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From: chrisa@azure.UUCP (Chris Andersen)
Newsgroups: net.singles
Subject: Re: Responsibility and blame
Message-ID: <399@azure.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 30-Jul-85 23:29:23 EDT
Article-I.D.: azure.399
Posted: Tue Jul 30 23:29:23 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 2-Aug-85 21:58:39 EDT
References: <750@ihuxa.UUCP> <1637@hao.UUCP> <882@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP> <287@tove.UUCP> <1353@pyuxd.UUCP>
Reply-To: chrisa@azure.UUCP (Chris Andersen)
Organization: Tektronix, Beaverton OR
Lines: 55

In article <1353@pyuxd.UUCP> rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) writes:
>
>but it is NOT a universal, it is a learned way
>of dealing with emotions.  A very good way, perhaps, but not one that everyone
>has learned.  Thus, not everybody has control of their emotions.

Hmm, I believe the original posting never said that EVERYBODY has control of
their emotions.  The point I would like to get across is that everybody CAN
control their emotions.  Maybe not all the time (bowing to those who don't 
like using absolutes in this case), but you still can.  That's the important
point.

>>  [The futility of blaming]
>
>Bravo!  Good for you!  Really, you're the first person I've ever come across
>with this point of view that really seems to believe in the futility and
>stupidity of blame.  Yet it would seem that most people who hold this view
>of "responsibility for what happens to you" are just on such blame trips.

Well, you just met another one who also considers blame trips futile.  And I
do hold the view that you can control your emotions (imperfectly perhaps, but..)

>"*I* got through this.  Why didn't THEY????"

Actually, I say: 

"*I* got through this.  Which shows me that others CAN do it too."

I don't consider anyone less of a human being for not being able to control
their emotions.  I just consider it dangerous to allow your emotions to
control you.

>> I find it uplifting rather than bleak, because I look at it through a
>> different set of filters, so that what it appears to be saying to me is
>> that "You are responsible for these areas of your life, so you actually
>> have more power of things than you think you do.  Therefore you can
>> make things better than you thought possible.  Isn't that wonderful?"
>
>Yet there are those who would belittle those who haven't had the opportunity
>to learn this.

Okay, I admit it, I have been doing this (a little).  And I'll try not to
do it again in the future (no guarantees (I'm only human (-:))

But that doesn't mean I'm backing down from my original beliefs.


Life,
  Love,
    Laughter,
      and Hope,

	Chris Andersen
-- 
tektronix!azure!chrisa