Tuesday, June 21, 2011

BLAME-THE WEIGHT THAT WE CHOOSE TO CARRY

Sometimes we just feel stuck-stuck in a job, a relationship, or some situation in life that we fight and struggle to break free from. And often, we look for someone to blame for our plight. We blame ourselves for not knowing better, for not having tried hard enough and for not being good enough. We blame others for victimizing us; for keeping us down or thwarting our attempts to be free from our perceived oppression. We blame them for not allowing us to be great. So we remain in the struggle, fighting against the tides of opposition and hoping for the day that it will all get better.

But we pay a price for the blaming-and that is the more we blame, the more stuck we become. Blame is literally like a bag of rocks that we decide to pick up and carry on our backs. And, it doesn’t matter if we blame ourselves or if we blame someone else-the impact is the same. The weight of it slows us down. But, we assume that assigning fault will lighten the load and help us to feel better. If we blame others, we feel better because we are not at fault for the conditions that we find ourselves in. If we blame ourselves, we feel better about having taken responsibility. But blaming never helps. It only causes us to focus on what we perceive as being “wrong” with us or with other people. Blame, (and all of those little nasty feelings associated with it) becomes our point of attraction. When we focus on who’s at fault, we don’t allow ourselves to see possibilities. We see only what is that is “wrong”; not what could be.

And although many of us take pride in our ability to make strides while carrying our bag of rocks (we are strong, right?), what we fail to realize is just how much faster and farther we could go without carrying the weight of blame, shame or guilt. We fail to grasp the joy and the freedom that comes with deliberately choosing to let go of the weight and living in the knowing that we can be, do, and have whatever we want.

So how do we stop carrying the weight? By deliberately choosing to put down our bag of rocks and allowing ourselves to know that no person, situation or institution holds us apart from what we want. Blame and fault finding fixes nothing; it only slows us down on our journey towards where we ultimately want to be.

-This post was written by Angie