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Victor Over Victim – with Ben Kjar – Episode #687 · Pathological Positivity

• This is Live On Purpose Radio, episode 687, Victor Over Victim with Ben Care. Now is the only time to create and live the life you love. I'm doctor Paul Jenkins, the positivity psychologist. My job is to connect you to powerful positive psychology principles that immediately upgrade your relationships, business, and mental health. Are you ready? Let's jump in. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to Live On Purpose Radio. This is doctor Paul, the shrink who expands your life with another episode of Live On Purpose Radio. Joining me on the mic today is a friend of mine who is inspiring our fellow humans all over the planet. Ben Care is a world champion wrestler, an international speaker, and the the the subject of a very inspiring upcoming documentary that we're going to be talking here. God bless you guys, doctor Paul Jenkins. Let's go. You know what, Ben? Here's here's something that really caught my attention. And you just... You wear it on your t shirt. Victor over victim. And this is at the core of many of the principles that we teach here at Live On Purpose, and it's been part of my platform forever in positive psychology. But I think you have a unique insight into this. You were born with an interesting diagnosis. Can you tell us about that? Because I don't know if I'm the first one to break it to you, but you don't look like everybody else. Yeah. You're the first one to tell me that ever. Yeah. First time you ever heard this. Tell us about your story, Ben. Everybody who's listening, go on my social media, Go on my YouTube channels. Why don't you go and take a look at what people are saying? You'll hear comments as early as probably today. I answered a comment today, and, they posted a video under or a meme under one of my videos, and it showed the sloth from The Goonies. And, they're making fun of me, and it's it's so funny because, the person who who who sent it was... Their their name was, like, Pure Love or something like that. Their name, I forget what it is. And so I just commented under it. Hey, Pure Love. I'm sending some Pure Love your way or something like that. And, you know, it's it's all how we react. You talk about victor over victim. It's a decision that we make. Are we going to hide? Are we going to play small? In the Bible, it talks about a bushel and a light and hiding your light behind this bushel. Basically, in life, are we hiding our light? Are we hiding who we are? It's not just the literal sense of hiding, like behind a wall or behind something. But when we choose to be somebody else, when we choose to be the person, Bobby or Billy or or Tommy version two two point o, we're in a sense hiding our light that we were born to shine. And if we're not if we're not shining that light openly, I see us all as being lighthouses in a crazy world of seas that are that that just have these waves that are big, and there's people in the world ocean. And they're going through what you've been through. And if you will not shine your lighthouse, they will not know where to go. They will not be dead. They will go into some horrible rocks or obstacles that will eventually be their downfall because you decided to not shine your light in the most genuine sense. You know, Ben, when you were born, the doctors introduced your parents to a brand new word, cruise on, which is a syndrome. It's a... It's an anomaly. Meaning, it's not... Not everybody has this. Now Now we can identify elements that anyone has that not everyone has. Right? But I I... Along with that message came another message that your son is not going to live a normal life or something like that. And that is true, isn't it? But I think they meant it in almost a victim kind of a context. Because when we have differentiating characteristics, I think you called it a decision. I like to use the word choice also because until you see it as a choice, it's not. And you would think that if you are blessed with, cursed with, the recipient of, however you wanna define it, something that makes you different, that makes you stand out. We're gonna come back to that. K? You would think that that means your life has to suck in some kind of way. But I think you're sending a very different message. And you probably didn't just, you know, come by this naturally. You probably had to develop it. You probably had to intentionally build an approach to life that allowed you to become a victor over victim. And I would just love to open that up to you a little bit, Ben, because, I mean, you just grew up as a little kid. You didn't know that anything was different until somebody told you. Can you just riff on that for a minute and where your brain goes with that? Oh, yeah. Brother, I thought I had a curse growing up, and I thought Curzon Syndrome was just that. I mean, get this. Like, Imagine an elementary kid, imagine having your own son or your daughter or whatever your child, and they're born with this difference. And imagine that every night, they would kneel down at their bed. And they'd pray to God, saying I got the faith of a mustard seed. Like you say, with that, I can move mountains. Well, I think I don't even need to do that. I just need to wake up tomorrow morning with a normal face. If I could just wake up... And then I would wake up and I would run over, to the mirror. And I would look. And it it was the same. And so I thought it was like a me thing. I thought it was my problem. I didn't have enough faith or whatever it was, where in turn, that was the biggest gift. Interesting. I'm not on the stages I am today. I'm not, my story is not the same. I haven't accomplished the same things. I didn't... I wouldn't have married the same person if I would have been, quote, unquote, cured growing up. Mhmm. When you find out in your life that your diseases, your complications... What if your addictions? What if your bankruptcy? What if your divorce? What if the death in the family was actually such a gift? What if it was working for you and not to you? You see world... You see a world that's different. And when you see a world that's different and you see these things as gifts, it ends up giving you an inner peace. Now I've talked with people all over, and I've talked with some incredibly wealthy people. As a matter of fact, I was just on another podcast. This is my second of four podcasts today that I'll be on. Oh, wow. I was on an earlier podcast with an incredibly wealthy person, we talked someone similar about this. The biggest flex today that someone can have is inner peace. It's not money. It's not cars. It's not the big house on the hill with the Ferrari. It's inner peace. How do you get that? You understand that you're dang proud of that person in the mirror. You understand that when you look at that person in the mirror, no matter what the... No matter if you're carrying a little bit more weight, no matter if you're going a little bit more bald, no matter if you're tall, dark, whatever, or a facial difference, that what if you were created for that? What if that was part of the plan? What if that wasn't just part of the plan? What if that was your wild card, man? What if that was your x x factor? What if that's what exactly was created for you to stand out, not fit in, not be average so that you could shine your light? You know, Ben, you and I are members of the National Speakers Association where we have... That's... That gave us a reason to associate, to come together, to get to know each other. And I know in the speaking industry, we do everything we can to stand out from the competition. Because there are so many great speakers out there, but they have to have some reason to hire us instead of the next person. And then I look at you and and it's like, you stand out whether you want to or not. And is that a blessing or is that a curse? And I think the way we view it is a choice. Mhmm. But until we see it as a choice, it's not. And we get to roll with whatever the traditions are. And there's a lot of false traditions out there that are not helpful. I look at your face, for example, Ben. I think you have a beautiful face. Why? Because it's my friend Ben. And nobody else has this face. And I can always find you. I can always pick you out because of your beautiful face. And I see over your shoulder, you know, you've got you've got a couple of the, the little mentions from social media or whatever that goes along with the movie that that features your life and your story where people call you a freak or a monster or the ugliest dude I've ever seen. And those are all judgments of, we used the word earlier called an anomaly. K? Meaning, it's not what you would expect normally. Right? But is it a problem, or is it simply a difference? And it just gets my brain thinking about all these things because I'm a psychologist, and I can't turn it off. That's a great question because I've had people come up to me and ask me. They're like, and it's the way you react to stuff, and you react on different levels. And eventually, you'll figure out a level that's confident and comfortable for you. But I remember at the early stages, and we talked about this in my film, There's this kid in elementary, and he was a couple years older than me. And he would walk around and he'd point at me and he was a lot bigger. And it felt like I could defend myself or beat him up. He'd be like, Hey, flat face. Hey, flat face. For some reason, he called me flat face. And it was it was not a good term, the way he said it. And then he's like, everyone look at flat face. Look at him. And, man, I remember going home that night and feeling like I needed to defend myself. Let's go. And in my innocent mindset, I come back and I pointed at him. I'm like, Hey, your round face, hey, round face. And it was funny. I mean, and I didn't know how to be mean. I was just so innocent. But then eventually, I'm like, okay, maybe that's not the right thing. And then eventually, maybe I'll be like, how do I make this funny? And then I would when people would look at me, I would like have a staring competition, and then that would get awkward. And then and then it would get to the point to where I had the courage to actually communicate with them. And you had mentioned something a few seconds ago where you're like, is it a problem? Is it or is it just a difference and anomaly? And I got the courage eventually to ask them that. Because they would look at me, they'd laugh at me, I would end up wrestling. I mean, this right here is a picture of me with an American flag where I represent The United States Of America and World Championships. And that the sport would change my life, but because I could control something, but one thing that would hurt is it on the side of the mat, the cheerleaders or the people in the stands. And this isn't football, I didn't have a mask over my face, I couldn't hide. They would make fun of me. And I remember talking with these individuals eventually, and I would go up to him and I would say, You know what? I'm okay with it. Now if this is a problem for you, that's your problem. That's your issue. But I've gotten to the point to where these comments up here that you read, which are, by the way, all completely true, And they get quite worse than this. Go on again, go on my social media, you'll see stuff people said today, yesterday, the day before in front of millions of people. You'll then you'll see my response. Because what I've learned is that good people, great people, noble people also have bad days. And I've seen that in those bad days when if we were to come back at them and terrorize them and I for an eye a tooth for a tooth type of behavior, a victim mentality, You would bury them. I'll give you an example. I had a movie go viral, excuse me, a video go viral, I adopted three kids. My family had no clue. We delivered them on the doorstep. It was fun. It's probably been seen between social media and YouTube, probably over 90,000,000 times now. Wow. And there's a lot of views, which means there's usually a lot of comments. And there was a comment there that was a meme of a little sloth from The Goonies and a Superman shirt on a little tricycle and, like, a three year old type of body. Right? And the comment went something like this. Of course, his wife didn't have this boy's or this guy's kids. It would have looked like this. Who would ever have a child like that? And this lady would then go on, and I know this because she messaged me later, private message. She said, Ben, after I posted that, I went and read your comments to other people. And I quickly realized you were a kind soul and I was in the wrong. And I reacted like a victim. I reacted emotionally. I was going through trauma and I quickly erased my comment. I hope you didn't see it. Well, I had. And then she said this, and this is why I tell this story. And this is the type of opportunity we have to show up like a victor, not a victim. She said, Ben, I want you to know that if you would have come back at me and answered me in anger, it would have absolutely annihilated me inside. You adopted a kid in your mid... In your movie, and his name was Liam. Days before I saw this this video, I had just lost my 2.5 year baby boy who just didn't wake up one morning. And his name was Liam. When you were gaining your Liam, I had lost my Liam. And so what did I do? I tried to take it out on you. Thank you. God bless you for not coming back at me. I couldn't have taken it. Even if you would have been rightfully rightfully so you could have came back and people would have defended you. You chose to react with kindness, with love, with a hug, not harm. And, and she said, Thank you. I've seen people again and again. And again, when we come back, like that it changes. Now, how do you do that? When you know yourself, you know, your worth, you have people in your corner, like you are for me, Paul, a kind soul, and you treat people with kindness. And then you look in the mirror, and what you see in the mirror, you're dang freaking proud of. You look in the mirror and you're like, oh my gosh, I look up to that person. Dang. When your life consists of that type of relationship with you and yourself, frankly, that's when that internal peace sets in. That's when life happens. That's when people can trust you. And when people can trust you because you're a safe space, you're a company, you're stronghold for them, you will never ever lack people in your life. So well said. Ben, I know our time is limited today. But before we wrap up today, we gotta talk about this movie. You have a movie coming out. This was, a long time in coming, wasn't it? It's the story of your life in a way that can inspire others. And there's a couple of elements of that. This was... It's called Standout. Right? Tell us a little bit more about the movie, how we can access that, and then I've got a specific question for you about it. Oh, man. Thanks for asking. So it was four years ago. I got a call. I was coming off of Mount Kilimanjaro. We've been off service for about a week. I get all these... I get to the hotel. My phone's like... All the messages are coming in and there's a person that I knew from high school. His name is Tanner Christiansen. And he had a buddy growing up named Jared Hess and his dad, TC, was an iconic film producer. And he said, Ben, my dad has been watching you since you were little. I remember watching you in junior league basketball, and my dad hit me on the shoulder and said that kid is a movie. Just watch. Years later, I get the call and they're like, and Tanner says, Ben, it's my first time ever directing a film. Would you be open to being the subject? My father is gonna be one of my producers. Jared's gonna be one of my producers. Now, Jared, if you know him, he is... He he did Napoleon Dynamite, not Jalibre, just came out with the Minecraft movie. And TC has done phenomenal films like Fighting Preacher, 17 Miracles, like all these cool films. And I said, let's go. Four years later, we've had a whole last year. We started in Hollywood where we did our first film festival. We won awards in every single film festival. And we launch in the theaters in selected states, January 23. So one, two, three, standouts. January 23. You can go to standoutfilm.com to find out if we're gonna have theaters in your area. If you don't have theaters in your area, you can host a screening. We work with theaters all over the country. We were just in Atlanta. We were just in Georgia and Texas, Oklahoma, California. And so if this is something that you feel like can connect with you, we've had five year olds all the way to 95 year olds come and feel the power of this film. It's funny. It's quirky. It's it's hard jerky. Like, it's it's it's real. It's real. It's a hero's journey. What is stand out when people ask? Well, if you've seen the movie Rocky, and if you've seen the movie Wonder, about the kid with the facial difference, and you can find those, it's that. It's a wonder Rocky film that's actually a real story. So that's what we love about. And you know this because it's your story, Ben. Got it. I told you I have a specific question for you about that because I was impressed as I was watching the trailer and as I was just reviewing some of the content for our our conversation today. There's a little boy that plays you in this film. Can you just talk about that briefly? Yeah. So when we started filming, we realized it would be a really hard ask to find someone that has, first of all, Croissant syndrome. Secondly, someone like me with the energy and, and just the who I am. And someone who hasn't had a surgery because they do surgery so well and quickly with today's technology that would actually look like I was when I was younger. We searched the entire world seriously, we went through all the facial difference organizations, nonprofits, and we couldn't find them. And so we resorted to age to AI. Artificial intelligence creates incredible things nowadays, but we didn't want that. We wanted... Artificial. Yeah. We wanted something real. And then we found him. What happened was there's a family that reached out to me on social media weeks before we would have to film. We were running out of a timeline. And they said, Hey, Ben, we've been watching you for about six months, and we feel like we'd love to have you over for dinner. We have a little boy, he's five years old with cruise on syndrome, and we would love to meet your kids and meet you. And I said, no way. And I looked them up on social media, and there was this kid. I'm like, oh my gosh. He looks like me. I respond back. I'm like, yeah. Where do you live? Where do I have to fly to? And they live twenty minutes away from my house. By car, they're not playing. No. Twenty minutes away by car. Like, I could run to this place in a day. It's crazy. And we show up, the door opens. I meet Jordan and Annalise Fielding, the parents. And then I looked down, and I meet Colton. And there's this kid not just looking like me, but then he acted like me. He responded like me. He had the energy like me. He was just curious like me. And in that moment, I would tell them what we were doing with the film, and then I would ask their permission. Phil, this is something that... It's hard for me to ask, but are you open to it? And then I told them if, you know, would he... Would you be open to having your boy play me in this movie? And the mom got emotional, Annaleigh, and I felt bad. I'm like, oh, no. This is not going well. Yeah. It's not how I pictured it. Yeah. I'm like, I'm overstepping the boundaries because a lot of kids with facial differences, especially when you're young, you don't... They don't wanna be put on display. Right. This movie will be seen by millions of people. It actually already has been. And the reaction was different, though. She cleared up her tears, and she looked over at her husband, and she says, it all makes sense. It all was on purpose. I'm like, what are you talking about? What? Yeah. She says, Ben, we've been trying for months. We've had countless nights where our pillows have been tear stained because Colton was supposed to have a surgery. And he would have this big device on his head called the... It's a... It just, you know, it does a lot of stuff to your face to fix it. But filming would have not have been possible if he had had success in getting a surgery. And they said, this is way bigger than us. Absolutely. We'll do it. We went through filming, he absolutely did a killer job did so well, changed people's lives. And shortly after filming, he was accepted into surgery that he had been waiting for. And, dude, when you do something that you're scared of, when you do something that's bigger than you, things like this happen that just work out. Another miracle, Ben. Oh, we could talk all day. Thank you for sharing yourself, your story, this inspiring idea of being a victor over victim. It is a choice after all. Once again, everybody, standoutfilm.com is where you can connect. Did I get that right, Ben? Yep. And standoutfilm.com. We've also got a little surprise for you. If you just go to the the website for the podcast, liveonpurposeradio.com/victorvault, victorvault. Ben's got a few free gifts for you there to help you in your journey as you overcome whatever it is, you know, that is your anomaly, whatever it is that other people might tease you for, make fun of you about, or whatever. It's probably exactly what you need to help you stand out and be that victor. Ben, I'm gonna give you the last word today. Is there something else you'd like to share with our our friends today before we sign off? Yeah. I would say this. The gift that I'm giving you guys is what I call my victory chant, and it's basically a list of I am statements. And I want to say this. Many of you guys out there might be Christians, and or may know of a man named Jesus. And a lot of us, including me, didn't know what an I am statement was growing up. Because we feel like we need to be humble, we feel like we need to almost not sound like we're arrogant. We play down our I am statements. We make them sound small. We're really in the face of darkness, in the face of obstacle and struggles, you actually need the opposite for you to get out of the the the mud, out of the dirt of what is life sometimes. And so I learned from Jesus what that I am statement should mean, and I'll end with this. As I was setting up my my I am statement, my first statement is now I choose me. Now if you didn't know me, you didn't know my story, it would sound probably pretty arrogant. But what you do need to know is that I didn't choose me growing up. I didn't want to be me. And when we choose us, when we buy into us, life changes. Jesus, the perfect example, would have an I am statement that among the kings of his area, when he's when he's bruised and beaten with probably blood down his forehead, shirtless, handcuffed in between in front of the king of his area, they would ask him the most humble man in the earth, but the most passionate and driven and and purpose driven man. Jesus would have an opportunity to say his I am statement. And I could just imagine being in the same room as this homeless man, Jesus, and the king of the earth says, I'll give you one shot to take away everything that you've said, and I'll let you go free. What do you say? And in that moment, the man that we know as Jesus Christ would look up to the king of his area, and would say this, I am the King of Kings. I am the Lord of Lords, the beginning and the end. When we think our I am statement should be small, look at people like that. They need to be so solid that it defines who you're meant to be. As you choose to buy into you, as you choose to buy into purpose, as you choose to buy into a life on purpose, you show up different for you and you show up different for others. Beautiful. Once again, folks, liveonpurposeradio.com/victorvault. That's where you can give Ben's generous gift to you. And the movie is standoutfilm.com. Ben, I can't wait to see it. Thank you so much for joining us here today at Live on Purpose Radio. Thank you, guys. If you wanna find out how to watch standoutfilmdot... Or Stand Out, just go to standoutfilm.com, and, hopefully, we'll be coming close to you. Otherwise, you can host an event yourself in a screening. Paul, thank you so much, brother. God bless. Hey, folks. You've heard it. It's time to apply it. Let's go live on purpose. Did you get what you came for? Give yourself the gift of taking real action on what you realized today. Please share this episode with someone you know would value it, and leave us a rating too. It's time now to live on purpose.