Blaming Behavior

My wife has this thing she says about blaming behavior being a sign of mental illness. I don’t know if it’s true and I don’t have any clinical evidence to prove or disprove it. But, for the sake of argument, let’s just assume it’s a concrete undisputable fact.

With that being said, let’s begin with politics. The right blames the left and the left blames the right. And when they can’t agree or disagree, the right blames the left and the left blames the right. And as human beings, it’s probably natural for us to agree more strongly with whichever side we have a tendency to generally support. Then for us, it’s always the other side who’s to blame. It makes sense.

We also have a tendency to focus our disgust or admiration on a single person or entity as being the “Bad Guy” when in fact initiatives that person or entity support are ultimately voted on and approved or rejected by a majority vote of the public. Of course the public means you and me. But someone else is to blame. The public had nothing to do with the final outcome.

And then there’s the state’s budget, which is coincidently approved by both members of the left and right. Whoever they are? But someone has to be blamed. No one wants to receive less. We want more. It’s our right. Oh yes, it’s the banks and Wall Street. They are the culprits. But this all begs the question. Who really benefits if the unthinkable happens and there really isn’t any more money to pay the commitments our government has made?

And there’s also the situation where one political commentator or candidate will want us to believe that a questionable action which one political party got away with acts to support the same behavior by another political party. In that case, my mother had a great saying. She would kind of tilt her head to the side and with questioning eyes ask, “If so-and-so jumped off a bridge, would that make it right for you to also jump off that bridge?” Let’s blame them so we can use their misdeeds to support our misdeeds. In a crude way it probably makes sense. But would you jump off that bridge?

As a parent though, that sounds like a good argument. Except, living in the real world and being a parent seem to relate to completely different things. Remember, it’s the teachers fault if your child isn’t doing well in school. Or, if you’re on the school board or a superintendent, even a teacher, it’s the parents to blame because they don’t spend enough time teaching their children and enforcing good study habits. But then expecting your child to learn could put too much stress and pressure and could therefore be considered unreasonable. Some parents even blame others for their children’s problems. Too much peer pressure. One parent even scolded me for encouraging their child during a soccer game. It was simply too much pressure.

But, if blaming behavior is a sign of something bad, what’s the opposite? Good question. Many might suggest its personal accountability. Others might say the solution is committing oneself to becoming a problem solver and a solution maker. Probably lots of other things too. All I know is, mental health is huge. I was once seriously depressed and I never want to go back there again. Perhaps you agree. If so, quit blaming others for things in your life and quit allowing others to influence you with their own blaming behavior. It’s a very simply solution.