Written by: Rana Khaled Awwad
“Reactive people…are often affected by their physical environment. They find external sources to blame for their behavior.” ~Stephan Covey.
Is it positive? Or Negative?
Is the idea of blaming an attitude that pushes you to be better? Or is it like a large stone that is tied to your legs pulling you backwards?
There are a lot of perspectives that can answer this question, so let’s remember some situations of our lives where we felt like blaming ourselves:
Social media vibes
situations like when you opened your Instagram in your vacation, and figured out that most of your friends and relatives are having an internship abroad in one of the greatest companies/Hospitals, or even spending their vacations seeing new places with their friends and families.
You may start blaming yourself for not being ambitious enough to seize an opportunity like applying to one of these internships, or even for having financial issues that prevented you from seeing new cultures and new people. If you are a girl, you may blame your family for lacking the mindset of leaving you to have this experience. And if you are a boy, you may blame yourself for not having your own money which deprived you of having this experience.
Positive if: you started working on yourself and took this blaming experience as an engine that moves you forwards; when you realize your mistake and start working on not repeating it twice: if you haven’t seized the opportunity this time’ it won’t slide the coming time. If you have family problems, you will substitute this internship experience with one in your own country, you will learn how to be tourist in your place and see places you never knew they existed. To start where you are, not when circumstances change.
Negative if: you spent your entire time in envy for those who have what you lack; for not taking any step forward but grieving that you have a lot of obstacles that preclude your way. When you blame yourself for not being able to fix your current situation and behave as if you never did anything good in your life and blame your capabilities. This is when you become toxic to your own self.
Comparing your achievements to others:
Why did I get rejected and my friend got accepted? Is it because of the higher grades he/she achieves? Is it because of the volunteering work and extracurricular activities? Why am I destined to always being less than the others? Why am I regardless what I do I will be missing something?
Positive if: you started taking this seriously and asked why are you rejected at the first place?
When you start having this mentality of looking for your defects to fix them not to demolish your mental health by blaming yourself for-like any human being- having defects. When you stop looking behind, only then you benefit from this situation and-at least- will not have any reason to blame yourself the coming time, because this time you would have really worked on your skills.
Negative if: you isolated yourself and stopped applying for any other opportunity because you fear rejection, Or when you start having hatred and envy for whoever succeeds around you simply because you are standing where you are and are not moving like them.
For having a break:
Why did I stop working? The world is moving around me and here I am taking one week off doing nothing but staying in bed all day eating and watching movies. Should I cut this break? Am I supposed to be working now? I should have been a more productive person, why am I someone who gets tired easily?
Actually, it SHOULD BE POSITIVE! The idea of always working and burning from your physical and mental health to be great achiever is not true! Your body needs to rest, your mind needs to relax and your life needs you back as well. Machines are not working 24/7, our cell phone batteries die at the middle of the day and need to be recharged to re-function. Our consideration to our batteries is more than our consideration to ourselves. Sometimes you have to pay attention to what your body needs to regain your real strength and energy before your battery dies forever.
Not being in relationship when everyone is living one:
Am I unbearable? Why everyone around me is getting engaged or married and I am not even in love or loved by anyone?
Positive if: you knew that you are not blamed at the first place. You are too good to meet someone who is at your level of goodness or compatible to your unique personality.
Negative: if you forced yourself to fall for the wrong person.
Blaming is a double edged sword: you can use it to be a better version of yourself, or to derail everything you’ve done in your life by having unnecessary thoughts. Everything in life has two sides- the positive and the negative- but it depends on your mentality and the perspective you see things from. It doesn’t mean that you should be entirely positive as if you only make perfect choices, but to live your life in balance: blame yourself to and extent that makes you feel better, and blame when you give yourself too much credit.
“A good leader takes a little more than his share of the blame, a little less than his share of credit.”