I’ve been both at times. In fact, everyone of us has dabbled at victimhood and punisher. Actually, many seem to switch between the two.
This behaviour keeps us stuck, stuck with judgemental lens on, not necessarily of just other people but more often of ourselves. It keeps fuelling that victim feeling and need to punish others.
It also keeps us from any self-awareness and stops us being truly accountable for our own behaviour.
The only way to stop this cycle is to accept responsibility for what we do, take off the judgemental lens and replace with a lens where the aim is to learn how we can understand others even better and how we can think differently to lead to a different outcome.
The same thinking and behaviour always gets the same results. If we want to move out the pit of victimhood and stop punishing ourselves and others then we have to focus on learning and accountability.
Philip Dodson 