In my last post, I wrote about the time I convinced myself that my daughter sent me a Poshmark surprise, only to be mistaken. I’ve also noticed that the stories we tell ourselves not only are often based on what we want to believe, but sometimes they are a result of not wanting to take responsibility for our own choices. Though I have plenty of experience with this myself, a more interesting story involves the online college classes I’ve taught for nearly 15 years.
Here's a typical scenario: I might receive an email from a student that says “Hello Professor, I am unable to take Test 3 because I cannot locate it in the course. I don’t want to be held responsible for not taking the test since it appears you have not provided it.”
My immediate reaction is that I probably messed something up in the course settings, but after verifying that everything is as it should be, I notice that this Test 3 was due 10 days ago and that the rest of the class was able to complete the test. The reason this student was not able to access the test was that it was past the due date, and the assignment was closed.
When this happens and I notify the student that they missed the deadline, most of the time they accept their mistake and either take a 0 or try to work out a deal for a late submission based on the terms of the course syllabus. However, every once in a while, a student refuses to see their mistake and insists that it is my fault. They proceed to go up the chain of authority, reaching out to an assistant dean or the dean of the department, attempting to prove my incompetence. They want to believe that it was someone else’s fault so badly that they’ve convinced themselves that their instructor is out to get them; maybe even the whole institution of higher education is against them.
You can see how not taking responsibility for our own choices, especially our bad choices, can hurt us and cause us to transmit the hurt to others by blaming them for what we did. We must interrogate the stories we tell ourselves so that we avoid embarrassing ourselves and hurting others. Though blaming someone else for our troubles is an easier path, it rarely solves the problem, and it keeps us stuck in a cycle of irresponsibility. It’s another way that our personal narratives influence our behavior and interaction with others.
photo courtesy of @ThePhotoQueue