You Are Not a Victim, Turn Your Pain into Passion

Hello ladies,

I pray you and your families are doing well. I want to share something with you that is extremely close to my heart and I want to be very transparent. The main reason is that I have had to walk through this lonely and painful valley of a mindset shift that has plagued me my whole life. I know today we talk a lot about a mindset shift but I didn't know how deeply rooted an unhealthy mindset could be. Carol S. Dweck, a psychologist, defines mindset as "The view YOU ADOPT, for yourself that profoundly affects the way you lead your life". Understand that these mindsets can be developed early in our lives, even as a young child. In doing my research on this topic I have learned that many factors create our mindset, but for the sake of this blog not being too long, I will only list five. They are: Thoughts, perceptions, emotions, values, and behaviors. (We can go deeper into these areas in another blog). The main point I want to drive home today is that YOU ARE NOT A VICTIM!

For many of us as women, from the time we were little girls there has been this seed planted in us that whatever people said about us, what we saw around us, or even what was done to us, we unknowingly created an unhealthy mindset around it. For example; if we saw someone we thought was prettier than us, we told ourselves we weren't pretty enough. As a teenager, If we heard our parents bragging about how smart our siblings were and that we should be more like them, we told ourselves we weren't as smart as they were. so we only put in enough effort to barely graduate high school. If bad things happened to us as we grew into adults, we told ourselves good things never happen to us and that's just the way our life is going to be. There are many more examples I could give, however, I am sure you have some evidence of your own from your life experiences.

Nevertheless, here is the good news. If God has kissed you with life today, which he has because you are reading this blog. Then you have been given the blessing of another chance to change your mindset. Starting today, you can determine how you want the rest of your life to go. You can say to yourself, although I have been treated badly in my past, I have had bad things spoken about me, and I have even made bad choices. But today I choose to turn my life around and I am saying to myself, I AM NOBODY'S VICTIM! Starting today, I will turn my pain into passion. I will no longer hold on to what is not beneficial for my life. I will not dwell on the bad things that have happened to me or the people who have treated me badly. I will no longer rehearse or build a shrine to my past mistakes reminding me of how I missed it or messed up. Today, I begin again. I will see myself as valuable, regardless of how other people see me. I will treat myself with kindness even if others do not. I will not take on the baggage, beliefs, or burdens of others or become responsible for their happiness. Today I CHOOSE ME! I see my future as bright and wonderful. I will embrace the thought that every day is a blessing and a good day regardless if things work out as planned or not. I will be careful to watch what comes out of my mouth because what comes out of your mouth comes back on your life. I will live my life with thanksgiving and a heart of gratitude every day. I will treat others as I want to be treated and live in the belief that "you reap what you sow", "what goes around comes back around", and "what you put out in the universe is what will come back to you." Any way you say it, what I think, speak, and do will affect my life. So, today I say goodbye to being a victim and hello to being a Queen! Thank you, God, for the freedom to choose and begin again.

Love and Blessings,

Dr. Doris

Call to action: Take inventory of your life, you decide what you want the year 2024 to be. Release blame, shame, guilt, and regret. Embrace the new you, a growth mindset, and the God-given freedom to choose. Watch the video below to help you better understand that you are not a victim, so turn your pain into passion.