Cognitive Psychologist: Break Free from a Victim Mindset | Scott Barry Kaufman

Michael Gervais (0:00)

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Scott Barry Kaufman (1:28)

A victim mindset is one where you blame all of your problems on external circumstances. You don't take any responsibility for how you respond to situations. And you devote most of your life to attempts to punish or get back at people who you feel have wronged you without actually creating constructive ways of moving forward with hope and purpose in your own life.

Michael Gervais (1:52)

What if the greatest obstacle to you reaching your potential isn't external barriers, but a mindset in which you see yourself as a victim?

Scott Barry Kaufman (2:01)

People with a victim mindset will take neutral responses to them as aggressive, without really caring for the facts of the matter. If you smile at someone and they just don't smile back, chances are they have nothing against you. You're not even on their radar at that moment. Do you know what I mean?

Michael Gervais (2:16)

Welcome back. Welcome to the Finding Mastery Podcast, where we dive into the minds of the world's greatest thinkers and doers. I am your host, Dr Michael Gervais, by trade and training a high-performance psychologist. And today, I am stoked to welcome back a good friend and one of my favorite thinkers, Dr Scott Barry Kaufman. This is Scott's third time on the podcast and he always delivers.

Scott Barry Kaufman (2:39)

Well-being is not the opposite of high performance.

Michael Gervais (2:41)

It's the foundation. It's the foundation, yes.

Scott Barry Kaufman (2:44)

And you nail it.

Michael Gervais (2:45)

Scott is a humanistic psychologist. He's a best-selling author and host of the Psychology Podcast. In his new book, Rise Above, Overcome a Victim Mindset, Empower Yourself and Realize Your Full Potential, dives deep into what it means to move through suffering with both self-awareness and strength.

Scott Barry Kaufman (3:04)

You can have confidence in your views, listen to others, be willing to change. But if you have no self-belief and no trust that you have what it takes to reach your goals or to formulate your own opinions outside of other people's opinions, you're going to fall to pieces.

Michael Gervais (3:18)

With that, let's jump into this powerful conversation with my friend, Dr. Scott Barry Kaufman.

Scott Barry Kaufman (3:23)

You ready for things to get real?

Michael Gervais (3:25)

Yeah.

Scott Barry Kaufman (3:25)

You sure?

Michael Gervais (3:26)

Yeah. The one and only Scott Barry Kaufman. How are you, mate?

Scott Barry Kaufman (3:38)

I'm doing really well, thanks. How are you?

Michael Gervais (3:42)

I think that I relate to being super inspired and a little tired.

I know that, I don't know, I love, I feel like I'm living a great life right now. But I'm at the edge with a lot of things, by choice. So, that's kind of how I feel right in this moment. And to be more concrete, Scott, the last three days of sleep have been pretty poor.

Scott Barry Kaufman (4:11)

I'm really sorry to hear that, yeah.

Michael Gervais (4:13)

Nah, it's okay. These are all choices.

Scott Barry Kaufman (4:15)

It's all the price of admission of being human. Yeah, right.

Michael Gervais (4:19)

Okay, so, revise yours. How are you?

Scott Barry Kaufman (4:21)

Well, there's so much going on right now that I've decided just to take the absurd humor path to dealing with it all. But yeah, there's just so many. I'm in the middle of massive transformation and change, so.