Who I am is a person who experienced an event at an early age that devestated me. It is really not necessary to go over the details in order to blame one of the people involved. What is necessary is for me to share with you, the general public, is that at the age of three, the belief system already instilled in me, RoseMeade (Blame), was one that I believed I was to blame for things happening to me and around me. When something happened that was negative to others around me, I blamed myself also. Even when others did not blame me, I blamed myself. I really started out believing I had power. Negative power for sure, but it was still power. The power then became fear. Fear then became anger. Anger became sickness and so on until I was a full-blown hypochondriac and ill most of the time.
I have shared my life story in front of hundred's of people since 1990. Most of the time, the easiest way for me to explain my life is by sharing about my addiction to power. So, the next article in two weeks, will be about that power. We will meet yet another personality that maybe my visitors will be able to relate to. Maybe you will instead have a relative that is similar in nature to the characters I share about. Our next character is Randy (better known as 'Rage.')
For this last section, let's move to another definition and then I will share on change. The definition to blame: to condemn, to hold responsible, to critise or to accuse (rather it be to do this to others or to oneself).
In my first article in this presentation, I made a promise that we would learn about changing belief systems and behaviors. Maybe as each article appears, it will become easier as we go along to see how very important change will be.
"What?" I would like to ask you, "would you most see needing changed in the personalities shared with you in this article." Most of you would probably answer me, "well, that is easy to answer, Blame and Bill need to start believing that they did not cause their circumstances and they need to forgive what happened. You might add, Connie does not need to change a thing.
Ellen Langer wrote an online article, "Behind the Apology: It's Not What You Think" written for Psychology Today in January 2000. She reported that if you "ask 10 people if forgiveness is good. All will probably tell you that it is. According to most experts, forgiveness is something to which we should aspire. The more wronged we have been, the more divine it is to be able to forgive. Now ask 10 people if blame is good or bad. All will probably tell you that blame is bad. And yet to forgive, we have to blame. If we do not blame in the first place, there is nothing to forgive. But there is a step before blame and forgiveness that needs our consideration. Before we blame, we have to experience the outcome as negative. If your behavior resulted in something positive for me, blame would hardly make sense. Those who see more negativity in the world are then those more likLanger place blame."
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