I bet you’re like me and don’t enjoy being around the guy who says, “I can’t help it, that’s just how I was raised” whenever someone calls him out for being a bigot, losing his temper, or just generally being a pain in the ass. You’re not alone; nobody wants to hire, marry, or work for that guy.
Blaming your parents or the neighborhood you grew up in only works for boys, not men. The truth is you have until age 25 to blame your behavior on your upbringing. After that, it’s on you.
That’s the opposite of today’s culture. Today everybody is looking for someone to blame for whatever is not perfect in their life. Nobody wants to take responsibility for their junk.
That’s not how men do it. A real man knows that a key ingredient to authentic masculinity is to take responsibility for his life. The Good and the bad.
You can only move on from a bad past after you embrace it and begin to take responsibility for your life. Here are three ways you can
- Make peace with your past- as long as you hold onto your past, you’re a prisoner to it. Extract the lessons then delete the details.
- Make peace with your parents- most parents did the best they knew how. Parents parent the way they were parented. That’s why it’s so important to have men who are committed to breaking the cycle of poor parenting in their family history
- Ask people who care about you to call you out when you act like a jerk- don’t think of these people as an accountability partner just waiting for you to mess up so they can pounce on you. Instead think of them as your allies who are fighting side-by-side with you and are trying to keep you alive by telling you when you’re about to do something stupid.
You shouldn’t want to keep blaming your upbringing because what that really says is you’re good with being a prisoner to your past. No man should ever allow himself to become a prisoner to anything, especially things that happened in his past that he will never ever be able to undo.
Commit to owning your junk. Give up excuses and crutches. People are more inclined to help you improve when you’re honest. People are attracted to authenticity instead of being repelled by men who are less than perfect but refuse to admit it.