Why do siblings hurt siblings?
Worthless. Powerless. Voiceless. Hopeless.
Worthless. Powerless. Voiceless. Hopeless.
These are the 4 marks (scars) of a sibling victimized by another sibling. These 4 scars are the end result of all mocking, bullying, shaming, tormenting, abusing behaviors.
Whatever steals or limits a person’s worth, power, voice or hope is the opposite of real love… it is destruction.
When a sibling wants to hurt their sibling, they are trying to take away their sibling’s worth, power, expression, or hope.
Why does a sibling think they need do this? Harassing, demeaning, antagonizing, instigating, provoking, dominating, manipulating…. are all dehumanizing behaviors.
A purposely aggressive sibling does not see their own worth and value. Therefore they cannot see the worth and value of a sibling—the one person in the world who is most like them.
The lie of self-righteousness.
An abusive sibling has believed the lie of self-righteousness. They falsely believe they have to show, prove, earn, deserve, achieve their worth and value (righteousness) through their own efforts.
Since this is an impossible task, they will automatically feel worthless and powerless… leading them to anger, thievery, destructiveness and abuse.
They are forced to gain power or value for themselves through their own mind’s measurements or comparisons to other people. They must decide for themselves whether they are superior or inferior to the person most like them—their sibling.
Putting down or destroying a sibling is the quickest/easiest way to do this (subconsciously trying to eliminate whatever or whoever makes them feel bad about themselves). This twisted quest to make themselves a self-made “good person” actually can only be done through destruction of their sibling.
Lie. Deny. Blame-shift. Coverup.
In this quest for self-made identity and value (self-righteousness), the aggressive sibling must try to maintain or win parental favor by hiding or denying bad behaviors.
Why? After themselves, the parent represents the self-righteous sibling’s most powerful judge.
Stop self-righteousness… by receiving true love and real identity.
Behavior that destroys or limits a person’s worth, power, voice or hope is the enemy of love. These behaviors are contrary to love… they’re the exact opposite of God’s intention for humans.
God wants to give every person infinite worth… unfailing empowerment… unlimited expression… unending hope. This is real love. This is eternal love.
When siblings bully, abuse, steal from, mock, control or hurt their siblings, they are functioning from the enemy’s desire for people:
“The enemy comes only to steal, and kill, and destroy… but I have come that you might have abundant life.” ~ Jesus
True Worth… True Power… True Expression… True Hope
The enemy of love wants only to steal, to kill, to destroy the image of God in people. The enemy tries to steal people’s worth, power, voice, and hope because he doesn’t believe people deserve to have God’s image.
True love gives of itself… builds up… encourages… strengthens. God’s intention is for every person to have infinite worth, power, voice, and hope—by freely receiving His image. His image comes through the gift of His righteousness. (click to learn more…)
With God’s worth, power, expression, and hope, we will manifest real love. Real love gives of itself. Real love empowers all life. Real love encourages creativity. Real love hopes all good things for others. Real love never fails.
God loves through people… The enemy hates through people.
God wants to live in and through people so that every person can know and experience real love! Only God can give worth, power, voice and hope to people. GOD IS LOVE.
God wants us to experience all His goodness and glory through our love for one another. It’s amazing!
The enemy’s desire is the root of all envy, jealousy, and destructive behavior. He hates that he has less than humans who are given the image of God. Since the enemy can’t be the image of God, he wants to destroy people who were destined to manifest and reproduce God’s image.
Similar to how God shows his love through people, the enemy of love also uses people to accomplish his destructive desires.
How does love’s enemy get siblings to do his dirty work?
Through the lie of self-righteousness.
the sickness of Self- rightEousness…
… empowers sibling abuse! Learn how You can crush it.
Parents: Your internal identity is crucial to the quality of relationships between your children. Knowing the source of your value (i.e., goodness) will create stability amongst your children.
Here’s a quick test:
Do you ever feel
anxious… frustrated… depressed… disappointed… impatient… angry… exasperated… defensive… lonely…?
Those negative feelings are not supposed to be “normal”. In fact the source of those feelings empowers all abusive behavior.
(Here’s how you can start to deal with them…)
Those feelings are evidence of a serious genetic condition endemic to the human race.
The condition is called self-righteousness.
We don’t mean the arrogant, narcissistic, morally-superior religious Pharisaic kind of self-righteousness. (That kind is found in a smaller number of people.)
The self-righteousness we’re talking about—the kind causing feelings of anxiety, anger, fear—is a mindset that tries to infect everyone. It’s usually tolerated as a normal part of human nature.
But it isn’t supposed to be this way, because it originates from a universal lie. And everyone’s fallen human nature craves this kind of self-righteousness.
Why is self-righteousness so bad?
It’s very deceptive. It often seems like a good thing. It can seem to make things in your life go better… temporarily. But self-righteousness will lead to devastation in the long-term.
Self-righteousness is the urge to (try to) make yourself a good person. Self-righteousness is the need to make people (or God) think you aren’t bad or don’t deserve punishment.
Self-righteousness includes the drive to make yourself better or achieve more. Self-righteousness can make you falsely determine your self-worth as higher… or lower.
Self-righteousness makes you try to hide your faults. Self-righteousness causes you to tell lies, cover-up your mistakes, and shift the blame to others.
Self-righteousness will reveal itself in seemingly normal conscious or subconscious thoughts you say to yourself or to your kids (if you’re a parent).
Take a moment to ponder these common thought patterns. You may be surprised how “right” these ideas sound:
“The most important thing is to try to be a good person.”
“Be careful… what will people think about you if you do that?”
“I am in charge of making me who I should be.”
“Other people need to see me the way I want them to see me.”
“I don’t want anyone to take what’s mine… and I don’t want bad things to happen to me.”
“I must make myself look good… I can’t look like I’m bad (or stupid or different or weird).”
“The most important thing is to try to be a good person.”
“I have to have (or earn, strive, prove, learn, deserve, achieve) this thing… if I don’t, I won’t be the person I should be. I won’t be good enough.”
“I am in charge of making myself who I should be, so other people will see me the way I want them to see me.”
“People should get what they deserve.”
“Once I have a better __________ (car, neighborhood, career, wardrobe, weight, face/body, friends, spouse, boyfriend/girlfriend, relationship, education/degree, income/ checking account, net worth/retirement fund…) then I can be okay.”
“I can’t and won’t be okay until _________ (my boss treats me better, my employees respect me more, my spouse does what I want, my kids are doing better…).”
More ways that self-righteousness works:
Deep down people don’t want to be bad. This is our God-given conscience.
Deep down people don’t want bad things to happen to them. This is our God-given desire to live.
Deep down people don’t want to be inconsequential, inadequate or failures. This is our God-given desire to thrive.
But the genetic lie of self-righteousness tries to force us to feel bad (or less valuable) about ourselves consciously or subconsciously in some way… no matter how much or how little we accomplish in life.
Self-righteousness can drive us to get wealth, or status... it also drives us to get the praise of other people, or desire pleasures we shouldn’t. This is called greed and lust.
When your efforts to be better or do better or have more fall short… emotions like fear, anxiety, stress, impatience, frustration, anger, loneliness, hatred, etc, kick in.
When others fail to do good to you, or seem to hinder your efforts to try doing good, or when they try to hurt you… those same emotions can become even stronger.
Self-righteousness often causes other people—especially those closest to you—to reinforce (purposely or accidentally) the badness or inadequacy you feel about yourself… so that they’ll feel less bad about themselves.
Self-righteousness may cause you to try feeling better about yourself by making yourself seem superior to others. Or you might avoid feeling bad about yourself (paradoxically) by quitting, putting yourself down, or hating yourself.
Another symptom of self-righteousness is pride… to hate or want to punish (or take revenge on) others who threaten you, take from you, or make you look bad.
Self-righteousness can cause you to accuse, blame or dislike others subconsciously in your heart, so that (in your mind) they’ll seem worse than you feel about yourself. This includes jealousy.
Self-righteousness can cause people to judge others and blame others as the reason why they’re not good enough or happy enough… leading them to bully, abuse or be violent towards someone or something else smaller than you (like a younger sibling or a pet).
Self-righteousness may cause you to remove yourself from the picture completely by disappearing, running away, medicating, taking drugs/alcohol, or putting yourself in harm’s way. (This is not about setting appropriate boundaries for the physical safety of you or your children.)
How can we stop being self-righteous?
We can’t help but try to be self-made “good” people if we don’t receive a new genetic code. A self-less code for life.
The good news is there is a new code, and it’s entirely free.
All thoughts and behaviors rooted in self-righteousness are ultimately self-protective, self-centered, self-motivated, self-seeking, and often judgmental and unforgiving.
But we can have new thoughts and behaviors driven by selflessness!
Whether it’s trying to be a good parent, or a good neighbor, or a good employee, or a good student, or a good kid… you can’t escape the urge to be self-righteous apart from the free gift of selflessness that comes through love.
If you realize you can’t measure up to the impossible standards of self-righteousness, if you realize you can’t help but feel like you’re “bad”… if you’re tired of the selfish, self-centered behaviors, thoughts and feelings toward others or yourself… and the craving for self-righteousness...
then you are qualified for your new genetic code for life!
You have a choice.
Reproduce the image of man, which is trapped in a desperate need of identity, purpose, affirmation, ego… self-protection, self-consciousness, selfishness… trapped in feelings, fears, emotions, fear of death, and a final outcome of eternal separation from God’s love
OR…
Receive and reproduce the image of God who is love, peace, joy, generosity, satisfaction, self-control… selflessness, other-mindedness, self-giving… with destiny, purpose, and a final outcome of eternal life
Read here for research revealing how self-righteousness will commonly show up in work settings…
Are you ready to accept the solution?
Self-righteousness has stolen your God-intended unconditional love, godly identity and selfless nature.
Self-righteousness replaced humanity’s belief that there is a freely given holy and pure and true righteousness that was meant to live at home inside every human.
By believing the lie of self-righteousness, humanity gave up the Image of God in them—who is perfect unselfish love—in exchange for self-righteousness.
Most people don’t know they’ve done this. But you certainly see the self-righteous lie manifesting everywhere!
It’s evident in feelings of frustration, or fear, or anxiety… anger, impatience… or lust… greed or pride… disappointment, irritation… revenge… or any other unloving selfish, self-focused, self-protective desire or need.
It also drives all social dominance, narcissism, aggression… violence, false-accusation, bullying, and abuse.
You can’t try harder to make yourself “good”… that only births more self-righteousness. To get rid of the source of your bad feelings and actions, you must go to the source of selflessness.
This requires you to do something counterintuitive (counter to your human nature). You must do less by learning to receive more.
Your original God-given design (before humans were programmed by self-righteousness) was truly good, selfless, righteous, glorious, radiant, loving, fruitful, multi-faceted and truly original. It was also pure, holy, peaceful, joyful and stress-free.
You were created to SHINE as the image of God! You were created to live free from pressure, fear, anxiety, frustration and anger. And the good news is you can have it back for free! You only have to be willing to receive it as a gift.
To learn more about shedding your “fallen” self-righteous human nature and receiving the gift of your original good nature (true righteousness), click here…