Guest Blog by Dick S. Forbes: Professional Victims

Are you a Professional Victim or Involved with Someone who is? 

The following characteristics are signs that you may be a professional victim or are involved with one.  (If you are a Professional Victim just remember, it’s somebody else’s fault.)

1) They never acknowledge when they hurt others. They have exclusive rights to the role of “injured party.” When you call them on their bad behavior, they blame, rationalize, make excuses and justify the behavior. “It’s different when I do it.” Blame is assigned to someone else. Just remember, it’s always your fault or someone else’s fault, but never, ever is it their fault.

2) The victim must be victimized. If you’re not an abusive person, they will pull it out of you in order to play the victim script they have in their head. For example, they will do and say things to push your buttons until you finally explode. The professional victim has gotcha! It’s like the old Green Stamps our moms use to collect, you get enough stamps and you can cash them in on their emotional prize. Now they can play the innocent victim to you, the bad guy.  (What a fun relationship this is!)

3) The professional victim never takes responsibility for themselves.  Let me say this one more time, they never ever take responsibility for their behavior. They blame others and circumstances for their failures and short comings. By not taking responsibility, they can blame the rest of the world for their problems, parents, bosses, ex’s, you, siblings, the cashier at the grocery store.  “If only my boss recognized my great talents,” or “I would be nicer to you if you did x or y for me”. It is always somebody else’s fault.

To have a loving, reciprocal relationship with a professional victim is impossible. In a healthy relationship, individuals take responsibility for things said and done. The professional victim feels slighted, angry and never takes any responsibility for their behavior. Let’s say you try to have a reasonable, adult conversation with the professional victim. You will be met with excuses, blaming, rationalization and justification for their behavior, “it’s different when I do it.”

This is who they are, their identity is found in being a victim.  Their life is really being thrown away. It is impossible to have a relationship with a professional victim who holds you hostage through guilt, obligation and emotional blackmail. The professional victim rarely changes, but they can.

Dick Forbes, MA, can be reached at www.forbescounseling.com, or 770-386-0608.  He has his multi-faceted counseling practice of over 30 years in Cartersville, GA.  His ministry is literally nation-wide due to his traveling to U.S. military bases, and his hosting of various national teleconference trainings and seminars on many relational and personal issues.

8 Ways to Spring Clean Your Marriage - Rebecca Barlow Jordan

Just as a home needs a thorough spring-cleaning, so do our marriages. As we sweep out the cobwebs in the neglected corners of our lives, we’ll discover a new sparkle and shine. Here are eight ways to freshen up your marriage:

Develop a plan for your cleaning ritual. What areas will you attack first? Personal disciplines? Attitudes? Neglected appearances? Habits? Expectations? Communication? List the goals you want to accomplish in your marriage. Be specific. Without a detailed plan, you’ll miss some hidden corners.

Sort through accumulated expectations. Most marriages begin with hidden agendas of his or her expectations. If a wife expects her husband to continue romancing her after the honeymoon and he fails, resentment may follow. A husband who secretly longs for a wife like his mother may set himself up for disappointment when his wife exhibits the opposite behavior. Be realistic with each other about meeting needs. Although God is the only one who can meet your total needs, a mutual exchange of longings and wishes will encourage give and take and help avoid unnecessary hurt.

Discard old habits. Keep a journal of old personal patterns and childish behaviors. Note negative emotions and describe your feelings. Ask yourself, “Could I be taking this situation personally? What does God want to teach me here? Did I in any way cause this?” Even housecleaning experts need extra help to destroy unwanted, moldy habits and to filter out compacted dirt.

Mend the tears of broken relationships and hurt feelings. A stitch in honesty and forgiveness will save years of unraveling. Love is eager to settle differences. Godly love is neither blind nor faultfinding. True love sees weaknesses but rallies to cover them with strength, compassion and encouragement.

Clean out forgotten closets. Family therapist Dixon Murrah says, “Secrets destroy family unity.” Though you may hesitate to reveal hidden skeletons to your mate, remember that marriage intimacy is based on honesty and trust. As you share your family background, open your heart to the negative hurts as well as to the joys of your past. It is always easier to deal with the known than the unknown. And when you understand the “whys” of your mate’s compulsive behaviors or peculiarities, you’ll find a greater capacity for gentleness and love.

Replace worn-out clothes of bitterness with new garments of praise. This will require time for personal discipline with the Lord in prayer and Bible study. Meditate on His Word daily, and you will find your marriage adorned with new beauty.

Vacuum up the spills of harsh words and thoughtless deeds. During emotional or physical stress, even the best of marriages suffer temporary dysfunction. Women can chart monthly cycles if necessary, and plan their activities accordingly. After years of premenstrual suffering (I used to call it pre-monster syndrome), I finally learned to program my schedule around high energy days. And husbands, before you explode your frustrations from work on your wife, think about the aftermath of clean-up.

Polish your marriage often with generous coats of compliments and caring behaviors. Continue this maintenance program daily, not just at once-a-year spring-cleaning time. Catch your mate doing something noteworthy, and give word gifts of praise. Exchange caring behavior lists with each other… the things you’d each like your spouse to do for you.

No matter how great your housekeeping skills, stop and spring-clean your marriage often--together. You’ll improve its value by 100 percent.

“Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. Point out anything in me that offends you, and lead me along the path of everlasting life” (Psalm 139:23-24 NLT).

Aubert Rose Quotes

Rev. Aubert V. Rose, Jr. said a number of things that have stuck with me, and that I've quoted from time to time. In my college days, he was associate Pastor to Dr. Charles Stanley at First Baptist, Atlanta. But he had grown up in Kentucky, with a lot of agricultural experience!

"Some stumps you pull up, and some stumps you plow around." I understood that from farm life... it can take a while for a tree stump to be rotted enough to pull up. But the application can be to an organization, or a co-worker, where it would just be too much trouble to deal with that issue or their stubborness, right now. Maybe next year, try it again.

"I feed in many pastures, but I give my own milk" .. back on the farm we had several pastures for the dairy cows, and you surely didn't want them getting into an onion patch or bitterweed!!! He used it in a sense of studying different commentaries and listening to different speakers, but his messages were from his own and the Lord's inspiration.

"Sometimes you have to get things spinning so fast in the Baptist Church that you'll sling some of them off." This means that some folks weren't ever going to be positively helpful, or might not ever bear spiritual fruit. Someday they'll just have to move elsewhere to ever be happy.

"Unfortunately, the Baptist church is too often in the red flannel long-handle underwear business, and ain't nobody placing any orders anymore!!" I took that to mean we could be irrelevant if we didn't watch out. In the church, or any organization, we can major on minors, and in so doing, be left behind.

There are cautions here, for sure. Better to use these for self-examination, that to use them for disregarding a brother in the faith!