Leaping in to fill the ‘responsibility’ gap?

Is it a compulsion to rush in with an apology when you see that someone’s been hurt and nobody’s stepping up to take responsibility for hurting them?

What is the source of this? I believe that everything *is* about me, or you, or whoever the ‘actor’ is in a situation – I think we’re only *capable* of seeing things from our own point of view, so, in the end, it really *is* ‘all about me’ in terms of our base motives for what we say and do.

So given that base assumption, what would be the motive for stepping in and *taking* responsibility?

I see this habit in myself in *lots* of ways – ooh, what’s coming to mind is that it was the only role I was permitted in my family?

Everybody was fighting for (what was seen as) a limited amount of ‘power’ in the family – there was only so much to go around, and we snapped at it like hungry little birds.

But the runt – me? or, at least, one of the less aggressive ones? found myself letting the whole madness pass me by, stepping off to the side to stay away from all the turmoil and emotional flailing around.

Between my father competing with me, and my brother, and my mother? I didn’t have any energy for it.

So I would just escape – go to my room, read, whatever – disengage.

Funny, I think this was my mom’s pattern, too – most of my images from childhood don’t have her in them, as if she simply was never in the room. And I remember her saying, many, many times, how much she hated the ‘competition’ that was such a hallmark of my father’s family. They *prided* themselves on their ability to compete, and shamed (or attempted to, anyway) anyone who didn’t ‘play by their rules’.

I opted out early on, not being a game player, except for word games – I never liked cards, and the pirahna-like feeding frenzy that would go on – well, it was ugly. At least to *me*, and I think, to mom, too. My middle brother was the worst – he was the ultimate ‘bad loser’, and an equally bad winner – he’d go out of his way to rub your nose in it, gloating and leering and taunting. I don’t know *why* he needed to win so bad – maybe it was the only thing my father rewarded? Because it was the only thing *his* family rewarded? And on and on, back through the generations? Who knows. Yet another form of generational poison, unconsidered, handed down through the children like some kind of demented recessive gene or something. Blech.