Bla Bla Bla Blame. Addiction is a Blame Game
When addicts and co-addicts and those with emotional issues (EA) begin to feel the pain that develops over the course of the progression of their perspective illnesses, they will look for something outside of themselves to explain the problems they or others are experiencing. This inclination to blame others represents the core of every addict and co-addict’s DENIAL. We call it Addiction is a Blame Game.
When we are looking to blame someone for the quality of our own lives, a target irrational or not, must be identified!
There must be someone, something, or some events to blame for why we behave the way we do. This is true whether our relapse is back into an active addiction, or old emotional behaviours, or even if the relapse is back into the unhealthy pattern of our character defects. Relapse of any kind begins with feelings of discomfort that we look to avoid since the tendency to play Addiction is a Blame Game with other people, places and things for the quality of our own life is a hallmark feature of our denial, the individual heading for relapse will always find a target to blame.
While the list of possible targets to blame is endless, our romantic partners unfortunately often rake the brunt of our blame and justification. They are our closest ‘victims’ of accountability and the easiest targets for us to pick on. The consequences of blaming others for our own discomfort however, can be enormous. When we set out to blame people, situations, and events for the quality of our own lives, we are merely trying to deaden the painful reality of the costs of our own behavioural choices, past and present. In an effort to lessen the pain of our reality anything and anyone is fair game.
Selecting our partners to play our little addiction is a Blame Game bit with, means we’ll blame them for how we are feeling or why we intend to misbehaved in the past is really quite easy. We will always find a target somewhere if we are looking for one. Life is full of people who appear to offend us when they have failed to behave the way we have wanted them to. These offenses and the people we associate with them can be stored in our resentment memory banks for quite a long time and are quickly retrieved hen we are looking outside of ourselves for an explanation for why we are disturbed.
Data from our drug rehab center work shows that through Addiction is a Blame Game work, we discover that if circumstances and events that do not turn out the way we had hoped for or failed to materialize altogether will provide many targets when we are looking for justification for unhappiness in our lives. Unfulfilling careers, dissolved marriages, broken family ties, relapse, trashed dreams, failed career choices, broken relationships, and many other disappointments can all be blamed on other people, circumstances and events when we are looking for a justification for doing something that we know in our hearts is wrong! Intimacy is about honesty, openness and vulnerability. A key ingredient to a lasting romance is found in a decision to allow yourself to turn your critical view of the world inward instead of focusing externally all the time and ‘risk’ taking full responsibility for your own life and your own decisions so that you are bringing your true self to your partner in open and vulnerable honesty.
Addicts, who continuously blame others, who play the Addiction is a Blame Game, whine and complain become nothing more than bullies, bullies who are incapable of taking any responsibility for their own choices and whose lives will remain uncomfortably static and cyclical. Don’t Play; Addiction is a Blame Game!
Healing: Addiction is a Blame Game
Blaming other people means never having to say sorry. If other people are responsible for the bad things that happen in life then the individual can avoid feelings of culpability. Blame involves making a judgment about other people. When blame is apportioned it devalues that other person in the eyes of the individual making this judgment. Those who fall into addiction will frequently blame other people for their predicament. It is only when they take responsibility for their situation that they can be addiction free.
In order for people to build a successful life away from the Addiction is a Blame Game trap, they will need to take responsibility for their own life. This means they can no longer act like a ball in a pinball machine using blame as the flipper. Emotional sobriety means dealing with life in a more honest way and taking control of things. Those who continue to focus on blame will be unlikely to get the most out of recovery. They will end up relapsing because somebody else made them do it, or they will develop dry drunk syndrome. To say that somebody is a dry drunk means that the only thing in their life that has really changed is that they no longer drink or do drugs – their behavior may still be appalling.
For more information about our drug rehab center programs or for info about Addiction is a Blame Game please email us.
