In life, if you want to get ahead and get better, you need to be flexible, open to new ideas, and help yourself first. I have a story to tell you all that is the perfect example of what happens when you fail to do so.
Recently an old friend of mine sent me an email with a website address. It was about her apartment. She had been having problems with it and posted pictures of it to show everyone what it was like. The roof had caved in and there was water damage as well as a multitude of other problems. To be perfectly honest, I had never seen such a mess! I couldn’t imagine anyone living in those conditions. She has been fighting in court with the owner for years and he refuses to repair anything. I couldn’t believe she had been living in this hell hole for over 2 years!
I had a discussion with her, as I wanted to help her out. I asked her why she stays there, instead of moving out elsewhere. She said she can’t afford a more expensive place. So I asked, can you perhaps borrow money to help you out in the short term? She said her credit was bad due to a bankruptcy a few years ago. Ok, so I asked her if she could go live with some friends or family. She said all her family was far away, and that she can’t bother her friends with it because she has 5 cats and doesn’t want to abandon them. Now this is where I noticed something. Every possible solution, she would shot it down, and say no way, not possible ever. She would not even contemplate the idea! I told her, if you want to get out of this situation, as you appear to be saying on that website with those awful pictures, you need to realize that you will have to make certain sacrifices to get things done. That’s life, you give a little, you get a little back, and so on.
So I tested her. I said, ok, I am offering you an apartment in one of my buildings, rent free for a year to get yourself back on your feet, you can bring your cats, and whatever else you want. It’s just a bit further away from where you live, that’s all. She right away said, no way. She needs to live in the same neighborhood to be close to her friends and her doctor!! Unbelievable! So she refuses a brand new apartment RENT FREE to stay in a hell hole because of ridiculous reasons. What about taking the bus? What about saving all that rent money? That’s a pretty good trade off compared to her current living conditions. Yet, she wanted none of it.
You see, she loves the victim role. She wants people to pity her and feel sorry for her. But when it comes time to get help or take action, she is reluctant to cooperate. She is not willing to be flexible, which you absolutely need to if you want to achieve any level of success in life. Everything has to be her way, or no way. And for most of these type of people, it usually is “no way”. Such personalities achieve nothing but destruction. They relish into their own misery, because according to them, they are a certain way, and they don’t want to change for anything. Life has no pity for people that are unwilling to help themselves.
I told her that if she stays in that apartment much longer, she will get seriously sick. It’s a dirty filthy place and in the winter, she will have serious problems. She turned it around and said that it wasn’t so bad afterall, and that she had been there for years and not gotten sick! You see the logic?! So why is she complaining then? She wants help, but she doesn’t want to move a finger herself. She wants the city or the court or the owner to fix her problem, because she doesn’t have the desire nor willingness to get up and do something productive.
In any situation, there are plenty of solutions, and if you think there are no solutions, it means you haven’t looked hard enough. But you need to be open to change and be flexible to alter certain things to get to a better place. Helping yourself is the first thing that you can do, and in fact, the only thing that you have total control over. She can’t control the court or the city or the owner…they can rule either way in this case. She has control over her own actions, but by dismissing this option completely, she has rendered herself powerless. Being stubborn and uncooperative leads nowhere. So take this example as a lesson learned, start by helping yourself as much as you can, then you can be guaranteed that you will get help in return.
