Blaming is a tool of the ego that is unproductive.  People who blame others instead of taking responsibility earn less, lose status, and perform worse.  It also supports that organizations with a culture of blame lose creativity, growth, and productivity.  Blaming others in a group setting is contagious.  Watching superiors’ fault find allows the egoic mind to believe that blame is an approved way to shift responsibility for a mistake.  So blame is spread like a virus.  We need to be responsible for ourselves and stop playing the blame game. 

The blame game is a negative way to live.  It slanders the person being blamed, even if that person did make an error.  This defamation explains why people react poorly when things don’t go according to plan.  Despite the rationalization, fault finding isn’t about understanding what happened.  Its goal is to shift responsibility to another person.  It’s avoiding your role in whatever the situation is. By doing so, you are feeding the fear the egoic mind is wanting you to feel. 

Blame is fascinating – it shapes our lives. It can be a benign way of positioning ourselves, a gentle joust or banter, or it can be poisonous, hurtful, or devastating for its victims. It can tear apart marriages and fracture work relationships; it can disable major social programs; it can inflict damage on powerful corporations; it can bring down governments; it can start wars and justify genocides. ~ Stephen Fineman

The Rationalization for Blaming

The ego wants to protect us.  It uses fault-finding as a distraction instead of looking at our role in what happened. According to Dr. Brene Brown’s research, blaming is a way to discharge pain and keeps us focused on fault-finding, then feeling the emotion. 

The egoic mind doesn’t like looking within and doesn’t like feeling bad.  It wants to look good, so it blames to divert the negativity it feels it needs to avoid.  We blame others to defend ourselves, especially if we were not guilty.  This release of the anger, of course, hurts our relationship with others.

We don’t like it when things do go as we planned, and we want to understand why it occurred.  We think by looking at the situation rationally that we avoid dealing with the emotions.  Fairness is how we feel life should be.  However, life happens, and many times no one is at fault.  But society assumes that someone is to blame and looks for that person instead of admitting that not everything is controllable.  This feeling out of control is why the ego wants to blame someone so that it can have the illusion of control. 

Blame is the demonstrated lack of self-respect choosing to deposit one’s negative actions onto others to reinforce one’s view of being of good, fair, and approved. ~ Byron R. Pulsifer

Blaming is Victimization

Victimization occurs on whoever has blamed as well as the person who is blaming.  That individual becomes the target, and a victim mentality begins to take shape by all involved.  This attitude means that everyone looks for those things outside of themselves to place the fault.  This fault-finding mindset keeps everyone helpless and disempowered. 

It allows judgment to creep in and makes the egoic mind feel superior over the person that has been blamed for the situation.  This drunkenness by the ego and the feeling of being better than who was accused is an illusion.  A lie of the ego to gain control but is still disempowering.

If everyone is looking to place fault, then no one is focused on a solution.  To be empowered requires us to take responsibility for our actions and the choices we made.  Somehow we arrived at this situation.  Yes, it may be helpful to figure out how we got here, but victimizing someone, even yourself, doesn’t help the issue at hand.  To be empowered, we first need to identify our bad behavior. 

Placing the blame or judgment on someone else leaves you powerless to change your experience; taking responsibility for your beliefs and judgments gives you the power to change them. ~ Byron Katie

Recognize the Fault-finding Behavior

We need to pause when a situation doesn’t go as planned and become aware that the natural reaction of the egoic mind is to blame someone.  By taking a few minutes, we allow ourselves time to respond correctly instead of blaming.  The urge to point the finger is high, but we need to fight it.  By doing so, we gain respect and trust from others, and we help lessen the influence of the culture of blame. 

Blaming many times is a result of defensiveness.  When criticized, the egoic mind jumps to defend itself, and one way it does this is to find fault with a force outside itself.  It’s a passive-aggressive way of blaming the one criticizing you or finding an excuse that’s not under your control.  I was late because of the weather or the traffic, not because I didn’t give myself enough time to arrive as agreed. 

Problems aren’t the cause of fault-finding behaviors, but it triggers the ego.  The egoic mind remembers an incident from the past that was painful.  The situation now, based on the painful past, blinds you to the real issue at hand.  The past problem filters the present and causes confusion instead of clarity.  The brain embraces information that confirms your beliefs and rejects those that contradict them.  By doing so, you rationalize fault-finding instead of focusing on a solution.  Instead, focus on creating a culture where learning from any situation is a priority. 

People who blame things rarely change things. Blame is an unassailable change-avoidance strategy. ~ Andy Stanley

Be Responsible and Own Your Mistakes

Only you can be responsible for your actions and your choices.  Therefore you need to be honest and take responsibility when those choices or actions cause an issue.  It’s not about making yourself feel guilty, but learning from the mistake.  The negative consequences that may arise will be short-lived if you gain a lesson from the misstep.

By taking responsibility for your role, you set an example to others for taking ownership of their errors as well.  And when they do, reward them with empathy and not judgment.  Talk privately about the issue and then focus on a solution.  Thank the other person for taking responsibility for the choices and actions they made.  Forgiving the error allows trust and accountability to grow instead of resentment. 

Even if it wasn’t your own action or choice that caused the issue, determine the role you may have played.  Did you need a more involved part to keep the problem at bay?  Could you have been more supportive?  What could you have done to have prevented the misstep?  By looking at your own role, you empower yourself to find a solution and create change. 

Blame doesn’t empower you. It keeps you stuck in a place you don’t want to be because you don’t want to make the temporary but painful decision to be responsible for the outcome of your own life’s happiness.  ~ Shannon L. Alder

Moving Forward

Blaming others is not an empowering act.  It’s used by those who don’t want to find a solution but avoid accountability.  If we fault-find, our ego is trying to avoid feeling bad for making an error.  But we still have to live with the consequences of the situation.  Therefore, it’s crucial to retake your power by taking responsibility for your role in the circumstances at hand.  Yes, life can make one discouraged, but blaming turns the misstep into a failure because you weren’t willing to look for the lesson you could have learned. 

You can spend a lifetime blaming others, but your success and your failures are your own responsibility.  Focus on the solution because it’s the only way you overcome the egoic mind.  By taking responsibility for the errors we make, we inspire others to be responsible for their own actions.  By doing so, we call come together and find ways to come together and correct the situations we find ourselves.

Blaming has no positive effect at all, nor does trying to persuade using reason and arguments. That is my experience. No blame, no reasoning, no argument, just understanding. If you understand, and you show that you understand, you can love, and the situation will change. ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

As you become more conscious of your emotions and become aware of your thoughts, you can overcome the behavior of playing the blame game.  If you would like to receive more informative and mindful articles right into your mailbox, fill this out. 

Do you need support to take responsibility for your actions and choices?  Do you want a strategy to help you overcome the ego’s limiting beliefs and live authentically? If so, please, contact me, and we can put together an action plan for you to create the life you desire.

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Article Name

How to Be Responsible and Stop the Blame Game

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Don't let the egoic mind play the blame game. Release blame by taking responsibility for your choices and your actions and see your life come into focus.

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Terri Kozlowski

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Kozmic Soul Solutions LLC

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