MULTIPLE CHOICE: a.) victim b.) intentional

During the 80’s while I was still in high school, I remember finding it strange that the perpetrators of crimes managed to be seen as victims. This is back in the days of talk shows like “Jenny Jones”, “Sally Jesse Raphael” and “Montel Williams.” Each day, these shows featured rapists and child molesters who complained that they had become perpetrators because they themselves had been victimized in the past. After describing their atrocities, “expert” psychologists and PhD’s were paraded on stage to corroborate that oftentimes offenders had indeed been victims. Even though I was still a kid, I remembered being uncomfortable with this dynamic. It seemed the media had forgiven the offenders for their choices. All of a sudden, criminals had been transformed into victims. When this is the case, where does accountability lie? No one wants to blame the victim, even when they are the offender.

In February of this year, I was introduced to a group whose way of thinking was very different from anyone I knew. In many ways, their views on life and the world were extremely out of the box. A couple of them proposed an idea that I had never heard before, but have contemplated ever since. The idea is the following:

“What if we have chosen everything that has ever happened in our lives?”

When I first heard this statement, my initial reaction was “No, of course we don’t choose everything.” Certainly, we wouldn’t choose bad things to happen in our lives. Or would we? The more I contemplated this concept, the more it made sense to me. The things we want and the things we need are rarely in alignment, and oftentimes unpleasant things lead to the greatest epiphanies in life. What if, on some subconscious level, we truly knew that we needed to experience both negativity and positivity to truly learn?

This is a scary concept in many ways, especially when you take it to its limit. The deeper idea behind it insinuates that we have chosen even the atrocities in our lives. Whether we have been robbed, raped or molested, is it all because we have chosen it? Do we choose to be rich or poor, sick or healthy? I realize this is an extreme concept. The thing I love most about “we choose everything” is that it accomplishes the opposite of that 80’s victim phenomenon. Instead of a world full of victims, we are all transformed into powerful, responsible beings who are accountable for our choices, even when they seem like bad ones.

Personally, the more I embrace this idea, the less victimized I feel by whatever is happening in my life. Two years ago, I received a rare cancer diagnosis and for many weeks, I felt like such a victim. I questioned how and why this had happened, and felt as if the world had been unfair. But soon thereafter I realized why not me? The more I looked at my life, the more the diagnosis made sense. It was a puzzle piece that fit very nicely into the mosaic of my life. Before the diagnosis, many of my pursuits had been ill placed. It took the diagnosis for me to begin appropriately making changes. Today, there is no doubt I am a much happier person than I ever could have been on my previous path.

Now, we fast-forward twenty plus years from the days of the “talk show,” and the media is airing shows like “Judge Judy” and “Judge Mathis.” I admit a few of these shows are guilty pleasures of mine and there is a certain satisfaction I take from knowing accountability is now being promoted. Finally, there is a reversal from the shows of the 80’s that featured bad behavior and then excused it. Done are the days of receiving sympathy in exchange for playing victim. As such, we should all contemplate the events and circumstances of our lives and ask ourselves “How has this transformed me into a stronger and better person?” When the answer to that question becomes clear, we will also come to understand whether or not we chose it.

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of my sci-fi/fantasy/adventure novel, “The Unveiling: 1.0,” please visit TheUnveilingSeries.com.