No man or woman will ever make a success of life or find happiness by blaming their misfortunes upon others - W.D. Gann

Quote just seen on School and the City, and it has reminded me about five years ago. When I was studying TQM (total quality management or six-sigma) there is a lot of emphasis on trying to ask for the reasons of the problems, on asking at least five times Why has this happened? and, on avoiding as muchs as posible the sessions of blamestorming that most of us have been involved in at some time in our lives.

The TQM sensei gave us another old saying, useful to keep in mind our share of responsibility whenver something does not go wrong. I loved it, and I try to live by it:

When you point your finger at someone, three of your other fingers are pointing back at yourself.

While finger-pointing may be a mildly effective strategy for getting rid of feelings of shame, blame or guilt, its collateral damages are terrible! Blaming others deprives the person of a chance of self improving! When you face a master at blaming others, you are looking at a person who is not evolving at all.