We are taught you must blame your father, your sisters, your brothers, the school, the teachers - but never blame yourself. It's never your fault. But it's always your fault, because if you wanted to change you're the one who has got to change.

Hepburn contrasts a culturally common habit of externalizing responsibility—attributing one’s problems to family, schooling, or authority figures—with the harder truth that meaningful change requires personal agency. The apparent contradiction (“It’s never your fault… But it’s always your fault”) is rhetorical: she is not denying the reality of circumstance or injustice, but insisting that the only controllable lever is the self. The quote encapsulates a stoic, self-reliant ethic associated with Hepburn’s public persona: independence, discipline, and refusal to indulge excuses. Its force lies in shifting the focus from assigning blame to taking ownership of one’s choices and actions.