Welcome back for the next installment towards becoming a successful victim. This week we address a crucial step, and one that will catapult you into the realm of successful victimhood: # 3: BLAME YOUR PARENTS!
The very cornerstone of victimhood is to blame one’s parents. Blame them for anything and everything. Run with it and never look back. Because ultimately our parents will in some way fall short of being perfect, they will fail us in some sense. This is, therefore, rich with opportunity. It is here that you can propel yourself into a life of sweet and perpetual wounded-ness. Whenever someone tries to back you into a corner, your ace in the hole is to bring up your parent’s ineptness. This sage advice has done more to develop the practice of victimhood than any other. It will defeat the most progressive challenger.
“Don’t you realize the kind of parents I had?”
“My parents argued too much,
… never argued,
… weren’t affectionate,
… were too affectionate,
… divorced when I was nine years old, 19 years old, 29 years old, this week, … were too into their marriage.”
“My mother didn’t hold me enough;
…held me too much.”
“My father was a jerk,
… was never around,
… was around too much,
… drank too much, gambled too much, too available,
… was too shy, too tall, too Italian, too Jewish, old fashion, uptight,
… too freewheeling.”
There are limitless options for you to exploit when it comes to your parents’ imperfections. It’s become very much in vogue these days to hold one’s parents totally and completely responsible as to how their children turn out. This provides a huge opening for one to avoid taking any personal responsibility for one’s own life. Just an aside: when children turn out well they did it on their own, but when they screw up it’s the parents’ faults.
There are now more books published about how to be a parent than there are children to be parented! And if parents read enough of these self-help books they are sure to encounter books that tell them to do the very opposite of what the previous books they read were telling them to do. This will effectively cause many a parent to become confused and overwhelmed.
It is quite easy to exploit the frailty of parents who have tried to do their best only to be caught up with so many misgivings. Parents learn how to raise their children mostly by the seat of their pants. And in doing so are bound to make plenty of mistakes. A lot of parents will even go along with self-critical thinking and become filled with regrets as to what they did or didn’t do when they were young and inexperienced parents. Grab hold of such self-effacing thinking and run with it for all you can.
This is where anyone serious about becoming victim can take advantage. Start by telling yourself “you got screwed. Cheated! Ripped off.” After all you got the parents that didn’t know what they were doing. Pick out each and every single mistake they made and dwell on it. Voice your dissatisfaction. Often they’ll even help you out by volunteering those things they regret now that they can look back.
Of course ignore any of the positive things they may have done. If that is too difficult, at least discount those things by telling yourself how the mistakes over shadow any of the decent things they managed to provide. This is where a few “Yes, buts…” are always helpful.
“My father did a decent job providing for us, BUT he never was around to throw a football with me.” You get the idea.
By incorporating some of the useful phrases mentioned above into your daily negative affirmations (See Step # 1), and using them on anyone who doesn’t know any better than to mess with you, you will be well on your way to becoming a person highly skilled in a powerful life of victimhood.
Next week: #4: SURROUND YOURSELF WITH REALLY “NICE” PEOPLE