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Responsibility and Blame

We fundamentally have two choices in life - take responsibility or place blame. (Obviously we have many more choices when we are at an ice cream store!)

My last post was on family and the challenges that face families in building and maintaining the connectedness that is necessary to an extended family.

I was recently at a meeting where the concepts of responsibility and blame were raised. Digging deeper we talked about how when family members recognize their responsibility, recognize their roles and take ownership of them, that's how family is built, supported, and encouraged. On the flip side when family members blame others for the real or perceived faults that blaming act only breaks down and destroys whatever relationship there was.

It's hard to take responsibility for ourselves. We work hard to teach our young children to do that. Owning that, "yes, I hit my brother because it was more efficient than talking through my frustrations about him having the last popsicle" is very challenging for a 4 year old (we have extensive experience with that in this house!). If we put as much effort into our own strength to take responsibility as we put into teaching our children to do so, think about how much more smoothly life would run. We know it's hard to do. We also should know that it's the hard things that are worth doing - isn't that something else we also try to teach out children? (Parenting really is karma!)

And while I'm raising this point in the context of family, it is worth noting that taking responsibility is the winning choice in all arenas of life, no matter how hard it might in the short-term the pay-off in the long-term is immeasurable. It's worth reminding ourselves.all.the.time.
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