0:00
INTRO: Hello and welcome to The Storyteller's Mission with Zena Dell Lowe, a podcast for artists and storytellers about changing the world for the better through story.
0:10
RECAP: So last week, I talked about how this year is going to be a call to action, a call to be bold and courageous, and to cast off our obedient cowardice, so that we can actually be dangerous storytellers who have a chance to influence and impact the marketplace of ideas and culture as a whole. Part of that calling means we have to change the types of stories that we're telling, and the types of stories that we are consuming. But it also means that we are being called to a radical change in our personal life.
0:51
TOPIC INTRODUCTION: I want to talk to you today about what sorts of things are happening in our personal lives that need to change. Things that if we can't tell the truth in our personal life, we're already sunk, because we don't have the muscle built up to be able to do it in story or in really high pressure situations in real life where we're put on the spot. And we're going to be hated by people, the public, if we stand up for the truth. If we can start practicing this now, in our interpersonal relationships, we'll never be able to stand up when we're really put into the lion's den. So, how can we expect to be able to do it in our stories, if we're unwilling to practice it in our personal lives? And what kinds of things am I even talking about? Right?
1:44
PRESENTATION: Well, how about certainly what's being adopted in society right now, which is a view of personhood that is based on victimization. There is such a characterization out of certain people groups, of being totally victimized by others, completely victimized. And out of that victimization, then become new rules, new morality, that "ought to be obeyed", that's being inflicted on us by those people, or by the people groups that supposedly support those poor victims.
2:19
So, the very first thing I want to challenge you with today, is to stop blaming others. You cannot be victim oriented. And in fact, you need to stop thinking of others as victims. Even if you don't personally identify as the victim, you need to stop looking at other disenfranchised people as victims.
2:46
It actually isn't good for them. It actually doesn't help them. It's condescending to them. And it actually prevents them from attaining growth or getting out of their situation. It keeps them stuck. It really does.
3:01
So, we need to talk about what happens to a person's psyche when they are victim oriented, or when they think of themselves or others as victims. We need to start changing that paradigm so that we can take ownership, and then give ourselves agency.
3:18
See, that's where self-esteem—confidence—comes from. It comes from human agency. And if you're a victim, you are deprived of human agency. It means you don't have the power to act. So that's why it's disenfranchising.
3:34
But we actually live in a country that gives people the power to act when the laws that the country was founded on are followed. Because we have in our Constitution, that we don't see race, we don't see gender, we don't see any of those things. And yes, all right, while the individual at times has violated that, the truth is the laws of the country are there to protect that. So that, that individual has agency to act. They have recourses that they can take. They have choices that they can make based on it. They are given agency.
4:13
And when we ignore that and start then preferring certain people groups and do reverse racism, we actually then take away agency. We're actually not allowing them to take action, but now they're still victims. They're still helpless because it's the system now taking action for them trying to correct these wrongs, but in the wrong way.
4:38
The key to our future in our society is not victimization, but rather, personal responsibility. And that is the challenge that I'm putting before you today. I want you to own your stuff. I want you to own it.
4:57
I want to talk to you today about something I learned while I was in recovery. Now, for those of you that know, I was in treatment for 60 days for some process addictions that are a response or a result of unresolved childhood trauma.
5:13
And so what a process addiction is, is it's basically a behavioral addiction that is sort of a trauma reenactment. And so you have to learn a new way of doing things if you want to break those habits, because it's addictive cycles, right? All right.
5:29
So, here I am, in a room with a bunch of other people just like me, and the gal that's teaching says, "Are you familiar with Karpman's triangle?" And we're like, no, and she says "Okay. Well, Karpman's triangle is basically reflective of a cycle of abuse. Because here's what happens, every single person in this room, you're in a continuous cycle of abuse."
5:53
And what happens is at the top of the triangle, that's when you feel victimized. That is the moment where somebody has wronged you. Somebody has done something to victimize you. They've hurt you. They've wronged you. They have sinned against you. They've done something to you, and you feel victimized.
6:19
All right. So, what do you do? Well, when you feel victimized, what happens is, it makes you travel down the next leg of the triangle, because you get angry. You get angry that they've done this thing to you. You start to feel resentment, and entitlement. Because what happens is, as you get resentful—"How dare they do that to me. I can't believe they did that to me."—it starts working in you this feeling of entitlement. "I deserve happiness. I deserve this. I deserve that."
6:56
And before you know it, you've moved your way down to the next little leg of the triangle over here. And guess what that one is? That is where you become the perpetrator. This is where you lose it. And you snap at your child or you snap at your husband. Or maybe you leave the house and you go get drunk or maybe you have an affair. Or maybe you just secretly do something. You spit in their soup. I don't know. I don't know what your thing is.
7:30
But whatever it is, it's because you started out feeling victimized, that that built up the resentment that made you travel down that leg of the triangle to the point that you finally snapped and you lashed out. And the reason you're the perpetrator is because the truth is, in that moment, you're the one causing abuse. You're the one doing something wrong. You feel entitled to do it. You've justified why it's okay for you to do it. But you're the one causing damage. You're now the one that's sinning against that person or against another person. But you feel entitled to do it.
8:09
But almost immediately, you start to feel bad about it. You start to feel bad. You start to feel guilty. You start to feel shame. And so that makes you travel now on the bottom leg of the triangle to the next corner, where now you want to rescue the person. You become the rescuer. You try to make it up. You make up for it.
8:35
And now you're being nice, and you're trying to do all these kind things for them. Maybe you go buy them a shirt, or maybe you'll do something nice for them that way. You're sorry, but you're not truly repentant. You are ashamed. But you're not convicted. And so you do these superficial things, to try to sweep over it to try to sweep it under the rug, to try to be nice.
9:05
But guess what. They're not going to respond the way that you want them to respond. Because it's a false intimacy. It feels false. It's not true. Nothing's been resolved. They know it. So this breach exists. So they don't respond to you the way that you manipulate them to respond, or the way you're trying to manipulate them to respond.
9:27
And so guess what. You travel back up the leg, and now you feel victimized again. "I fix them dinner. And they didn't even thank me for that. I mean, can you imagine?" And guess what. Once you're a victim again, the cycle just continues. The cycle just continues and here you are. You're on this cycle, and it's never ending.
9:48
Can you relate to this? The problem is that if this is you, you're in an abusive cycle. And once people are in this cycle, because both parties are in the cycle. If you're in a relationship like this, both parties are in this abusive cycle. And you just keep taking turns being victimized and being the abuser and then trying to rescue the other person. There's no way that this is ever going to lead to anything good because you're stuck on Karpman's triangle.
10:17
And so the question that was raised in that treatment room with about 30 of us was, how do you get off? And it's actually kind of funny, because I wish I could accurately describe the looks of all the faces in that room. Because when the gal teaching this little seminar said, "So how do you get off the triangle?", nobody knew. Because we were all on the triangle, and we didn't know how to get off of it.
10:44
And it's really easy. Can you guess? Based on what we're talking about today? The way to get off the triangle is to take personal responsibility. You're not a victim. The minute that you take personal responsibility, you stop being victimized.
11:06
And by the way, this means personal responsibility for whatever is genuinely yours. Because there's always something you can own.
11:13
So, if you're mad at your spouse because they genuinely embarrassed you at a dinner party by saying something about your bad cooking, instead of letting that build up resentment to the point that then you're going to lash out and say something even more demoralizing or demeaning to him in front of his friends, instead of that, you simply arrest the cycle by stopping and owning your part.
11:44
Well, what would you what would your part be in that? Well, right there, your part would be, "Boy, that really hurt me," or "that really embarrassed me, when you said that." That's only my part. Simply admitting how it made me feel and expressing that. And being honest about how it made me feel. "Boy, when you said that thing about my cooking that really hurt my feelings, it embarrassed me. It made me feel stupid. And I don't want you to do that anymore. Don't do that to me, it was really hurtful." Now you've arrested the cycle, you're not going to go to the lash out part because you expressed the sentiment.
12:21
Now maybe it's something else where you know, you were late getting home from work, and your spouse is like, "Oh, you're always late. And now we're late for this dinner party." And now your part is to go, "You're right. I should have called. I was—I didn't think about that." And granted, maybe it was some big work emergency that was beyond your control. Nevertheless, there's still something you can own in that. You know, "There was a big work emergency, but I should have taken the time to call you and text you so that you weren't worried all night. I'm so sorry, I own that. Will you forgive me?" And now all of a sudden, you've arrested the cycle, because you take ownership of your part.
13:02
You might only need to own 30%. And maybe the other person is 70% in the wrong. It doesn't matter. You don't worry about their 70%, you worry about your 30%. And you let go of their 70%. Once you own your 30%, that's all you have to be responsible for, not their 70.
13:02
See, you will get back on the triangle if you stew over the 70 that they didn't own. And that's not the goal here. The goal is personal responsibility, owning your stuff. And if we can all just own our stuff—oh my goodness, we would turn society around like that. We would turn everything around. Because all of a sudden, we would see that it was up to us to own the things, to look to see where we have agency. What could we have done differently? What could we do different next time? What can I apologize for? What can I own? What changes can I make so that I don't feel this way? Or I don't have this happen to me again, or I don't cause this to happen to you again, so that I don't victimize you again. Okay, what do I need to do?
14:18
Personal responsibility is one of the most important things you will ever learn in this life. And it's something that so few of us have an ability to do.
14:30
So we need to look at our personal relationships here. We need to look into them, our interpersonal relationships, and ask ourselves, "Are we being honest?" One of the reasons why so many of us don't do this is because we're afraid to be honest. We're afraid to arrest the cycle by telling the other person how their actions made us feel. Most of us walk on eggshells.
14:55
Now, a lot of that comes from, in my case, for example, childhood trauma, where I was terrified of further rejection and abandonment and all those things, but part of my process of recovery was that I had to be willing to risk the rejection. I had to be willing to risk the wrath by expressing what was true. And not trying to walk on eggshells.
15:21
If you feel like you are a person who always walks on eggshells because of somebody else's anger issues, or because of how they're likely to respond, then what you need to own is that you are walking on eggshells, and it is up to you to stop. You cannot control the outcome. You cannot manage their reactions. That's not your job. Your job is to simply own your stuff, and to express it.
15:47
And I learned a phrase in recovery that really helped me. "I do not need to prove myself to anyone. I need only express myself as honestly and effectively as I am capable." And that really helped me because I would always try to prove myself, but the proving of myself always led me to lash out, right? It was like a defensive mode. I had a knee jerk defensiveness instead of just being able to say, "Oh, yep, screwed up there. Boy, that was wrong of me. Man, that was really selfish of me. Oh, gosh, that was pretty inconsiderate. I didn't even think about it. I'm so sorry. You're right. That was wrong of me to do that."
16:25
And I don't need to defend myself. We take responsibility by owning it and letting the other person react however they do. And by taking the risk to tell the truth to the other person, regardless of how they're going to react to that truth. We are not supposed to control their reaction or try to manage it. That's where we get into trouble.
16:49
CONCLUSION: So if you've learned something today about the example of Karpman's triangle and being on that triangle, and you're in an abusive cycle, based on what was explained to you today, then my encouragement to you is be bold. Be bold. Be bold. Take radical action and take personal responsibility. Step off that triangle by owning your stuff, practice doing it. Take as much percentage as you can ownership of whatever situation. That's how you do it. And you practice doing it and you get better and better and better at it.
17:21
Have that be one of your New Year's goals. It will change your life. I promise you.
17:30
CALL TO ACTION: Okay, if you've related to this may I just encourage you to share this with somebody maybe for accountability purposes, so that they too can get off the triangle if they're on it too or something. You can practice it together and hold each other accountable.
17:46
Also, if you liked the show, if you've been enjoying it and you—and thank you Lulu. As just like she said, if you are interested in subscribing, then please do that. We would love to have you subscribe on YouTube or the podcast app of your choice. And of course rate and review the show.
18:06
We love to have ratings. It's important. People read them. People like to see even how many there are—even if you don't want to write a review, then rate it. If you think it's a five star give us five stars. The more we have of those, the better we can find more people whose lives can maybe be changed for the better because of the content being discussed here.
18:26
Okay, so thank you so much for listening to The Storyteller's Mission with Zena Dell Lowe, when you go forth inspired to change the world for the better through story.
