Over-Taking Responsibility: What It Is & How It Holds Us Back

[andrew.gardiner]

Heidi - where have you hidden the cameras & microphones all these years? I swear, virtually every one of your videos is speaking directly to me, and accurately call out all of the issues and challenges I must face or work on. It’s eerily spot on. As always, THANK YOU, and please keep up the amazing work! XOXO

[jennw]

“A warped experience of reality is significantly more dysregulating than a true experience of reality that is painful. Painful truths are still regulating for our systems, because we’re responding to what’s actually happening.”

So true. Nothing is more dysregulating than cognitive dissonance. And giving up wanting something to happen that will never happen, is strangely freeing.

[CreativeImpulse]

Everything in this video is so fucking real for a Fearful Avoidant like me. I also want to add - if you were parentified in any way as a child, willingly (*stepped up to the plate because caregivers were overwhelmed and you wanted to help; caveating no child is capable of understanding what this truly entails) or unwillingly, there's a chance you are inclined to feel over-responsible for everything. Especially if that parentification holds other significant trauma. I had a hugely toxic relationship with victims in the Karpman's drama triangle because I was the sole "adult" in my household with five grown-ass family members. Because I was the golden child to my personality-disordered, extremely volatile grandmother, the whole family relied on me to placate, soothe, and mediate any interactions with her. Like, her own husband and brother and child didn't know what to do with her. She became my emotional ward by the time I was eleven. I can still remember the time she threw a slew of dishes at the wall at my mother, who quaked and sent me - the twelve year old! - to her room in order to calm her down. Any failure to calm her down would escalate to violence on me, while any success would bring me so much positive reinforcement from my family that it would incline me to do it again. So it's like I was groomed for the Rescuer role.

As I grew up, I saw my role in the world as the one who is *meant* to be regulated, responsive, and responsible for the person who is out of control. I got into so many fucked up relationships with victims by trying to rescue them because it's what I knew. Any time where my relationships felt shaky, the only way I could feel any semblance of safety was to fill in where the other person lacked. Uncertainty and ambiguity literally felt like the prelude to violence. I didn't give space for people to own up to their responsibilities because my brain perceived so much danger that there was no time to sit with reality. It wasn't just the fact that I thought other people "aren't capable of being responsible", but that there was DEMONSTRABLE evidence that I would be harmed otherwise. So I'm starting on this long journey of self-compassion and forgiveness and release from shame, while also trying to undo this bone-deep wiring I've carried for years.

[creepydani]

I am insanely controlling over my own "personal growth" I overthink every aspect of how I feel, what I've done and what I could have said or done better in any situation. This is my way of avoiding blame and difficult emotions. This was the cardinal coping strategy I used in my family environment.
I've started to recognize these obsessive self-help binges as markers that I'm anxious or triggered and that I'm avoiding something difficult, but in some ways, very simple.

[czypauly]

You are the absolute best at delivering clear, concise and engaging content. You've helped me so so much. Thankyou from me and all my inner children.

[NitaJain]

Yesss, hyperindependence is also really common among those of us with chronic illness or dynamic disabilities!!

[Clive-uscl]

My default state seems to be that I have no idea who ought to be responsible for what. Therefore, if other people don't want to take responsibility for something, I just decide whether I anyone should be responsible for it and if so take responsibility myself; and furthermore it is opaque to me whether I am under-taking responsibility in some other areas.

[beth]

Guilty of Taking too much responsibility. Ugh. It’s been a long and painful realization to come to this truth about myself. The key to healing it is setting appropriate boundaries - which for me was learning how to assertively speak my truth and tell the person how their not taking responsibility for themselves was affecting me and the health of the relationship. It was scary because I think I knew in my gut that the person never truly cared or saw me at all. They chose to remain in denial and blame. I left the relationship. 😢. It’s painful but I know it’s the path to healing and growth.

[noahhh]

What I’m thinking as I watch this video: responsibility as dissociation. Maybe not the most obvious connection, but I’ve been thinking a lot recently about dissociation in its different forms, and I see it here. This idea that we have agency over everything, that we can control x by doing y—that all obfuscates the much more difficult to accept reality that we don’t have agency over everything, and that we can’t always control things. Action taken without that acknowledgement (or knowledge) is actually blindness, and life has a way of making us see things.

I’m a gay man. So a man but with a very different perspective on what it means to be one. I think a lot of this is gendered too. Men who buy into a certain narrative about who they are cannot accept that the world might be other than what they will it to be. It’s taken a long time, but I’ve come to a place where I’ve found compassion for them. Life shows them what they refuse to look at too.

Thank you, Heidi, for showing up as you do.

[trevorleake]

I turned on my computer and just felt like Priebe would have something new. And looky here, 1 hour old. I have attuned

[julietteferrars]

I over-take to fill in potential gaps instead of seeing how the person actually is and finding someone else if needed. I have a scarcity issue and try to make it work with what I’ve got instead of looking for something better.

[natsu-machi]

I had to take the blame for everything growing up as my mom was triggered by rejection of any kind, and I was the only child, the only person she had power over. I got a little nervous when you talked about how not telling people how they’re affecting you is a disservice to them, because I recently set some boundaries to stay away from a few people in my life who had thrown my feelings back in my face when I tried to be vulnerable. But I hear you saying “why would you stay in relation with someone like that” and I think I’ve done the right thing boundary-setting, because I can bring up my feelings to people I can trust. I have a message in my head that I shouldn’t be running away, which often makes me question boundaries I feel I need. I definitely identify with trying to solve things for myself all the time, as my mom and partners always pathologized all my feelings and couldn’t tolerate my dysregulation. It was also like I owed it to them to let them “fix” me so they could be needed, even if their fix made things worse. So I had to pick up the slack and fix it myself and then let them think they helped. I’m trying to learn I’m lovable even when I’m not okay, and that I’m not going to get to a point where I don’t have struggles. It’s hard when I’m frequently dysregulated and my feelings seem so huge because I’m healing through abuse.

[davidhunsaker]

While soul searching after a recent breakup I can see how i took too much responsibility for my partners feelings and actions and how my decision to shield them from their own mistakes just to preserve the relationship robbed us both of a path to healthy healing.

…but I’m now left with a huge feeling of irony. I feel responsible for over taking responsiblity.

[joshuahutt]

Another banger, right on time.

7:05

“When we take too much responsibility, we lose our connection to reality and we obscure other people’s connection to reality by being dishonest with them about what’s going on for us.” 😮

“We get stuck in repetitive loops of thinking or feeling or experiencing the same things over and over and over again, because we’re not accounting for all of the variables that are at play in our environment that are outside of our control. And because we aren’t factoring those things in and staying aware of them and attuned to them, we’re not able to make wise and integrated decisions about how to interact with our lives.”

[shininglight]

I love the idea of sitting with pain when it's authentically present. I also think there is a certain amount of pain that is born out of a missalignment with reality. I would appreciate even a one liner about finding the beliefs that are causing more pain than necessary and working to correct them. Then we will be left to sit with clean pain - the necessary aspect of reality. Thanks for the education on over-taking responsibility. I found it personally helpful.

[IGBOSTROLOGY]

i literally JUST suffered the consequences of not knowing how to do this. really made me come to terms with my neurodiversity. it DOES make my life different and it means i need to tackle my problems with different strategies as opposed to powering my way through everything. it does NOT mean i am doomed and i can’t survive in this world. i just have to adjust my approach is all.

[brambleinhabitant]

This series on self-esteem is very eye-opening and empathetic. Thank you Heidi for preparing all these videos and sharing them with us. You are helping to not just gain clarity but also figure out the practical, doable, and loving steps that we can take to get better. This is especially important for those of us who procrastinate due to perfectionism, which again is a consequence of taking too much responsibility for every single thing in our lives. Thank you so much! I can't appreciate you enough. ❤

[lionheart]

Heidi please make a video on hyperindependence as a trauma response 🥺

[fishingforstars]

You always prompt questions that address the underlying issues. Why am I actually in this relationship if there is this imbalance? I love that you motivate for this level of self honesy and self awareness.

[Brinaweenahwoo]

I literally download all of your videos and binge listen while driving or at night when I'm camping! 😊