Days 13-17 – Creative Blaming – Journal of Sacred Work

My three-year old grandson has an older sister (as do I.) Little brothers learn how to deflect blame early.

At my son's wedding, that three-year old was the ring-bearer. Inevitably, he managed to loosen the rings from the pillow and they hit the hardwood floor with a double clang. "I didn't do it," he proclaimed to the crowd. "Daddy did it!"

Over the Christmas holidays the same little guy got into a fight with his sister. Stuck on what words to use he decided to spit instead. "No spitting!" I told him. "I didn't do it," he protested. "It came from the ceiling."

Punishment for our wrongs causes us to develop the art of blaming early in life. Why suffer when you can shift the heat to someone else?

You may have refined this skill in your adulthood. It requires courage to volunteer to your boss that you have erred. It is equally tough for a leader to acknowledge mistakes.

Chronic fault-finding with others poisons any setting. Real solutions go deeper than simple accountability.

In order to grow Love you need to shrink your ego. Love can only thrive in the garden of humility.

If you are spending lots of time blaming others than you are missing the chance to solve the problems in front of you and to strengthen your life skills.

Success never comes to those who blame. With his final breaths Michelangelo said, "I am still learning."

-Erie Chapman

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Categories: Reflections, Holidays, Spirituality

Tags: caregivers, creative blaming, Erie Chapman, hospitals

4 responses to “Days 13-17 – Creative Blaming”

~liz Wessel

January 13, 2014 at 10:39 pm

In our house growing up it “wasn’t me” was the big culprit. Blaming others is a one way to shift the focus and perhaps miss opportunities for growth.
In the work setting one of the best teachings I received from a colleague was not to focus on the person when a mistake happened, but rather on the process. This shift in attention has been invaluable in identifying gaps. Also, when a mistake occurs there is usually several breaks in the system along the way, like Swiss cheese, at each check point there was a hole in the process. We also emphasize our values in our mistake management philosophy, honoring dignity, being transparent, accountability focusing on improvement to avoid a reoccurrence.
BTW the photo of your grandson, Erie is so adorable that I’m afraid I’d be tempted to believe anything he told me! Ha!

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Maria Doglio

January 14, 2014 at 1:55 pm

Honesty was instilled in me as a small child, which I carried into adulthood. Being taught early to take responsibility for my actions was a gift I have carried into my adulthood in all areas of my personal and working life. Yes, it is easier to shift blame or hide the truth, but life catches you sooner or later, so better to own the truth, apologize and have dialogue about a better way.
Sometimes, when a situation is so poisoned by fault finding, with denial and no communication to resolve the web of problems, real solutions must go deeper, but first they have to start with accountability from all parties so that healing or solutions can be effective. Through honesty, trust can slowly be re-established. It takes leadership of the highest caliber, who not only talk values, but live them in their personal and working lives. Being willing to identify the gaps that Liz talks about in her commentary, is essential. A long and not always pleasant journey.
I have come to understand that the ego can not be gotten rid of, because it is part of our human nature–and it does have a purpose; however, through love, knowledge and true wisdom, we can transform it to work with us. As we evolve through our connection with our divine attributes in this way, so does your ego evolve – truly an on going process, this transformation of human and ego mind! It’s a matter of surrendering to the process and aligning yourself in love.
I agree with Liz, your grandson is so adorable. Three year olds are always testing, aren’t they?!

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sbeng

January 15, 2014 at 9:51 pm

Erie: as you mentioned when we were a child it was easy to play the blaming game but as we grow and mature we learn to take the responsibilities for our actions and account for our actions or in actions in a lot of areas in our lives. It takes a lot of will power to achieve what we want to achieve in life and it takes hard work to reach our goals. In the work place errors are made,e.g. paperwork not turned in on time and areas that needs cleaning are not properly cleaned etc. Who is to blame except for the individual’s slothfulness. Some successful people have had humble beginnings, are creative, hard working, goal orientated and they achieve what they want to achieve in life.

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erie chapman

January 17, 2014 at 11:38 am

Thanks to all three of your for posting here!

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