Blame Feels Like Control, but It Keeps You From Fixing the Problem
After a spilled cup of coffee, researcher Brene Brown saw how fast blame dumps pain, and how little energy it leaves for fixing anything.
Royal Society of Arts · The Power of Vulnerability - Brene BrownBrene Brown, a researcher who studies vulnerability, was standing in her kitchen in white pants and a pink sweater, getting ready to go teach. She was holding a full cup of coffee. It slipped from her hand, smashed on the tile floor, and splashed all over her.
Before she could reach for a towel, she shouted, "Damn you, Steve!" Steve, her husband, was not in the room. He had gone out the night before for a water polo game with friends, and Brown had already built a whole case against him in a fraction of a second.
She had asked him to be home by 10 because she cannot fall asleep until he is home, but he stayed out until 10:30 chatting with his friends. So she went to bed later than she planned, and so she poured a second cup of coffee she otherwise would not have had, and so the spill was his fault. That instant rush to ask whose fault it is, Brown says, feels like taking control when something painful and embarrassing happens.
People would prefer the mess to be anyone's doing rather than an accident, since pinning it on someone offers a semblance of control. Brown describes blame as "the discharging of discomfort and pain." It lets anger out fast, in about 15 seconds of raging about fault, and that speed is the attraction.
The problem is that blame works against accountability. The research shows that "people who blame a lot seldom have the tenacity and grit to actually hold people accountable" because they use up their energy in a burst of fault finding. Blame is also corrosive in relationships, and it blocks empathy because the blamer is busy assigning fault instead of listening.
Accountability, by contrast, is an exposed and uncomfortable effort. It involves calling someone and saying that your feelings were hurt, and then talking it through without turning it into an attack.
Brown calls herself a blamer, and she tells the story as a warning. The fast relief of "Damn you, Steve" feels like power, but it leaves nothing left for the slower, harder work of owning what happened and talking it out.
Questions people ask
Why does having someone to blame feel like control?
This is general psychology, not something Brown said: uncertainty feels worse than fault. If someone caused the spill, the late night, or the bad morning, then the world still follows rules and you can argue, fix, or prevent it next time. If no one caused it, you have to sit with randomness, which feels helpless.
What does accountability sound like instead of blame?
It sounds slower and more exposed. Instead of deciding fault in seconds, you name what hurt, listen to the other person, and work out what should happen next. Brown describes it as calling someone, saying your feelings were hurt, and talking it through rather than discharging anger.
Does this mean you should never feel angry when something goes wrong?
No. Anger signals that something hurt or felt unfair, and naming it can be useful. The difference is whether you dump it on someone to get quick relief or use it to start a conversation. Blame ends with a verdict, while accountability starts with a talk.