If only the microwave could, it would have been shocked at the waitress who exclaimed, "No, it was the microwave!" She blamed the poor machine for heating up my plate of rice for too long. It was nearly crisp, although I could still eat it just fine, but that immediate attempt to absolve herself for her mistake was just unbelievable.
It really is that crazy how quick we can be to want to blame someone or something else for some form of negative outcome. Sometimes it's subtle, but there are many variations of it you can easily hear every day. "If only my father had not left me as a child, I wouldn't be struggling to even get by today." Or, "This country is this and that; therefore, I cannot be..." Sounds familiar? We're getting somewhere.
Maybe it's some age-old survival instinct that kicks in -- that makes one want to "save themselves"—to quickly blamestorm a way out the shame of their perhaps ugly situation. But it really is an illusion. If the blame's yours, it's yours. Sometimes it isn't, yeah, but you're responsible for what you do about it, especially if it concerns you. Of course, it's easier to blame someone or something else, but it sure is embarrassing and could even make matters worse.
If you've seen when a bunch of guys are playing football on a console, FIFA or PES, you know how hilarious it can get at the end of a match between two guys. It's usually very easy to know who lost. When you hear something like, "This pad is not good," or "I don't understand why my players were not running," or even "I just wasn't in form today," then you know who got wiped 4-0.
Ideally, the boys would have their laugh at your massive loss. The best you can do in such a moment is to keep shut, join them to laugh at their jokes, or just admit that you really got wiped. Anything other than that is just story for the gods and they'd just make even more jokes with your excuses. To avoid any further humiliation, I just maintain steeze and hardly make comments when I lose like that... until the time I caved.
"Something is wrong with this pad's analog." I muttered when I was losing big time one time. At first, some people were a bit concerned when I actually said that, but soon enough dismissed it when they realized that others had used that pad and won. At that point, I knew I messed up. I had my own share of jokes that evening. I really never thought anything was up with that pad until a champion said so a while back, and somehow it stuck in my head, and voila, it became my excuse.
Games aside, it happens in different ways in everyday life. And it can be easy to slip into it if one's not being proactive about their thought processes and actions. But as we all know, you're not doing any better by not owning up to your stuff. It's why I vibed strongly with the quote, "If it's to be, it's up to me." I found those exact words in two books I read recently, Psychology of Wealth and Sometimes You Win, Sometimes You Learn.
Ever caught someone/yourself blamestorming? I'm curious if this fits with your experience. I hear it's a pretty interesting world out there.
Images on this post belong to me
