17. "Why should I be punished? I didn’t do anything wrong!"

It’s so easy to make ourselves victims. How do we do it? By one thing only: Our thoughts. We think we’re a victim just because we told ourselves that. Maryanne is a woman I know who’s been single about a dozen years since the death of her husband after a long marriage. She’s bright and articulate and she feels vulnerable and gets hurt easily in her dating life. She’d been dating Hank at times for a couple of years. They were both part of the same church and both participated in a number of church retreats for mature singles. She told me Hank had wanted to be just good friends and that she wanted more. Maybe she was pushing, but one day Hank made it very clear he wanted no romance. She was devastated.

Maryanne sent me an email describing her deep hurt and her dilemma. The dilemma was this: Since they were both active in regional weekend retreats for singles she knew she’d see him at these functions. If she saw him she’d feel hurt and sad. When I suggested she stop attending them for awhile she said, “Why should I be punished when I didn’t do anything wrong?” The obvious implication is that Hank did something wrong.

Yet from everything she had told me Hank had just been honest with her. She felt victimized, however, as though he should have wanted to commit to her. Any time we find ourselves using words like should or ought or wrong and similar words we know we’ve made a judgment. At those times we think we know how people should be and what they ought to do. We’ve forgotten that our view is a fantasy. What’s real and true is that “what is” is. You can’t argue with that reality and call yourself sane.

Maryanne's judgments were causing her a lot of unnecessary pain. When she said she shouldn’t be punished by skipping these meetings you’d think someone else was imposing that restriction on her. But who? She herself made up the idea that not going to the meetings would be punishment, as though Hank had set it up. But all Hank did was to be honest and tell her he didn’t want a romance.

How could she have gotten past her pain? By asking herself a few simple questions: Is it true Hank did something wrong? Was he punishing me? Is it true he should want a relationship with me? Honest answers would be no. How do you know that? Because what happened is real. That’s the end of the story. We get stuck in old belief patterns that aren’t true and we don’t realize it. And how do we feel when we believe these lies? We have a lot of pain. When we see the truth, on the other hand, we can feel a lot more peaceful. The emotional hurt is a ringing bell that says, your thinking is off track. Simple investigation through questioning puts you back on track and back to peace again.