We are told, and I believe, "There is no advantage to playing the victim, and we are forever warned against victimizing others."
In a less-than-wonderful situation, the hard lesson learning is that when we respond in kind, we are responding as a victim. We immediately wrap ourselves in the self-protection of the victim shroud where we either shrink into quivering hurt or lash out with our machete-tongue. Either is just an excuse to victimize another...often not even the person we felt victimized by.
According to me, all slights, petty disagreements, arguments, wars unto annihilation begin with somebody feeling the victim and, justified, victimizing another. The big however, however, is, in my own experience, there is nothing harder to actually do than to not respond in kind. Because we must detach from our own self-interest.
The word generally heard is that we must love our own self before we can love another...we must forgive our own self, etc. etc., etc. I believe it is our preoccupation with self that keeps us from even considering the other much less loving him, forgiving her.
It is only when we choose to let the word we hear be Others, and then willingly choose to put Others before our own self, that we can begin to know the Light. I'm convinced we make that choice when we realize that the Father really does know our needs, and it really is his good pleasure to give us heaven...and that realization can only be delayed by our attachment, our want, to feel the victim.
Here's my good news: The Sermon on the Mount is the virtual playbook for how not to play the victim and how not to victimize others. Its only message, underneath it all, is: be kind...not act kind, be.
It's all about cleaning up our insides...our thoughts, our feelings, our self. Clean them up and out...to make room for love and laughter, and that is all.
Thank you.
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