How To Stop Blaming Yourself For Everything: 4 Tips
It is clear that if we should be perfectionists with something, it is our own behavior, but there are people who go overboard in this. And while some value what they do by analyzing their weaknesses and devising ways to improve, others become obsessed with the habit of blaming themselves for everything bad that happens to them.
Stopping blaming yourself for all the bad things that happen to yourself is essential to improve your well-being, since if you do not get out of this dynamic, a vicious circle appears in which pessimism and the expectation of failure make it impossible to improve.
Related article: “Theories of causal attribution: definition and authors”
How to stop systematically blaming yourself for everything
In this article we will review some keys to stop blaming yourself for everything and face life with a more constructive attitude. However, remember that any personal development and learning process has to go beyond reading, so everything will depend on whether you use these ideas to modify the way you relate to your environment and others.
1. Relativize the importance of guilt
Even if one is responsible for what happened, this does not mean that guilt has to keep us mired in misfortune indefinitely. The only usefulness of this feeling is make the memory of that negative experience last over time and lead us to avoid making the same mistake. If we manage to learn the lesson, the reasons to continue martyring ourselves have no reason to exist. In other words, guilt is not a condemnation: it is a learning factor.
Thus, there is nothing that should lead us to think that the simple fact that we feel bad is a reason why we should suffer. In nature, rewards and punishments do not exist beyond human imagination.
2. Analyze your real weaknesses and strengths
Beyond what one would wish, it is evident that every person has their imperfections. This means, among other things, that Not everyone can do anything at any given time in their life. Some things yes, and others only if you have a lot of practice or knowledge.
Remembering this is important, because it provides real information about what is really your own fault and what is not.
In those situations in which a very complicated and difficult-to-avoid obstacle has appeared, there is only one situation in which oneself is to blame for what happened: the one in which it was evident that this obstacle would appear, and pride or another form of irrationality led us to go meet him. Of course, this changes if the reason we “complicate our lives” in this way had to do with protecting another person.
3. Reflect on your relationship with the environment
People who tend to blame themselves for everything tend to keep a low profile in their social relationships. That means, among other things, that they very easily believe that they owe things to others, they feel “helpless” that they live at the expense of the good will and virtues of others, and spontaneously adopt submissive roles.
The consequence of this is that as people in their immediate social circle see that the person has a clear lack of assertiveness and self-esteem, it is normal for them to obey and make sacrifices for others. Of course, when everyone exerts this type of pressure, it is very easy to fail many times, both due to probability and the stress that this dynamic of social relationships produces.
So, to stop blaming yourself it is key trace the signs that this phenomenon is occurring in our personal relationships. Even unconsciously, it is very easy that if we begin to blame ourselves for everything bad that happens, others will also do the same.
4. Practice compassion
Much of our perception of the world and ourselves does not depend on the content of these ideas and beliefs, but on the attention we give to each of these elements. In the same way that if we only thought about poverty and suffering we would become depressed, focusing only on one’s own imperfections achieves a similar effect, with the addition that by locating the problem within oneself, it has no It makes sense to try to fix what is happening: what is broken cannot repair itself, according to this belief.
Therefore, it is good to practice compassion, which in this case is nothing more than applying to ourselves what we usually do with the world: never forgetting its positive aspects.
In this sense, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy can help a lot, since it is based on the acceptance of a very specific series of imperfections and on working to improve in other aspects.
