Between Victimhood and Absurdity

Are you actually 100% responsible for everything that is or has ever happened to you?

Is it your fault that your partner cheated on you? Was your divorce settlement a shit show because, deep down, you really wanted it that way? Do you always get back exactly what you put out into the world? Was your early childhood sexual abuse something you “attracted” to you by way of unconscious manifestation?

Did you make a soul contract with your uncle before this lifetime that he would commit suicide in the garage “for your growth and evolving soul path?”

Did Indigenous American Tribes bring on their own genocide at the hands of white settler culture because of self defeating unconscious belief patterns? Was the holocaust ultimately - yknow what? Let’s just stop there. Yikkes.

There are some popular ideas out there that make me nauseous. I get why they’re popular. I’m all for jettisoning the victim mentality that looks at life as a series of unfortunate events we just have to limp around somehow. I want to believe that we all have the power to create the life we want - without limitations or setbacks.

I worry though. Some ideas have shadows of their own. Some metaphysical truth claims that feel liberating can also have a biting long tail you don’t see coming.

I’ve read a lot this past year on reincarnation and life between lives and near death experiences. I’ve poured over self help books that talk about manifestation and how you create your own reality. And to be honest, I’ve really enjoyed and gotten a ton out of most of it. I know that in general, the more responsibility I take for my life the higher my emotional health and sense of well being is likely to be.

But.

If we are just going to spiritually bypass the horrific evil that befalls a child burned alive by a sadistic murderer because “it was all part of their karma” or “it was Gods will” or “we create our own reality”, I think I’ll get off this train at the next stop.

Do we really have to decide between victimhood and absurdity? Are we really saying to grieving parents that unless they take responsibility for their role in the cancer that claimed their child’s life that they are living “powerlessly”?

I understand that notion would eliminate the victim mentality, but is it really any healthier than spiritual bypassing? And for the record, how the fuck can anyone ever discern whether that’s true or not? This can’t be proven true OR false!

I think it’s hard for us to embrace that we don’t really know the answer and that maybe it’s a little of both. Sometimes in life, shit happens. And you know what else? A lot of times we perpetuate our suffering because there’s a certain payoff to always being the sick person, or the one who got cheated on, or the one who never failed because, welll, they never actually tried.

We absolutely DO lock ourselves into repeating loops of misfortune because of unresolved trauma from the past and projected fear of the future. And in those cases, it helps to have a therapist or a close friend who can help us see how we are attracting these outcomes habitually. It is true that if you wanna have good friends, you gotta be a good friend and there’s a certain truth to the idea that your vibe attracts your tribe. But it doesn’t mean that if that good friend betrays you in a business deal, that it was your fault. Nobody needs the depression inducing idea that your shitty life is merely a result of the shifty person you are wanting more shit to befall you. But also, maybe yes too.

Can we relax the spiritual certitudes and the complicated unprovable metaphysics while also acknowledging that we are co-creators of reality along with an innumerable host of other factors and beings, living as well as dead?

Maybe we do create some - maybe even lots- of our reality. But also, sometimes your friend just has a shitty boss, who screwed her over and now she just needs a listening ear and some empathy, not our bypassing or silver linings playbook.

Also...I could be wrong. This could just be a long essay attempt to escape responsibility for my own life. So make your own call.