It’s Their Fault!!

It’s his fault, her fault, the boss’s fault, my mother’s fault, my dad, my cousin, my dog…

Stop!! Enough of the ‘blame game.’ What was your role in all of this?

Well, they made me angry and upset. You mean you ‘allowed’ them, gave them ‘permission’ to get you angry and upset?

What is that supposed to mean? Quite frankly, when we say someone made us angry the fact of the matter is we allowed them and gave them permission to press our buttons.

Granted, easier said than done when dealing with family members and friends in particular who usually know all the right things to say (actually, the not so nice things to say) that can (if we allow them to) place us in a state of mind that can turn reactive and emotionally charged.

One healthy option is to utilize ‘positive confrontation’ when a person says something to try and get you to react.

It works like this. A person says something nasty to you. Instead of reacting, you can respond back with, ‘geez, what is going on with you that you would make that kind of a comment to me, I’m concerned about you.’

Or, ‘geez, you say you love me and care about me, then why would you say something like that? What is going on with you, I’m concerned.’

Usually by showing you are concerned rather than reacting back, ‘argument over before it can begin.’

Sometimes when working with people I will hear a client say, “You know, I am the way I am because of the environment I was raised in!”

Congratulations, you are halfway there. When you have that type of realization it gives you one of two choices; continue to ‘use it’ as your excuse for drug and alcohol use and behavior, or, work on those issues so you can come to resolution on them and move forward in a healthy manner.

If you are not quite there yet for ‘positive confrontation,’ then I suggest you just walk away from them and say nothing to fan their fire further.

Usually we do less harm by walking away then by reacting back.