While I appreciate what you are saying "in principle," it ignores several variables that must also fall into place to be workable "in practice."
Your word choice is correct. My wife did have to change herself, but that self that needed changing was a free-floating miasma of self-justifying rationalizations, the only two goals of which were to provide her with a secure platform to launch speculative accusations, and using those speculative accusations to transfer responsibility to me for her lack of satisfaction in life.
Personally, I believe the grandest travesty in the Christian community in dealing with this type of problem is it's failure to recognize the enemy has been busily working on mechanisms to bypass the defenses normally confered by following Biblical principles. Much like the workings of the ACLU, People for the American Way, the Democratic party, etc., our own laws instituted to protect a way of life are being subtly shifted in their application to tear down the very way of life they were designed to protect.
When I was younger, I too agreed with my wife on why we had marital problems. It took several years for me to come to the realization that no matter how many of her hoops I jumped through, there was always something slightly wrong with the way I jumped, so my remedy was invalid. In effect, she was moving the target, then blaming me for not hitting it.
It was only when I stepped back, and acting unilaterally, informed her a carress is not "grabbing," showing frustration is not "verbal abuse," arguing for my perspective is not "demeaning her," that I was able to make her understand she did not get to define reality. Her "feelings" were subjective, and if she insisted on treating them as objective I was outta there.
The case we are currently discussing is similar in that this witch has so little wrong in her life she actually has time and temperament to threaten the marriage over the thermostat! I feel confident she was absolutely filled with joy at taking the trash out in twenty degree weather, because it gave her another cudgle to use on him, and the husband is too much the naif to recognize if she had been too sick to take out the trash, she would have been too sick to take out the trash.
If she wants to throw herself on the fire, then blame him for her burns, that's her choice. But please, don't demean the guy by trying to teach him how to keep her from throwing herself on the fire.
If your assessment of the woman is correct and if your analogy holds, she will continue to throw herself into the fire and she will continue to blame him for her burns, and he will continue to accept responsibility; he's incapable of restraining her from jumping into the fire, he can't keep her from lighting fires, and he has no idea how to put them out. He is no fireman. He is more like a little boy chasing the fire truck, waving and imploring the driver to turn on the siren.
He must go to Firefighting School so he can learn to utilize The Shovel Of Growth to smother The Cinders Of Obstinacy And Self-Justification, and learn to work The Hose Of Discipline in order to channel The Waters Of Maturity. In so doing he will acquire the tools necessary to save them both from The Fires Of Hostility, Anger And Hatred and they can live together happily in the uncharred Forest Of The Grownups.