victimhood, or your victim story. You know, people who are stuck in this mindset are not going to call it a victim story. They are going to  likely just say, you know, it's, it's, this is, this is, you know, I can't control it.

Um, you know, these bad things happen to me and I really can't do anything about it. Um, it's a real, like I said, it's a really distorted mindset. belief that you just can't have any influence or impact or control over the outcomes in your life. So it's quite harmful in terms of the harm that can be caused to you, but it's also harmful in the harm that you can then cause.

So it's, it's really on both sides of that coin.

Yeah. Well, that's it. I definitely want to dive into this because you know, this person who I'm thinking of, who I really care about in my life, the particular way it manifests, it really is not just this, Oh, I'm powerless and things happen to me. It really is this, and it's everyone else's fault, you know, and it's this person's fault.

And this person did this to me and that person did that. And it's this, this really angry kind of blame game where, you know, not taking any kind of ownership or responsibility and just kind of pointing the finger at other people. and. you know, that kind of attitude, it can be so destructive. And what I'm curious to hear from you is, as you say, it can be such a distorted lens that people are seeing through. 

And there's such a lack of awareness around it sometimes that most people when they're in the victim mentality, and I speak for myself as well, we're not really aware. Oh, I'm playing the victim mentality, right? Like, It's just this, no, no, no, like this is other people's fault and, you know, I was powerless.

There's nothing I could do. and so I'm wondering how do you help people see? if someone is seeing through this lens where they think they didn't do anything wrong. It's just because other people messed with them or other people did them wrong.  How do we start to shift that and see outside of that 

lens? 

that's a, it's a really good yeah, it's 

such a good question, right? And 

person who I love, it's like they're stuck in this for, for decades. And it's so hard because if you say, hey, you it's not this other person's fault. You gotta look at, what you're doing here. You know, they'll just get defensive and kind of back off.

And we all do this too. We don't want people to tell us, no, you know, you're playing a role here too. Like, no, no, no, I was 

wronged or it's unfair or whatever.  

yeah, it's,

it's a really tough one. I mean, any, um,  any self inquiry, I think it's really important that when we love someone, if we love a friend, a family member, and we see that they're struggling with, I mean, it might not just be a victim story, it could just be something more broadly, like they're having a challenging time, they're struggling with their mental health, you know, a lot of this stuff can kind of  Um, interweave and, you know, people who are stuck in states of anxiety or depression often will understandably feel like they're powerless to, you know, fix it or to fix their circumstances and feel like victims of life. Um, You know, and anyone's work is theirs to do. So I think that's, that's really important is that when we love someone and we care for them and we can desperately want them to  see or, you know, shift their perspective to start taking some responsibility, some ownership, start reflecting on that.  Is number one is that if they're feeling stuck in it, it means that there is some un or invalidated or, or not yet validated pain.  They are not able to, they are not in a place of recognizing that the experience that they're currently feeling a victim of likely has similar feelings. It echoes something that did happen to them previously where they were a genuine victim.  So I think from. That, let's say the outsider, the concerned friend, or the concerned partner or the concerned son, whoever it might be,  is I think is to, first of all, yeah, don't take full responsibility for it.

Remember that they have to do that work, but number one would be to bring some curiosity and some compassion to their experience. Why is it that they, they are unable to see their own contribution to  their experience or the negative outcome that has?  You know, happened to them, right? Um, So I think that those two, two aspects are really, really important.

Curiosity. What's going on? Compassion. Where's the suffering that we're not seeing? You know those, those, because that, that is often it's a blind spot for this person.  And, um.  You're helping them get there. You know, you, depending on who the person is and how well you know them, you might be able to actually join the dots up and go, I think I understand what's going on here.

Or you might not, but you're just concerned for them. So that's where I think some helpful, compassionate questioning can come in and start to provoke or encourage a little bit of self reflection inquiry, encourage a little bit of their own curiosity. And, you know, get them, which is hard, right? Because  the challenge is, is that when we are, when we are stuck in a victim story or a victim mindset, 

 

the idea that we have contributed to our own pain is so challenging and so potentially  painful to imagine. Because. If we contributed to this experience, how else or what other experiences in my life could I have unconsciously or subconsciously contributed towards in terms of the pain that I've felt during my life? There's an incredibly overwhelming amount of responsibility  that, that it can be really, really confronting to start considering.

It can almost, once you, once you realize one, it can almost unfold like a waterfall. And  if you're still, Viewing these experiences through the lens of blame rather than empowerment, responsibility, you know, reflecting to see, okay, well, if I, if I contributed towards this, myself, what can I learn from it?

How can I make a different decision next time? If you're still stuck in that, you know, inner critic, negative self talk, blame, harm, shame, kind of energy,  well,  the realization that you may have been contributing towards your own pain is incredibly, incredibly hard. So again, this is where an incredible amount and a deep amount of compassion and love and non judgment comes in. And One other thing, and this might not be possible,  but I've found that when we are witnessing a person that we have a relationship with, it could be a friend, it could be a partner,  if we are seeing someone struggling with something and we wish to help them reach a desired outcome. So self reflection curiosity, taking some responsibility, some ownership.  One of the best things that we can do is if we have an example where we can model that for them, it might start help joining the dots up. So, you know, for example, your, your friend who is struggling with taking responsibility or, you know, it's, it's maybe stuck in a bit of a victim mindset. If I were to have a conversation with them, and it was a conversation that, you know, the context was, was there, I wouldn't just say, hey, can I tell you a story? Um, you know, if we were, I don't know, out having a drink, you know, the all of us, and we were talking about things, and, you know, I might share a story of where My victim mentality kept me stuck, kept me powerless, kept me hurting for a long time, and then describe moments where I was able to bring some awareness to how I had missed things, how I'd accidentally, innocently, subconsciously contributed to that suffering.

You know, I've got a couple of those stories that I would very, very gladly share, and hopefully that would model,  and something might twig, something might spark, and they might  Oh my god, my Maybe, maybe that I could have done that. these are all very gentle, very soft approaches. you know, you can't sit someone down and say,  Hey, I think you're stuck in a victim story and I think you need to get out of it. Right? Because  again, that's such a challenging, confronting realization. And the likelihood is that, well, it is in a blind spot of theirs. So they're not going to be able to see it if you're just shining a really powerful, scary torch on it.

Yeah, and those, those kind of approaches always just put up the defenses and they, you know, defensive and put up walls and you can get more entrenched in the victim's story as opposed to, I feel like you, with these, you always have to go in the back door somehow. You have to kind of go around the walls and say, Hey, there's my, be this thing that you're not seeing it or, you know, here's, here's a story of me and how I was kind of stuck in.

Yeah. Hopefully.

a lightbulb turns on for them at some point, but it's interesting, you know, this, as you mentioned, like 



the compassion, the curiosity, these are the things that we can do for ourselves as well to help us process our own victim mentality. Like if we can get compassionate and curious

about our own 

story, 

yeah, definitely. You know, talk about being able to model this behavior or this perspective of, of recognizing and bringing awareness to where I was stuck in a victim story or a victim mentality and being able to shift out of that and demonstrate how I shifted out of that in a compassionate, kind, self compassionate way.

Okay. Yeah. You know, because as soon as you realize that you may have been,  you know, let's, let's make sure we're using the right words here. It's often unintentional, accidental, innocent, unconscious. We're not realizing that we're doing it.  So  when we don't realize that we're doing it and it's happening in this kind of unconscious accidental way,  we can begin to give ourselves a little bit of a break there because why would anyone choose suffering if they're consciously aware of it? Why would anyone choose to when we know that we want to? Whether it's a loving relationship or great friendships, or we want to build the business, whatever it is.  If we know that we want those outcomes, it's quite clear that if we're in some way contributing towards it, we're doing it subconsciously or we're doing it without realizing. So  what we're able to do there is we're able to shift out of this blame and recognize that, okay, well, I didn't realize I was doing this. Let's get curious on how that came about. And curiosity becomes the gateway to really learning. And really reflecting and understanding what was going on, what was going on in my mind or what was going on in my experience when I missed that thing, or when I made that decision that ended up not being, you know, that ended up causing me harm, you know, why would I have done that?  We start to, you know, hopefully begin to shed some light on it and begin to take the lessons out of it. And as I say, those things are all. empowering. They're all, they're helping us. We're learning and we're able to then choose, you know, hopefully with, you know, this is the work around victim mentality is if we're faced with a situation that looks or feels similar, we've got the experience and the knowledge of, the time that it happened before to recognize that we're potentially about to go down the same road and we have the opportunity to then choose to do something different.

And that's really, you know, radical ownership, radical responsibility. And we've kind of taken our power back. You know, we're no longer falling victim to that victim mindset. 

This, you know, this podcast is a podcast mostly for men and we have 90 percent male listeners. I know you do a lot of men's work and work mostly with men.  Are you able to talk about what are some of the common ways that victim mentality shows up specifically for men? Like, are there certain  arenas of life or, you know, like one that I can think of for myself was dating, you know, like  dating was always, you know, it's not fair, blah, blah, blah. 

I'm curious, are there certain

topics that typically come up for men? 

 

I think the best way to identify is to look for patterns.  So look for patterns that are happening in your life. Patterns of behavior or outcomes that you feel stuck in. So, You know, an easy one would be addictions. Okay. So, you know, if you're stuck with a porn addiction, if you're stuck with a gambling addiction, a sex addiction, if you're stuck in a behavior and a cycle and you're unable to break free of that, it would be to me, it would make all the sense in the world that at some point you're going to start feeling, or you'll likely have spent a long time feeling a victim of your addiction.  And the important point here is that  there is.  a real sense that there is victimhood present. Okay. Um, I would say when you bring awareness to the addiction,  um, and perhaps  do nothing with that and don't start trying to, you know, seek help, find outcomes, get support,  you know, you, you probably then slipping into a victim mindset.

Okay. You're stuck in that behavior. Um, but you know, other ones would be things like dating.  It's a great example, you know, I mentioned that I have stories of, of where I was stuck in a victim. I was stuck in my own victim story for a long time. And one of them was about a, a relationship that ended about six or seven years ago. And the story that I told myself was that

 



in 2018, I had a really challenging year. I lost a friend of mine, very close friend of mine to suicide. Shortly after that, my partner cheated on me and left me for another guy.  And then shortly after that, I  struggled with my mental health and it reached a point where I couldn't support myself and I couldn't run my business.

So I had to close my business and go back to employed work. Now, all of those things are objectively true,  but you can hear that they are, you know, I'm not denying my experience. I'm not saying those things did not happen,  but the lens through which I'm just seeing that, that, that year and those experiences is very much about those things in the way that they happened to me.  So, if I look at the relationship as a specific example,  those things did happen.  And I didn't  consider how I may have contributed to, you know, the relationship ending, how I might have pushed her towards, you know, you know, Going, you know,  sort of seeking attention from another guy and leaving me, uh, the things that I may have missed in terms of red flags or signs that she wasn't someone who had a history of being faithful.

All of these things, I didn't consider any of it for two years.  And, uh, Around the two year mark, I ended up, I think I was doing a period of celibacy at the time because I was  still dating and I was still kind of projecting this stuff onto women. I was dating and  I wasn't getting anywhere. So I stopped and I shut it down and I created this space.

And all of a sudden I started to inquire and I started to think about what might I have missed? What happened in that relationship where, how could I, how could I have contributed towards that? And all of a sudden I started realizing, I was like, hang on a minute. She had a history three or four relationships time after time after time in the build up to meeting me of leaving the guy that she was with  for another guy.

And there was always an overlap. There was always some miscommunication. There was always a, you know, Oh, it was, I was with him. And then I left him and I moved on to someone else. There was no, she was a serial, um, what's the word when you hop from relationship to relationship, but she would do that. Um,  You know, I, I reflected on how  



towards the end of that relationship, when after my friend died, the amount of responsibility I put on her to make me happy, to meet my needs, to support me. You know, she was a lot younger than me. She was five years younger than me. I was 28. She was 23. And I didn't seek any other support. I put it all on her, which was incredible burden. And I could see it very clearly, you know, in hindsight. I also realized that I had a few red flags when I, you know, when I started that relationship.

There was so much evidence that she potentially could do the thing that she ended up doing, that I completely excused, justified, made up, made excuses for,  

 

and I suddenly realized I was like, wow, maybe I'm not a complete victim of this. Maybe I did contribute in some way.  

Mm. 

um, so I've gone, I've gone on a bit of a tangent there around the

patterns, but I just wanted to give you an example of, of, you know, dating, because I think that that is, uh, a really, really common one.

And you know,  we get stuck, we don't realize how we, you know, the things that we're missing. And  the truth is that a lot of this happens, whether it's a wound that was inflicted on us or whether it's

just something that we weren't taught, you know, I didn't get taught about  trauma. I didn't get taught about attachment.

I didn't get taught around, you know, about,  I don't know.  love bombing and, you know, all of these things. I didn't know it about any of this. I didn't know that I was doing it. I didn't know that stuff was happening to me. So  

 

it's really, really easy to get stuck and to find ourselves in these states of victim mindset.

You know, I will never shame anyone for being in a victim mindset ever. Because to me, it's, there's a valid reason for it. 

So I'm trying to wrap my head around this and really just trying to understand it for myself and I'm,  you know, this like, one way I can see it playing out is a way to notice or identify is when there's some kind of phrase in the mind that says, I can't get X, Y, or Z because, and it's like kind of blaming it on some other person and like, I can't, Get jacked because of my genetics, right?

Like, you know, some kind of like blaming something  For why I can't get what I want, you know, I can't whatever because this other person You know didn't give me what I needed when I was younger, whatever And I'm trying to understand that because I can notice that pattern in my life in different ways  one of the ways is around like getting jacked.

You know, like I'm on Instagram and I'm seeing these  dudes, everyone's probably on steroids, but I'm like, Oh, I can't get jacked. And I, I, I'm like, well, it's because of my genetics and I just wasn't born to look like that. And, um, and in some ways, you know, I can recognize the kind of the victim mentality in there.

They're kind of giving away my power and saying, well, it's because, you know, it's, you know, it's not, I was born in an unfair way. I wasn't born to have. big muscles, whatever it is. Um, but I can also recognize there is a, there's also a component of acceptance of saying, well, it's not my lot in life, you know, I wasn't born to be Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Um,  and it's almost like the tone of voice is really the differentiator. Like. I can't get jacked because of my genetics. Fact. I mean, I can get somewhat jacked, right? It's all relative also. Um, 

shape, Jeremy, come on, 

thanks, man. I appreciate that.  We could have a whole podcast episode on body dysmorphia at some point because that's a thing that affects a lot of men.

Even when we're all jacked, we still feel like we're not jacked enough. But I'm curious, like, how do you discern between those two? Like, there's a thin line between recognizing and accepting like, Oh, this is a truth about my life. You know, when I was a child, I didn't get the attention that I wanted, as opposed to when I was a child, I didn't get the attention that I wanted.

And that's why I'm messed up. Um, how do you find kind of the, the right tone for 

yourself around it, you know, that balance.

Hey, I think, I think the key thing is, are you using it as something to empower you or disempower you?  So, for example.  you talked about the example of not having the best genetics as a reason for not having a particular physique.  And that could be genuinely, that could be one very, very true component towards why you are at the physical, you know, in the physical condition that you, you are, your certain levels of, you know, muscles, body fat percentage, physique, that's going to be a contributor. But  in that example, I would ask,  Is that  disempowering you to and stopping you from exploring all of the other components that do contribute towards your current physical health? The way that you look, I would say, no, it's not because it's clear that you train well, eat well, look after your body. You, you know, you move, you work out hard and you actually do, do achieve a degree of, of, Success in that realm.

I appreciate there might be parts of you that disagree or, you know, if we've got low self worth or body image issues, then that might feel, you know, a challenge to agree with. But, you know, the truth is that 



 

we're stuck in a victim mindset, we're actually allowing that story to completely disempower us from exploring all other avenues or possibilities or opportunities. We're going straight there. And that's all we're considering. We're not thinking about other opportunities, other choices, other options, you know, um, you not having the best genetics  stop you from. Potentially working with an incredible trainer or adopting an amazing, you know, workout plan, eating incredibly well, nailing all of your macros, getting great rest and recovery, you know, it doesn't stop you from exploring and really maximizing all of those other parts of, you know, your, you know, your fitness journey. But so, so therefore, you recognizing that you don't have Arnold Schwarzenegger's genetics doesn't disempower you from looking at, well, okay, well, I don't have the genetics, but what can I do  so so victims, you know, the victim mindset or the victim story disempowers you acceptance of a limitation or a very real truth. doesn't stop you from, um,  exploring other options. You know, a great example, and I don't know him personally, but there's a guy called Ed Jackson who, uh, I actually, I went to school with his wife. Um, he's a former rugby player who, I can't remember how many years ago it was, but he dived into the, um, shallow end of a swimming pool and he, uh, severed his, um, spinal cord in his cervical, I think it was his cervical vertebrae, in his, in his neck, basically broke his neck.  And  he was  categorically told he would never walk again. Uh, he would be in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. I think that's what he was told. But there was absolutely no chance in him walking again. No chance. No doctor gave him the hope in hell.  And he could have taken that advice, allowed that victim story to build, and say, well, you know, I broke my neck.

I'm never gonna walk again. That's it for me. But he didn't. He began to, number one is he had the opposite mindset. He, he was like, I'm, I'm not taking this. I don't believe this. I'll get other opinions. I'll do extra work. I'll, you know, I'll speak to whoever I need to speak to. I'm, I'm going to beat this.

Right. Which is an incredibly, incredibly, um, inspiring mindset. Okay.  But because he didn't fall victim, fall into a victim mindset, he was, you know, he was a victim of a, an awful circumstance. He broke his neck. It completely changed the course of his life,  but by not falling victim to the story that he could have very, very easily and understandably fallen victim to,  he was then able to actually, through a number of years of incredibly, incredibly hard, um, you know, discipline, rehabilitation, perseverance, he was not only able to start wanting to walk again, he still has, you know, challenges walking challenges with all sorts of his lifestyle is completely different, but he climbs mountains now. He, you know, he, uh, he did a challenge in lockdown where he climbed the height of Everest by walking up and down his stairs.  an incredibly, incredibly inspirational guy. And that is for me, the best example of not having, not going straight to the story of, well, this thing happened to me. So therefore I'm powerless. He went, this did happen to me. It's very true. It happened to me and it will undoubtedly impact me for the rest of my life and stop me from doing certain things. But what can I do? He continued to explore where can I get, where can I still, where do I still have power? Where do I still have choice? Where do I still have an ability to positively, positively impact my life, my experiences, my outcomes?

So I think that's probably the,  yeah, that's probably the difference.

Yeah, I love what you said at the end there, which is just that,  just asking yourself the question, Okay, well, what can I do? You know, because I find that the victim mentality, it almost just, it just shuts you down right there. And it gives you this idea of like, why even bother? You know, why bother trying to break free from my porn addiction?

I'm just, I'm a victim of this. It's not my fault. You know, it's because of X, Y, or Z. same with going to the gym. Like, okay, well, I don't have the best genetics, so why even bother trying to get in shape? Because I'm never going to look like this person. As opposed to, okay, you know, here I am.  Everyone's different.

You know, I didn't have exactly what I wanted, or I do have some benefits. Okay, what can I do from here? It's such a, it's a more empowering

mindset. 

Yeah, absolutely. I couldn't agree more. And I

think this is also where, you know, you and I had a great conversation about shame beforehand, and it's, it's a big component of the work that I do. And I think this is where there are real crossovers between shame and, you know, the victim mentality or victim mindset.

Because  when we, you know, when we experience when we carry shame. We have this felt sense, again, it's a distorted view or a belief that there is something inherently wrong with us, broken, something unlovable, unworthy. And  that is something that's been inflicted on us. It's a belief that feels so deeply true.  But if you are broken, Unlovable, unworthy, powerless. If there's something wrong with you,  and there's no, perceivably no way of fixing that brokenness or, or, you know, unworthiness, well, the likelihood is, is that you will then move through life with a victim mindset, because you cannot change that. And, the truth is that shame is, Whilst it's a deep, deep, deeply rooted, painful, kind of emotional wound, um, that again, gets inflicted on us and it distorts our perspective of ourselves. It's still something that is not,  it's, it's, it's still not true.  So it's how being able to discern or separate

from that truth, you know,  a victim mentality or victim mindset could be an extension or a branch of like a version of shame because they, they are effectively.  These are gateways to things happening to you that you seem to believe you have no way of changing or altering in terms of the outcome. 

The insight that just came to me is that,  in some sense, the shame and victim mindset are the same thing. And they're both, there's something wrong with me,  and it's just, who's to blame? Like, with shame, it's there's something wrong with me, and I'm to blame. There's something wrong with me, and I did this bad thing, and I'm the reason that there's something wrong with me.

And with victim mindset, it's there's something wrong with me, and it's this

other person is to blame, and that person is to blame, and this incident is to blame. 

It's like there are two flavors of the same thing, which is there's something wrong with 

me,  

Yeah. 

And, 

blame or someone else 

is.

and shame and blame are, again, so closely linked, but what they both do is they disempower us and they stop us from  taking responsibility. They stop us from being able to, they stop us from  connecting to the power that is in us, but that has just, we've become severed from it. 

 

Shame and blame, they disconnect us from our power.

And when we're disconnected from our power, we do become. In a in ways helpless or powerless because we just don't have access to it. We don't feel like we can change our experience or our outcomes. Things are going to keep happening to us. We're going to keep staying in the same patterns. We're going to stay stuck.  So yeah, 

The other, the cool thing about that is like, it also points to that there's actually, you know, there's, there's two ways to then deal with it. One is to take back your power and say, okay, I can do something here. The other is to realize there's nothing wrong with you. You know, so like, for example, with my story of getting jacked in the gym, you know, it's like, okay, one way to solve that would be, no, I do have the ability to go to the gym and, and get, you know, more jacked, you know, whatever.

The other pathway would be there's nothing wrong with me as I am. You know, like,  you know, I'm just as sexy this way as I would be if I looked like Arnold Schwarzenegger, kind of thing. You know, it's like, there's nothing wrong with me. So both are ways to kind of heal that

that victim mentality and 

that shame. 

Absolutely. And I think, you know, it's really important to say at this point that. You know, what you've just described, you know, 

 

letting go of the idea that there is something wrong with you is incredibly challenging work that requires an unbelievable amount of, you know, deep inner work and an incredible amount of self compassion and time and space and love.

And, you know, it involves sitting with the parts of us that do feel genuinely broken that do feel truly. unworthy of love, of joy, of everything. So it's, it's, it's, it's,

deep work and it takes some time, but that is ultimately what you need to do is you need to be able to  separate from and begin to provide evidence to the parts of you that believe you're broken, that you're not broken. And that again, it will take time, but it's, it's incredibly, incredibly worthwhile work. 

Yeah, I mean it, it lies at the heart of so many of the spiritual traditions in the world. Like just that fundamental thing of recognizing you're not broken, recognizing you're, you know, you are whole just the way you are kind of thing, like that really it's at the root of a lot of different spiritual traditions, uh, whether you're talking about Buddhism or Christianity or plant medicine from jungles, you know, it's all of it's kind of recognizing you are already enlightened or you're already whole. 

Yeah. I 

you share some actionable steps or exercises that people can do to

start overcoming the victim mindset? 

Yeah, absolutely. I think um,  I think that there are, there's, there's probably two parts to this. I think that there are, I guess if I would, I was thinking about this beforehand, because I know we talked about some, some kind of topics that we could go to, and I kind of came up with a bit of a framework. I don't like to productize things or put them into sexy little groups of, well, you've got three, three this and, you know, but I, I think that there were definitely, there was two schools of thought for me.

One is what can we bring to, you know, the, In terms of what we,  what's the best way of describing this? But basically I realized that there are three things that you can kind of bring in terms of your,  your input, your mindset, your, your kind of inner toolkit. One would be, we talked about compassion and we talked about curiosity.

So those would be two, um, and three would be choice. So three C's compassion, Curiosity choice. Compassion is this feeling that arises within us when we sense suffering and we feel called to alleviate or try and help ease that suffering. That is something that we all have deep is in an innate quality within us.

So being able to direct that towards ourselves, if we're trying to solve our own victim mindset is understand that that victim mindset comes from a place of pain. And we want to try and resolve it.  Curiosity is, of course, just adopting a student mindset or, uh, you know, what am I not understanding here?

What's going on? A desire to go a little bit deeper.  And choice is one of the most challenging ones, but being open or maybe curious to the potential that we could be making a choice to be in a victim mindset. So, Those three things to start with in terms of actionable steps. I think number one would be to  learn.

First of all, how to reframe,  you know, reframe these things with kind of empowering questions. So, when we talk about things like.  I, you know, a good example might be, you know, what can I learn here? Or, you know, what did I miss? What could I have missed here? You know, they, they imply the kind of innocence and the accident and the unconsciousness, you know, it wasn't an intention to cause myself harm,  but it just evokes empowering kind of curiosity.

What, what could I have missed here? What, what could have happened here that I didn't realize? What, what, what went on?  Um, so I think reframing with those empowering questions, number two would be.  system regulation. So when we are stuck in states of victimness, we're often stuck in a freeze state, um, or a state of shutdown, a state of state of helplessness. So that's where our nervous system just goes into shutdown and it's actually a protective mechanism. So being able to use our things like our breath to actually  get us out of that state of freeze, bring some energy back, bring some kind of vitality, some control, some power back through the breath would be a great, a great example.  And the third one would be just to connect with this idea of radical responsibility. So radical responsibility is, for me, it's I mean, it's a practice, but it's also an intention. It's a perspective. It's a lens. And  the lens of a radical responsibility or the mindset of radical responsibility is what can I take ownership for here?

What can I control or what, what was I in control of? It's again, I guess it's kind of linked to curiosity, but it's saying, it's asking you those, those powerful questions  within the realms of what is possible to control. Or take ownership for the intention is to  take ownership for it, you know, to actually say that I did do that.

I might not have meant to, or I might not have realized, but I did that. And I can see that now. And I can choose to do something differently next time. So  three C's compassion, curiosity, and choice. The three R's reframing responsibility and regulation.  How's that? 

Well, it's beautifully packaged and productized. And I sense an online course coming soon.  Yeah, I know that feeling of like, I don't want to get too kind of cheesy markety. But I mean, it's helpful to have, you know, these little, you know, it's helpful to remember. Like when you're in the heat of the moment, like, okay, the three C's, right?

Okay, what was it again?

Um, yeah, it's beautiful. 

If there's someone who's listening to this and they're, they're really struggling with porn addiction and they have been kind of living in that victim mindset, is there anything else that, that you would want 

to say to someone who's in those shoes?  

Yeah, that's a really good question. Um, I think first and foremost is. If any of this conversation has, triggered you or caused you to feel defensive or targeted,  number one, that's never my intention. And that's a really, really common reaction. So it's okay. If you feel like that,  the idea, as I said earlier, the idea that we may have a On any level contributed to our own suffering or contributed to our negative patterns or the cycles of harmful behavior that we can't seem to break out of.

It's a really, really challenging reality to begin to consider, so it's likely to trigger. It's likely to bring up some discomfort and that's okay.  The reason that I feel this is such a, an important topic and something that is ultimately designed to empower to instill a sense of control is.  Is because once you can get your head around this and it might take some time and it might be really hard, but when you can begin to explore this idea of being stuck in a victim mentality, you then automatically become open to the idea of, well, how do I break out of it?

How do I begin to then take some control back in my life? It's all about empowerment. It's never meant to shame anyone. It's never meant to blame anyone. It's never meant to,  you know, one of the key differences between kind of blame. And understanding is  when we blame people or we shame people, we're kind of insinuating that they deserve to be suffering. And that is never, ever, I will, you know, that's not what I'm saying. And I have never said that. And I would never say that  the reason that I talk about this, and hopefully I'm able to articulate this stuff in a, you know, in an educational, informative, compassionate way, and an empowering way is because that's the intention is it's to empower you to take control of your life and to ultimately. Yeah, take back that control that has been taken from you by, by your  understandable accidental falling into this perspective of victim, victimhood and this victim mindset. So, you know, it's, um, yeah, it's be gentle, be kind, be compassionate with yourself. And like I say, three Cs, three Rs, I think would be a really, really great place to start. 

Yeah, beautiful. I love that, what you just brought in about the, one of the challenges of breaking free of this is it feels like any ownership that you take, it's almost kind of this saying, well, I deserve to suffer. You know, it's like, well, like, like I, I've deserved this because it's my fault, but just to let that go and say, no, no, I don't, it's not that I deserve this.

It's just, yeah, I played a role in that and it's time to take back my power and do something about 

it. 

Yeah, and if it this is where you know, again, we say shame is so closely linked because if we do slip into that mindset where we are saying it and we start to believe, well, maybe I do deserve this. I deserve to be suffering. You know, again, we're, we're going down the avenue of disempowerment. You know, if we can say, well, I.  I don't deserve to suffer, but I can see, and I didn't mean to suffer, but I can see now how clearly, or a bit more clearly, how I contributed towards that suffering. Well, that empowers me to learn from it and potentially make different decisions next time I'm faced with a similar situation. And those are the moments where we can break the cycle, break the pattern, and create different, more desired outcomes for ourselves and our relationships and our lives moving forward. 

Well, man, last question, where can people get in touch with you if they, they want to learn about the coaching work you do, your offerings, where should they 

get in touch? 

That would be Instagram DMs, uh, I am. Yeah. What's my Instagram at? I am James Oliver. Um, just drop me a DM. Um, yeah, I'm in the process of, first of all, um, I've just released a free guide, which is. Uh, centered around shame and how you can uncover and begin to heal your shame. Um, and yeah, you know, I work with, I work with people one on one in private mentorship and I'm looking to run a, a group, uh, hopefully a really accessible group program in the new year.

So, yeah, if any, any questions, just drop me a message more than happy to support in any way I can. 

Awesome. Well, we'll link that all in the show notes.  All right, folks, that's it for today. Thanks for tuning into another episode of the Unhooked podcast. We'll catch you guys on the next episode.