I have my fair share of character flaws. Don’t we all? It’s what makes the world go round. It’s what makes life hard and challenging and gives us things to overcome.  Some character flaws are somewhat innate—it is amazing once you have children to see what they start life out with. I can be very impatient, for example. Just always been that way. Some character flaws are learned. I struggle to acknowledge the amazing things I do—nothing is ever good enough. That one was learned.

I also have some strengths. For example: I am very good, sometimes overly good, at looking to myself as the source of a problem. When I was in my teens I was struggling with depression and a need to talk it out. As a result, I was going through friends like candy. I came home after a rough night with some “friends” that were basically not going to my “friends” any longer. My mother was upset and protective and said, “Those girls are just so horrible.”

I remember sitting there and everything became so clear. I said. “It can’t be them, mom.” My mom was confused and I explained. “This isn’t the first time it’s happened. I have gone through so many friends. At some point it can’t be them anymore. The common denominator here is me.” ( I may not have spoken so eloquently at 14, but you get the gist.) And it turns out, I was totally right. Who wants to hang out with someone who is always depressed and cries all the time? Uh, that would be no one.

This is something I wish everyone would learn. Self-evaluation. It is a very good thing when kept in check. No, you can’t (and shouldn’t) blame yourself for everything. Not everything is your fault. But guess what guys? There is a large piece of life that is.

I know some very miserable, unhappy and incredibly angry people. Every single one of them has one thing in common. They are incapable of looking to themselves. Everything is somebody else’s fault. Their neighbor, the guy at the grocery store, God, their boss, Mother Nature. Whatever—whoever. You name it, regardless of the situation; they are incapable of looking to themselves for the root of the problem.

In desperation to cling to the ideal that they are by no means the cause of anything driving their pain, they are inadvertently placing themselves in the exact situation that feeds their anger. A situation of total and complete helplessness. How angry would you be if you felt like you were tossed about in a sea of pain and loss without so much as a life preserver?

Although events happen that are truly outside of our control, most of the consistent everyday things that may plague us are very much inside of our control. Sometimes our ideals need to be adjusted, goals altered, or minds opened to what might truly make us happy. Maybe a little forgiveness? Or maybe, just maybe it was our own idiotic actions that got us to here in the first place.

It’s ok! Be mad at yourself for a minute. But here’s the kicker. Let’s say you can’t acknowledge it was you—YOU, that got you there? You become mad and angry at everyone else and everything around you—things you can’t change. You feel helpless—again. And angry—very angry.

BUT, if it’s you that caused it, what do you do? After you get done being mad at yourself. You tell yourself that you aren’t going to do that again. You change. And then, as if by magic, things slowly but surely get better.

You are not helpless. You are not at the mercy of a vengeful God, or Karma, or whatever it is you believe is making your life horrible. You are not drifting in a sea of monsters out to get you. The biggest monster in the waters is you. It always has been you. If you truly want things to get better, battle that monster. Get YOU under control and always take a look at your own snarling teeth before looking elsewhere for blame.