A Victim Mentality: 6 Ways To Stop Self-Pity

“Self-pity is easily the most destructive of the non-pharmaceutical narcotics. It’s addictive, gives momentary pleasure, and separates the victim from reality.” – John W. Gardner

Having a victim mentality is self-destructive. But all it takes is a shift in your perspective to stop the pity party.

Self-pity is about believing you’re a victim of circumstances. Feeling sorry for yourself will not get you anywhere. In fact, self-pity can keep you stuck in the past and prevent you from getting close to anyone. It can even weaken your immunity or lead to depression.

Instead, you need to realize it’s no one’s fault how you live and feel. You’re responsible for your life, and are capable to take control and change it.

This is what you can do to shift from feeling sorry for yourself to completely owning yourself.

1. Change the way you think about yourself and your life.

Sometimes a small change can bring big results. When you change your beliefs about yourself and life, your life changes.

Below are examples of some common negative beliefs, as well as simple ways to shift these beliefs into positive thoughts.

2. Your life is your responsibility. Take control over it.

You are responsible for your actions, choices, thoughts, and feelings.

If a partner cheated on you, it’s their responsibility. You must take control over how you react to that situation and move forward.

This means you have at least two options:

1. Forgive him or her, commit to staying together, and work on improving your relationship.
2. Leave him or her, and take time to work on your own personal development.

Remember to stop blaming him or her, and especially yourself. Take such a situation as an opportunity to look deeper into what you want out of your life.

3. Skip the pity party and feel the compassion—especially for yourself.

Having self-compassion means understanding and having empathy toward yourself.

When you feel sorry for yourself, you distance yourself from reality. You withdraw and avoid facing the challenges ahead of you.

Start feeling self-compassion with a few of these techniques:

• Be kind to yourself
• Focus on being more mindful in every situation
• Encourage yourself to try new things
• Recognize and understand your emotions
• Write what you’re grateful for
• Enjoy the small things

4. Accept your mistakes as part of your learning process.

Your mistakes are the choices you make. They are there for you to learn from. Remind yourself that with the knowledge and experience you had before, you acted the best you could.

Accept the fact that you can’t change your past, but be grateful that you can change your future by acting differently now.

5. Always look at the bright side of any situation.

Don’t attach yourself emotionally to a negative situation that may seem unbearable. There’s always an opportunity that can be had, even in the worst of situations.

Try to be flexible and open-minded. If you currently have a stressful job, take a step back to see the bright side of it. Write down what makes it great. Are you building experience? Learning new valuable skills? Working with inspirational people?

That said, if you can’t see a bright side, maybe you need to re-evaluate what you’re doing. Remember, leaving a bad situation is always your choice as well, and may end up paying off in the long run.

6. Stop complaining.

When you talk about your problems with other people, you remain in those problems.

Ego likes to complain by saying “Why me?” The ego thinks that nothing bad should happen to you. It badly needs attention. But your ego isn’t the center of the universe.

Instead of wasting energy complaining about your life, choose to improve your life, and the results will follow.