Victim: a person harmed or injured as a result of an action, crime, or other event, or action; someone who is duped or tricked.

Victor: a person who defeats an opponent or adversary in a battle, struggle, or a competition

Which definition fits you?

We’ve all been a victim of something at least once in our lives. A traffic accident. A break-in at our home. The subject of harmful and untrue gossip. Losing a job or a home. Desertion by a spouse.

Or possibly events that are far worse.

We don’t plan on becoming a victim. But sometimes it happens; it’s not preventable. And there’s nothing we can do about it. Except rise above it.

Yes, that’s easier said than done at times. And how long it takes also depends on what you’re a victim of. Naturally victims of severe accidents or other situations involving long term or permanent physical injuries take much longer to overcome, and that is not the focus of this particular blog. I’m speaking about emotional trauma. Those hard-to-handle, sometimes crushing losses, that while not physically destructive or disfiguring, they are emotionally and psychologically crushing, sometimes almost to the point of physical pain.

Because many of us take an unwelcome and traumatic event in our lives and let it control our lives, rather than navigating through and rising above it. Many times we get so deeply mired in the nuances of what was done to us by others, that we get stuck in a pit filled with feelings of discouragement, disappointment, helplessness, and self-doubt. It’s not a pretty place, or a healthy place, to be.

Being the victim takes over, defines our life, and takes away our joy.

But we don’t have to stay there. In fact, staying there will destroy us. We have to grab the ladder and crawl out. It’s not easy; the rungs of the ladder are slippery, and quite often our feet slip, and we fall back a couple of rungs, but we don’t fall all the way back to the bottom.

It just feels like it sometimes. And the climb starts again. Until something else kicks us back down, and the cycle starts again. And we begin to think maybe we’re stuck there forever. As much as we say we want to be out, it just doesn’t seem possible.

We get so used to being a victim, it becomes our identity. We keep waiting for the next strike against us, instead of recognizing and appreciating the good things that are trying to come into our life. We continually dwell on all of the bad things that have happened and it becomes our identity; the very essence of who we are. It’s easier to stay in that pit of victimhood than crawling out.

But we cannot remain a victim. If we do we will never make it to the beautiful future that is waiting just around the corner. Instead of dwelling on all the negative, all of the bad things of the past, we have to focus on the good in our future.

Because it’s coming. It’s coming as soon as we release the past to the past. It’s over and gone, and it won’t be back. We can’t change what happened, but we can change our responses to it, and we can change what happens tomorrow.

Changing our responses to what made us the victim enable us to finally become the victor. By putting what happened behind us once and for all, and making a conscious effort to keep it behind us, we will no longer live as a victim.

A victor rises above difficult and challenging circumstances, and once we make the decision to do that, and stick to that decision EVERY DAY, no matter what reminders of the past try to creep back in, what a difference we begin to see in our life!

No, we won’t get back what we lost.

We will get back so much more!