I know, I know. This is such a short entry, the shortest I’ve ever posted. But the next subject in queue has nothing to do with this one so… Sorry. Hopefully, you’ll get something out of it. All of us have been victims of something. It doesn’t have to be at the hands of others. I could be losing job after job, being financially strapped, having a poor self-esteem. Well, you get what I mean.

Me: Why do some people decide to stay in victimhood, yet others become survivors like me and overcome it? Why?

Erik schooches up on the chair and puts his elbows on his knees.

Erik: First I want to be very clear that surviving is an action word that gets you out of no longer having to “survive.” This is where people hang onto it too long. They tell their story again and again, “I was raped twice and held at gunpoint, and I’m a survivor.” I know these are traumatic experiences. I’m not taking them lightly, but you more you use it to define yourself, the more you’re telling yourself the story that this is still happening to you, and you need to survive.

Me: Yeah, a lot of people define themselves that way. “I’m a survivor.”

Erik: Yeah, but guess what? If you’ve survived, then you’ve survived. Let it go and let yourself flower in the new place you are. You don’t have to stay in survivor mode. You can be held at gunpoint and raped and then come into this new relationship and that story from the past never comes up. That’s because you’re the new flower. It’s still part of your foundation, but it doesn’t feed who you are in every waking moment and in every single decision that you make.