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G'day leaders, in this podcast we talk about something I'm very passionate about and that is

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the difference between a victim mindset and having agency or accountability over your life.

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It has an amazing impact or positive impact if you become accountable and develop agency

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and has a negative impact if you develop and catch the mind virus which I call victimhood.

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Enjoy.

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Why did it count backwards?

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I don't know, we're now recording.

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What? Hello captain.

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Come fly with me, let's fly, let's fly.

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What are we going to talk about?

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I don't know, leadership, life and everything else.

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And we're live.

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No.

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Oh we haven't put the on air sign on.

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Can you click it on?

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Sure.

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Yeah okay because we've got to have it on when we're recording.

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Exactly, we're recording.

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Alright yeah you've got me there.

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Now we're live and recording in the studio.

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Hey Michelle.

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Hi guys.

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You can call me Turtle.

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I can, I can.

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Yeah because you're Michelle.

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So funny.

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First bad joke of the day.

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Well I'm excited about this episode.

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Why?

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Because it's on a topic that's really, well discovering it and understanding it and applying

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it, what we're going to talk about has changed my life in many many ways and it's something

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that I'm quite passionate about talking to other people and it's something I call a mind virus.

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Yeah I, when we were speaking about it on our walk I thought I have definitely been a victim of.

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What we're about to talk about.

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That's right.

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Which you've probably let people know what we're going to talk about.

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Well I hadn't labelled it.

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You hadn't labelled it.

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No.

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Well yeah it's the difference between having a victim mindset or being accountable or having

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agency over self.

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Yes.

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Something that I have been caught up in at different stages in my life.

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It's a mind virus, a mindset's in your head, it's very hard to

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recognise that you're in it but that is of having the victim mindset where things are happening

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to you.

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Yeah that's right.

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Rather than for you.

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That's right and the reason it came up on our walk today was that you've just recently spoken

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about it, it was in one of your training workshops.

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Yeah it was with a local council so we do a lot of work with councils around Australia and

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where I was working with some fantastic field service guys and we were doing resilience

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and anti-fugility training and it came up and it's an interesting discussion because

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when you start to look at it, it's basically a choice.

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You have a choice between having what's called a victim mindset or having an accountability

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mindset.

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Once you're in a victim mindset it has so many impacts on so many areas of your life.

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But then if you are able to get yourself out of it and get yourself back into an accountability

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or an agency, we'll talk more about what agency is, again very very positively affects your life

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rather than negatively.

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And people around you as well.

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Yeah so no, that's why we brought it up on the walk because I had a fantastic discussion with

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a few of these people at the council.

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Yeah so okay we'll start with what is victim mindset?

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What is victim mindset? It's basically where you are focusing on negative things that have

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happened to you and that's how you see them, that they happened to you, that you're the victim

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of circumstances, you're the victim of bad events, you're the victim of the things that have

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happened to you and you spend a lot of time focusing on that and you become quite negative.

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So your default mode network which is the part of our brain that is working when we're at rest or

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if we're just contemplating life and that sort of stuff, the default mode network, if you've got a

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victim mindset the needle is very much towards the past.

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So you constantly go back to the past and you constantly relive negative events that have

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occurred and you start to get the oh woe is me, nothing is going on, you're not going to be

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oh woe is me, nothing ever works out, everything always negative happens to me and you start to

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develop these thoughts and these thoughts then travel down into your subconscious mind,

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nothing ever works out for me and now your subconscious mind has to do its job and its

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job is to find evidence of that. And so now the filter that your brain operates on is

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searching your environment, searching your experience for evidence that you have been a

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victim, that nothing ever works out for you and it will only ever bring to your attention

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the stuff that isn't working the way that you want it to. A negative detective. A negative, oh I love

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that, can I steal that? Absolutely. Your brain becomes a negative detective. Oh that's brilliant,

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I love that term. Yeah. Coined by Michelle Huntington on whatever date this is. So bad things

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do happen and so it's not dismissing those or saying that nothing bad does happen and

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now you look at it. It's potentially I suppose it starts out as a coping mechanism. That's what it

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is, it actually is and I've read about how as a child if you feel powerless, if when you're a

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child and you feel powerless you don't have agency over self, you're very much controlled or whatever

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or like me very shy, sensitive, insecure little kid and you know just struggling being in the world

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because you're so sensitive to things. Yeah when you feel powerless it's a coping mechanism

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that I think your brain adopts to put the blame elsewhere so that you don't pick on yourself.

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Yeah and so how it appears to others is when, so some of the ways that you can tell if someone is

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or you yourself are, if you're self-aware enough and catch yourself could be blaming others.

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Oh yeah it's all about everyone else is to blame, circumstances are to blame.

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Like the world, feeling like the world's against you. Excuse me yeah the world yeah the world is

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against me, the world is out to get me. Well you were talking about the default mode network

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and how your brain, the negative detective, finds things to confirm and validate. That's right so

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self-sabotage almost to make sure that happens. Yeah yeah it has to find evidence of your internal

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belief so if your internal belief is that you're a victim, that your things happen to you, nothing

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ever works out for you, your brain will find evidence of that and that's all you see which

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then validates it and then it's self-fulfilling and self-justifying. It's yeah.

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Okay. It reminded me of a time in my life where I was flying and I remember being on a particular

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flight with a captain and you know there's a long time in the office, you've got many hours together

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over many days quite often and I hadn't seen flown with this captain for probably six to eight months

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and he said to me oh how's everything going and even his tone of voice was

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it was empathetic and I thought it was a little strange and then he made you know I was like oh

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good and he started asking me about particular events that had happened in my life that weren't

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so great but he then made a statement and I was shocked by it. It felt like I'd been punched in

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the guts actually and he said oh everything bad always happens to you, you have such a bad life

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and I thought what no I don't but and I questioned it I said why do you say that and he said oh well

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every time I see you something else bad has happened and I thought do I say that but maybe

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I do and I realized that he and probably others had communicated we had communicated in a way

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and our habit was talking about the bad things or emphasizing things in our life that hadn't

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gone so well and only talking about that rather than it be yet part of my life but not the

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good part and I saw myself especially that day when he said it to me as having a great life and

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everything worked out for me so when he said that it was a real like slap in the face of thinking

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oh I've really got to change my language. Maybe he'd caught you in a in a period of time where you had

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caught the mind virus. Oh absolutely you know there were there were and it can feel a bit like that

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and then I was attracting people like that to my life which he and potentially others were also

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helping me stay in that little hole. Well that happens yeah when you when you when you catch the

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mind virus which when we discussed on the walk we we both have caught it a few times in our life I

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had it from my early childhood that you do attract others because you surround yourself with people

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who validate you who make you feel like you are okay for being you so you're not going to

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surround yourself with people who are the exact opposite. No. Yeah so it does attract people

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towards you and regrettably then makes it more challenging to to get out of that mindset because

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it becomes the normal and you may have been in networks of friends where the and I've been guilty

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of this where when you see them you go straight to discussing the negative things that have happened

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and and I remember the like I'm certainly not in that now but I remember one particular period of

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my life where I was in it I caught myself whinging and I don't like whinging I think the world is a

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fantastic place what have we got to whinge about really and I caught myself whinging and then I

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kind of stepped outside of myself and I started to look at why was I doing this why I don't know

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I'd gone through a you know a tough time and and that I'd been whinging with all my friends and

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then I thought to myself if I was my friends I wouldn't want to be hanging around with me I'm

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very lucky I've got amazing friends who you know even if I was having a whinge at the time they'd

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sit there and they'd listen and they'd show compassion and and it was it was beautiful

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having them at the time when I was in this victim mindset but then I looked at myself and I thought

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I don't want to be like this and I know what's happening and I know the effect it's creating and

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I know that this isn't the full picture this is my mind only seeing negatives yeah and I didn't like

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being around me at that time in my life and I'm sure my friends were lovely they didn't say oh I

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don't want to catch up but when then once I pulled myself out of it it was such a relief to just let

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go of the mind virus and go back to the way I'd like to live my life is that I have control that

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I have agency over my life I contribute to every event that happens and I am in control of how I

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react to those things and and what I'm going to be doing moving forward.

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Oh I was in a mother's group when my twins were babies and um which was you know great I hadn't

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been when I had my first son we were in remote um New South Wales and I thought oh this is an

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opportunity to form a bond with women who are going through similar things you know they're just given

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birth to babies as well and I thought we had a bond a common bond because basically sleep deprived

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new babies um first time yeah I know for you it wasn't the fact but yeah and and so that cohesive

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group and I really craved that community and longing but I actually removed myself from that

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group after a couple of months because it became a bit of a bitching session and apologies to anyone

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for the language but it it really uh appeared to me to be an opportunity for a group of new mums

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to get together and hate on their husbands and just talk about the bad things when I didn't need

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that I I needed support and community and we celebrate the things and sure you know we talk

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about oh I only had this much sleep or whatever and laugh about it whilst having our fifth coffee

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for the day at 10 o'clock in the morning but um that that's what I thought it was going to be

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so my expectations yeah were not met and I could see that if I stuck around I too would start to

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have that opinion of my husband and and so I yeah I removed myself and made excuses initially and

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kind of edged my way out of that group it's so easy to fall into the trap though isn't it

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especially when you're around other people it's contagious because it's an easy mindset to have

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because you can blame everyone else and you don't have to do anything yeah yeah the opposite is

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that you have to take accountability you have to have agency over self and that takes effort well

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if you keep doing it it's becomes a learned helplessness it does it does and then it's

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very much linked to pessimism and and anxiety and depression so if your default mode network

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needle is kind of skewed towards the past then you're going to be falling into depression because

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you're focusing on the negative things if your default mode network needle is you know more

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angled towards the future you're worried about things that are in the future and you think that

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bad things are going to happen so you're more inclined to more anxiety and those sort of things

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yeah so it's um one thing I have noticed is people who are in it and you feel for them you

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really do because you don't want anyone to be in a bad situation in your life or be thinking bad

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things is that um those people if you yourself have something so they're in a they're in their

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mindset yeah and you're empathizing with them and trying to help them and being a shoulder for them

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you know support but if something ever happens to yourself and you're you have a bit of a stumble

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and you question or oh yeah don't know what to do about this they have a really um obvious lack of

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empathy towards your stuff even though you may have been supporting and not that it's a give take

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sort of thing you know you don't do it as a transactional giving empathy but you find that

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they have a lack of empathy for anyone else's problems it's very self-centered um and and

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inward looking it reminds me of a set of characteristics personality traits i've seen

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uh in the past where um these people will actively ask questions about negative aspects in other

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people's lives without sharing any of their own which you typically do when you're trying to do

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that building reporting oh yeah i've had a similar situation in my life and you which is called an

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autobiographical response but there's these people who will ask you things about your life that are

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negative and bring up things that you may have discussed in the past that are negative even

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though you know you might have put it to bed and got over it and they're doing this because when

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you're in your victimhood they feel better about themselves oh that could have been the captain

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old mate he could have possibly possibly i don't want to project that onto onto everyone and

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i'm really lucky i only ever surround myself with amazing supportive compassionate people

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that's a choice that's a life's choice and so none of my friends do this but i have i have seen

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this and recognize this in other people where they actually want to want to drag other people

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into their victimhood so that they can sit there and go oh at least my bad at least at least my

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life's not that bad sort of thing and that's something i've seen as well which is certainly

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a character trait to avoid if you can

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then is victimhood or a victim mindset is it a symptom or a personality trait it's

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oh okay great question i well it becomes it can become your persona um if you surround yourself

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if you've grown up like it with the victim mindset the negative of the pessimistic sort of the needle

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towards the negative um and you surround yourself with other people who are like that you're not

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even aware you're not even aware you're not aware that you're creating your own reality

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by telling your subconscious mind to only find evidence of where the world is shit and where

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the world isn't happening the way you want it to happen so i'm going to suggest it's

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i wouldn't describe it as a trait or a personality or a symptom it's it's it's it's a mind virus

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and i think i think it's i've felt myself actually catch it even during periods like the last few

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years have just been amazing in my life i'm the happiest i've ever been the most content i've ever

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been but occasionally you can just feel it this this virus just so it's not going to jump into

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your head for a couple of days and wants to sit there and and re uh ignite old negative neural

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networks in your brain and then you sit there and you go oh look at what happened and you can feel

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the energy dragging out of you and then i'm lucky every time i recognize it now i just

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no no no that's not the way i'm living life yeah so if you do start to notice that you might have

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a few of these traits coming in yeah and you've got that self-awareness or you've got an opportunity

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to kind of sit outside yourself and realize hey maybe i've been doing this or i'm not liking what

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i'm projecting out here into the world or my friends family etc yeah how can you change it

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well i think that the best thing we can all do right now in this moment whether you're driving

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in your car you're at home you're wherever you're listening you and i are standing here behind these

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microphones make a decision right now to not be a victim to basically say to yourself i am not a

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victim things don't happen to me they happen for me i have agency over my life i am accountable for

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everything that i do so therefore every experience that i have and the universe will not throw

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everything good at me it will throw both good and bad but what i have the option to do is choose to

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be in control of my actions so i'm going to focus on what i can control focus on the things that

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are within your locus of control so that then you have agency over your life not being a victim of

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circumstances it's kind of stupid to think that the world will never throw shit at you yeah of

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course it will yeah but if you have the mindset that you're a victim when the world throws shit

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at you you're going to go oh well it's me and you're going to become the victim but if you've got

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somebody who's got agency over their life and you've got it and you're accountable when the

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world throws that shit at you you can go okay all right well what do i do now what's within my

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control how what lesson can i take out of this and that's what you talk about in your keynote

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i love the bit on anti-fragility that you talk about in your keynote about how you know adversity

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is a gift because it provides an opportunity for you to grow to learn to get stronger and if you

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have that mindset that adversity is a gift in the future when things happen to you you go okay

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what's the lesson here what am i going to gain how am i going to strengthen what am i going to do

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you know this is happening for me not to me a friend of ours rich who has come over to australia

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for a couple of weeks on holidays from singapore another pilot and he shared with me just yesterday

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actually the um a post on social media about is it elena dockage yes the tennis player yeah and her

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story she's amazing she is and her story's pretty shit really um but her attitude now she is amazing

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i've actually got goosebumps on my arms it's it it was so was it an article it was an article on her

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and so inspiring she is like i i've flown her actually to albury on rex when i was um working

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for them and and she was in her tennis you know um era but she i and i didn't know any of her story

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to what has happened to her um continuously for so long and how she's come out the other side and her

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attitude to it and it's exactly what you just said it's happened for her not to her and she's in a

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place that she now credits what happened to her um to how she is now it like amazingly how she is

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now so thank you rich hi kylie and um isn't she a ball of energy kylie and derek and me but um

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hello everyone yeah they it really it was a great great article and i will i will share it with you

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actually i'll put a link um in the podcast notes as well if anyone else wants to to read it but

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it was just um a great reminder that regardless of of what you've been in and and it is easy to

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to fall into that why was me and you know but yes very inspiring so and i interrupted so as

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far as how to change as well i think understanding that there are alternatives which is what you were

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saying about the anti-fragility yeah it becomes a choice yeah a simple choice humans have the power

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to make a decision about anything in their life the problem with choosing to be accountable is

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that you have to uh just release this need to blame others and blame circumstance um and it can

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be challenging for people because you're basically saying to yourself the way of thought in the past

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was wrong but it's not that that you were wrong in the past yeah it's that that the way you were

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thinking was creating a certain result yeah and that is negativity and pessimism and lack of energy

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and all the negative things that come with victim mindset and there's a different choice well i hear

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you talking like this to the kids you you say you know when they they get upset they get frustrated

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they get angry about they can't do something straight away or they've you know that what

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they're wanting to do fails or breaks or whatever and you say to them rather than saying i can't do

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it i'm hopeless i can't do it yet or that way hasn't worked so far yeah let's try a different

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method yeah the growth mindset language changing the language yeah yeah yeah so instead of becoming

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the oh well with me i can't do it yeah that's that's very much the growth mindset stuff so that

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you don't you never say i can't do it you say i can't do it yet yeah you don't see failure as

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failure you see it as a learning opportunity um i hope this is true it's on the internet so it's

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got to be true edison was asked mr edison how do you feel about failing 10 000 times because

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apparently he had lots and lots of patents uh trying to invent the light globe and he said sir

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i did not fail 10 000 times i found 10 000 things that do not work and i love that that attitude

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because that's that's somebody who's got agency well that's reclaiming your story or rewriting

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your story isn't it it is it is being being responsible being accountable i i have um

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yeah agents i love that word agency over my life

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um one one thing we did discuss for new year's eve also was to set healthy boundaries so um

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they're the habits or um that we now set so as soon as we start to go down a certain way of

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thinking it's when i start to think this i do this so we've got rules yes mine is um drink a glass of

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water and so when you do catch yourself or if you do catch yourself starting to think

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starting to say then um you know have a rule that when i start to i have to do this 10 push ups go

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drink of water yeah whatever yeah my my new rule is radical acceptance which helps with this

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so radical acceptance is it happened it is what it is everything is as it should be or everything

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is as it will be yeah instead of oh that shouldn't happen oh whatever it is so radical acceptance

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really helps me i want to talk about um what we can do when our friends are in the victim mindset

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yeah yeah so um the what they want and what they need in that moment is compassion to start with

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they need the compassion the empathy from from from you as their friend or or you know acquaintance

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or even a colleague but the next step i think is the most important step once you've shown the

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compassion is that you actually play what's called responsibility tennis i love responsibility tennis

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it's one of my favorite topics to talk about especially in the leadership workshop and the

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coaching and mentoring workshops because responsibility tennis is when somebody has

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a winch to you they complain about something you can either sit there and be in that energy

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and you can yeah catch the mind virus um or you can play what's called responsibility tennis put

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them back into agency and the way you do that you say okay so what can you do about it what's within

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your control what have you tried what else could you try who could you speak to who's an expert in

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this area that's done this before so in other words you're hitting the responsibility of fixing

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the situation back into their court which gives them agency and if you're asking questions you're

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putting them in control so you're actually compassionately asking them okay i see the

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situation you're in i have compassion for you now what are you going to do about it yeah yeah and

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you can do that for yourself as well yeah yeah so it's a it's a technique to make sure that you're

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not catching the mind virus of victimhood i like that i have so how would you do it to yourself

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to yourself so what okay so as i said before everyone just today make the decision that you

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have agency over your life it doesn't matter what has happened to you it's happened for you just

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just just adopt that mindset and so in the future when you find yourself whinging when you find

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yourself being the victim when you find yourself being negative looking back in the past and being

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depressed about something that's happened just sit there and go okay i have an opportunity to

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rewire my brain to change the way i think about things and i can look at what's happened what i've

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learned what i'll avoid doing in the future what i'll do differently in the future and just focus

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on what's within your control and then just get yourself back into a mindset of that you have more

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input into what happens in your life than circumstance so ultimately you have a choice

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you have a choice everyone has a choice and it really i know it's not black and white victim versus

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accountability it's not a black and white thing no shit will happen to you yeah but expect that

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in fact even look forward to it well that's part of anti-fragility is the expectation so setting up

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systems that you've actually thought and gone through the process of what if yeah and it's

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and so you're prepared for the shit yeah and then because you are it's not the first time it's not

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a shock your your shock response is reduced yeah and you then go into fix it mode that's it that's

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it that's why a psychologist will always say to you what's the worst thing that could happen

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because when you identify what is the worst thing that could happen and then you identify what would

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you do in that situation you're now back in control yeah yeah so if you expect it don't walk around

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expecting bad things to happen yeah that that's that's again the negative detective yeah but just

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know that things will happen from time to time but great things will also happen and if you have the

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mindset and we both share this one that great everything works out for us yeah it does we say

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this to always we say this it does everything works out for us uh i will always get a car park at the

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shopping center yes and when you get it you go oh i got a car park but if you go i never get a car

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park you drive around the car park going and you don't somehow you don't see yeah true and it

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shifts the way you feel quite dramatically yeah it's it's i i love this topic because

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it's something that has affected me deeply in in many years ago when things happen i fell into the

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victim mindset i became a whinger the sort of person i don't like uh i didn't want to be um but

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then when i realized that i have agency i have control i have decisions i can make in my brain

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that makes my life mine to create and mine to dictate and mine to i i'm steering the ship of my

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ship of my life yeah yeah i've so to sum it all up yeah how to change it is awareness awareness

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so no yeah make it know that you're in it yeah so so then acceptance of it yeah okay yeah guilty

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guilty um make the decision now i'm going to be in control of my life that's right so decide on

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alternatives yep and then shift your self-identification so change your language

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and reclaim your story yeah as it from the different perspective yep surround yourself

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with people who lift you up yeah and help you focus on the positive don't don't don't get

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don't surround yourself with negative people who are always in trauma yeah um if you do have people

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you know be compassionate but play that responsibility tennis so that you get a

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bit of a boundary there be that annoying person that's always up and then people are wanting to

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be in the in the in the mud and they'll either soon extricate themselves from your friendship

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circle because they don't like your positivity yeah or the responsibility tennis and your energy

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lifts them out that you may have been what they needed to kind of go oh hang on why aren't i like

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that oh that that reminds me of the story i was teaching um at a company here in sydney and we're

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talking about optimism and pessimism and when we go on to the topic of optimism there was a lady in

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the course she said oh i know something like that and i said okay please share and she said oh she's

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at my gym i said okay she's yeah she's the instructor every morning she's up there you

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and oh you just want to throw a brick at her and i went what she said oh nobody could be that

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positive and like i didn't obviously i didn't go i didn't want to expose what was happening in the

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in the classroom at that time i didn't want to make her feel kind of sad or you know exposed in

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front of her colleagues because she did a good enough job of doing that anyway she had visceral

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hatred towards somebody who was optimistic ah but it would have been okay if the brick that she

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wanted to throw was 10 kilos one week 15 kilos i'm getting stronger throwing these bricks yeah it was

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it was basically she couldn't be that person in the morning so she had visceral angst and

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i wouldn't say hatred but like whatever words you want to throw onto it towards this other person

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because you're making me feel bad because i'm not as energetic as you in front of the classroom i

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just thought that was hilarious that you know people some people actively avoid positive people

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because it makes them feel bad about themselves but i prefer to surround myself with them and i

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want to be that person that injects happiness and we i know we've spoken about brett's uh our friend

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of ours in the past he always leaves people that he meet feeling better than when he arrived in

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every shop every cafe you go to you can just see the person who's got more energy than before we

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were there and that's something that that i'm going to try and do for the rest of my life

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in inject energy give compliments when you walk past people we've spoken about that on another

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podcast and be the sort of person that creates a world that is positive we're catching up with

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brett tonight we are we are captain my other captain mate yeah he's a skipper captain you're

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you're the uh the up in the air captain yeah all right well i've loved this topic thank you for

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agreeing to do to do this one michelle oh that's been fun good good for awareness again oh one more

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quick thing it's about your mental diet right your mental diet if you're if you're somebody

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who is addicted to drama just take a step back and think why am i doing that big does that then

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validate my victimhood so i've often noticed that the sort of tv sheet shows that people watch will

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determine whether they are somebody who has agency and accountability or if they're somebody who is

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more of a victimhood sort of person people who watch um shows like grand designs and uh how to

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fix this and how to do that so action-based learning-based entertainment yeah or humor

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based entertainment tend to pick people with more agency and accountability people who love the drama

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shows oh those are housewives where people are just whinging and whining about each other and

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being negative about their circumstances yeah they tend to have more victimhood so just consider

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that as well what sort of mental diet do you have physical diet is very important for for mental

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health but mental diet what you watch what you listen we don't neither of us watch the news

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listen to the news we just wait for people to tell us what's going on in the world and we try and

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fill our lives and our heads full of happy stuff yes yeah yeah that's right that was good yes i

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enjoyed that one excellent great to see you again michelle yes you too guys oh now bollinger where

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are you yes yes bollinger boes lint yes reach out reach out if you want some merch on our website

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captaintheclown.com we have t-shirts and caps um and they're they're getting some great feedback

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yeah the moor dogs comment on them that's right it's been fun wearing them around actually it is

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i need a new one i've worn this one all night i was gonna say you do need to update it it's a bit worn

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out now anyway take care everyone bye bye well that was fun that was fun you're such a clown

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that's my lady and who's gonna listen maybe i'm not thanks mom