The Blame Game

More often than not, you will find people all around you blaming others and situations for bad things that happen to them, backed by perfectly logical reasons to support their argument. Well, maybe not. The thing is that blaming people and/or situations for your misery is the easiest way to convince yourself of being correct. Fact is that you are only correct in your head because you convince yourself to such a high degree that there is really no looking back. That only happens because you believe yourself more than any other person on the planet, even if you don't believe in yourself. What actually happens is that one side of your personality that feels bad about the misery that you go through gets consoled by another side of your personality, which holds you responsible for nothing. And since anyway you believe only what you want to, you accept the misconception that it's not your fault, and that it's someone else’s. However, the sad sad sad bitter truth is simple – Almost everything that happens to you, happens because of you.
Allow me to elaborate this. Let’s take some live examples. Say you get bad marks in an exam because you got late for it. Now you’ll start by telling yourself that it was partly your fault because you probably didn’t get up on time. Then you’ll think for less than half a second and come up with an ‘analysis’ which prove it wasn’t your fault – like there was traffic on the road. And then, the icing on the cake, you’ll very conveniently blame the teacher or invigilator for not giving you extra time for the paper or waiting for you. All of it makes sense right? And justify that it wasn’t your fault? Uh, No! You waking up late is totally your fault, not your moms, not your room mates. You judging the density of the traffic incorrectly is your ignorance. It's an exam for god’s sake. And, this is my favourite, blaming the teacher/invigilator for not giving you extra time is the most absurd, idiotic and asinine thing that you can possibly do – since you’re clearly not the king/queen of the world – because everyone else made it on time, you didn’t and that’s all your fault. So basically, it was all your fault, barring of course the miniscule number of environmental factors that you couldn’t predict.

Let’s look at another situation. Say you get a ticket for something while driving. First thing you do is go ahead and blame the cop and try to prove that you were, in fact, not speeding. Then you try and bribe the cop to get out of paying the entire amount. And finally, you abuse (In your head of course) the cop for first accusing you of breaking the law and then taking a bribe from you. Makes sense? Hell no! You got a ticket because you weren’t wearing a seatbelt or speeding and hence, breaking the law. It's simple! You do the crime, you do the time. You bear the fruits (or weeds) of your idiocracies. The better part here, however, is that we all blame cops for being corrupt, unjust and whatever the heck not. Well they are. But only because we’ve made them like that. Because we’ve made the ‘system’ like that. And we’re all a part of the problem of course. Had people put their foot down on bribing cops, they would have eventually got out of the habit of expecting bribes and hence, getting bribes. And in turn, they would have eventually stopped charging you with crimes that you did not commit. So it's essentially your fault, not fully the cops. It's you, all you.
So what should you get out of this? Learn to accept responsibility for your actions (idiocricies included). The sooner you do, the better it is for you and the people around you. Overlooking facts and not accepting your own mistakes. No one wins the blame game. In fact, you lose because you end up blaming everyone else for everything bad that happens to you, and continue to do so without ever as much as considering doing something about it. You become lazy and a pain in the ass for people around you. So think about things that happen to you, or have happened to you, and try to critically analyze your own contribution to each one of them. You’ll discover that the answer is clear – You’re the culprit, not the world.
(And by the way, there are still situations where it's not completely your fault, but more often than not, it is.)

©Anish Arora, 2008