Releasing Blame for Greater Peace

Blame...
Oof- that's a tough one! 
 
I recently realized I was blaming someone for my lack of inner peace. I knew I was giving my power away, but I hadn’t seen how much blame was tangled up in it—until I was talking it through with a girlfriend. Sometimes our negative behaviors aren’t obvious to us- it takes someone else to help shine a light. 

My blaming was problematic for a couple reasons, the biggest being that no one outside of us controls our experience of life. Nobody is doing anything to you, it's all your reaction, and I was reacting with self-pity and victim.
 
Is that pretty to look at? Not at all. But it’s often those very truths that open the door to real freedom—if we’re willing to be honest about them.
 
If we don’t face them, they live in our shadow and from there, they can do tremendous harm. Not to mention as I said above, completely eradicate our inner peace. 
 
As I said, I knew I was giving my power away, but no matter how many times I took my power back, it wasn't shifting the issue. Same with forgiveness—which, as you all know, I’m a huge proponent of.
 
The only thing that finally released the issue, was acknowledging the part of me that was getting off on blaming. That was getting to feel righteous from my blame, making them wrong and me right. 
 
Once I really sat with that and could own it, then I could finally take my power back and forgive. But not until I called out that negative payoff. 
 
You may have heard negative payoffs referred to as ‘secondary gains’—meaning, what do you subconsciously gain by staying in a negative situation?

This is a deep subject but for now, start observing if there's a negative pay off in a situation that you're unable to shift. Is there a part of you that wants to blame or go into self-pity or feel martyred? Is there a part of you that is happy that you get to rage against something or someone? Is there a part of you that gets to amplify a shame story you have? 
 
Again, not pretty, but necessary. 
 
And notice if there's a part of you that starts to argue right now. If there's a part of you that says that you don't love your rage or shame etc., but that it's necessary. That’s your negative ego acting up. It wants to keep you stuck in a negative emotional cycle with no resolution.
 
It's necessary to bring the negative payoffs to the light because when you can call them out, they no longer have power over you.
 
Here's my challenge to you- write me back and call out a negative payoff that you discover. Why? Because when you can not only own it, but say it to someone else, it takes away its power even more. It releases the part of you that wants to go into shame that something's wrong with you if you're not perfect. But none of us are perfect, we're human. That's part of the journey. 
 
I can own that self-pity has been a trap in my life, and the more I’m aware of and catch it, the less it runs the show. So, call it out, give it voice, and allow it to be released.
 
Because on the other side of it? Is beautiful freedom and the return of your power.