As a recovering blamer, my eyes have been opened to what blame really is and why we do it. Blame is really the inability to own our own “junk”. A lack of accountability, if you will. Brene Brown states in her research, “blame is a discharging of discomfort and pain”.

Early in our marriage, I would react to everything and everyone, especially my husband. “I’m not happy” I’d say to him. Waiting for him to do something about it. The house is too small. The kids are driving me crazy. The job is too much. She made me mad. He made me angry. You made me eat that and now I don’t feel good. One time in particular, I vividly recall yelling at my husband because the water softener salts were making me gain weight, or at least retain water. Yes. I said the softener salt was the problem and he was to blame because he put it in. You get the picture. When I look back at it now, I see the utter ridiculousness of the accusations. But, at the time, my awareness only knew blame. All the “things” were to blame for my unhappiness, except me. Well, I was, however, to blame for all the awful things that happened to our children, but that’s another blog post.

What was the truth? Why did I project blame outward? Why is blaming a knee jerk reaction? Why do we, as a society, consistently push blame onto others? It’s so much easier to blame than it is to take a look inward and investigate what’s really going on. Were my feelings hurt? Was I not using my voice to say what I really wanted and needed? Was there wounding in my childhood that caused me to react in certain ways? Did I not feel worthy? Was I feeling shame? Yes to all of the above. It’s not easy to explain the transformation that began once I started to stop and really look at what was happening. Lets just say, I had a lot of apologizing to do to our children and my husband for my past behaviors.

You’re probably wondering, “did she wake up one day and figure this out”? I wish it was that easy. It took work. It was a process of self discovery and awareness upleveling. I had done a women’s study on the book, “Unashamed”, by Christine Caine. It was through her words that I started to recognize things in myself. Then, I was led to Brene Brown’s work. If you haven’t read her books, I highly recommend doing so. These two ladies taught me about shame and worth, and how often our reaction is a trigger of a deeper wound. Through my work with a life coach, I healed many of the wounds of my inner child and my awareness raised even more. The pivotal moment and awareness raiser happened in a class I took. In this class, I learned about self image, the subconscious, and the levels of character and awareness. All these “tools” were part of the journey to finding freedom. It is comforting to know that when something triggers me, it’s really a gift. It means I get to look in the mirror and investigate what the lesson is in this situation. I look forward to teaching others how to do this for themselves.