Emotional Self-Hostage: How to set yourself Free

The bad habit of emotionally holding ourselves hostage is unfortunately quite common. Why do people trap themselves into feeling certain feelings and continue to do things they know are bad for them and make them feel low about themselves? It varies for everyone. In order to set yourself free, you first need to understand and learn why you are holding yourself hostage.

Begin by paying attention to the emotions you feel when you are living the moments of your self-dictation, along with acknowledging what subjects play the role in attracting you into preventing yourself from being free and moving forward. Do you like feeling sorry for yourself? Do you feel the need to put yourself in situations that will make you feel badly afterwards? What about doing anything, harmful things both physically and mentally, just to be accepted in society? If this rings a bell to you, then you are suffering from Victimization Addiction, which means exactly the way it sounds- you are addicted to victimizing yourself. This addiction is not really the true issue however. The real problem is what lead you to this addiction and the way it has made you feel about yourself.

When you are experiencing a time when you hold yourself hostage, make a real effort to stop at that very point. When you do so, examine yourself emotionally and ask yourself why you are doing this to yourself. What event in your life influenced this behavior and attitude towards yourself? Keep in mind that the reason could trace all the way to an incident that happened during your childhood years, so be prepared to take a little journey back in time. A good example for explaining this method would be a person who constantly places themselves in relationships they know are bad for them- Relationships in which their lovers will take advantage of them, abuse them both emotionally and physically, and someone who will value them in no way. Why would someone purposely put himself or herself through this pain? Well, there are various answers to that question, but let us say that is this person had a childhood where he or she was a regular witness to the fights and abuse their parents inflicted on each other. Perhaps their father hit their mother when he was angry and their mother would deal with it by having affairs. This child then grew up believing that this behavior is normal and acceptable and should be tolerable. This would be the root of the problem and reason to why he or she victimizes himself/herself today.

This is what you need to do, find the root and true reason of why you are holding yourself hostage from being the person you are really meant to be, as well as live the life you are capable of living. Setting yourself free is definitely challenging and there will be times you will want to give up and just live a world of victimization. You might feel guilty about a mistake you have made and cannot forgive yourself for it, believing you deserve to feel horrible all the time, regardless of how much forgiveness you may received from another person. When this is the case, you need to learn to fight the mind tricks that are played on you. Gain your power of control back by telling yourself that the experience you feel badly about did happen, but is now over. You feel regret for it, but have also learned an important lesson from it, making you a better person. These are the things you must give your time to, to the positive things. Give yourself the credit you deserve and fight the temptation in going back to that painful memory that will force you to keep reliving it.

If the root comes from an event that occurred in your childhood, then you are in no way at fault for what happened- especially if it involves your parents. Your only responsibility as a child was to be carefree, enjoy yourself and leave the responsibility and the proper upbringing methods to your parents. Use whatever experience it was as a way to improve the adult life you are living now. Remind yourself on a regular basis of how no one on this earth is perfect and we all make mistakes and life can throw experiences at us that we feel helpless or painful over, but this does not make you any less of a good person. All it means is that life will send obstacles down our paths, and all of these obstacles hold a purpose and are intended to teach you how to be the best human being you can be, and discover the true meaning of your life.

Sometimes going through this process can be too hard to accomplish on your own, and that is perfectly normal and understandable- and does make you a failure. What is does, is make you aware of the fact that you are not alone in this world and therefore should not have to go through difficult periods by yourself. Find support and motivation that works for you. Some suggestions are family & friends, church, support groups, books, and counseling. Take a tour outside and search for what works best for you and what you feel will help you get through this. You can set yourself free...if you really want to. It is all about willpower -so start regaining that strength and use it on the maximum level until you are free and can move forward, moving on to the new and exciting stages that have been waiting for you.