Who's Taking Responsibility For Your Life?

personal responsibilty Do you find yourself blaming others for past and present events happening in your life? Do you make excuses as to why you cannot be happy?

Are there always reasons as to why you don't achieve what it is you set out to achieve?

If you have answered yes to any of these questions, then it isn't you who is taking responsibility for your life.

When I say taking responsibility for your life, I don't mean part time, occasionally, or when you feel like it. I mean 100% full responsibility all the time.

If you don't take 100% responsibility all the time, for your actions and your life then you will never be truly happy and successful.

Taking responsibility for your life means assuming full responsibility for your health, your relationships, your finances, your social life and activities, your career, your spiritual development, your personal development, your goals.....EVERYTHING!

Many people these days now, walk around with an attitude as if the world owes them a living. It doesn't owe us anything. It's quite the opposite. We are in debt to the world and should find ways to contribute to its amazing existence.

Most people, including myself, have had that attitude. Believing that the government, our parents, teachers etc are responsible for ensuring our lives are filled with continual happiness, an exciting career, tons of money and our families should be taken care of.

I particularly recall this type of attitude from my days working at a jobcentre, but it's far from being exclusive to that place alone.

The fact of the matter though, there is only ONE person responsible for the quality of life you live. That person is YOU.

From this day forth, you must learn to accept responsibility for the outcomes and feelings you experience in order for you to navigate the life you really want to create.

Due to social conditioning, we tend to look outside of ourselves when the problem is actually ourselves and the resources we need are within us too.

This isn't an easy thing to do. But what is easy, is to make the decision to do so. You either will or you wont.

Responsibility vs. Blame.

When you portion blame to another person, you are subconsciously or consciously giving away your own power.

You are saying that it's somebody else's fault and that there was nothing you could of done to help that situation.

So therefore, you fail to take charge of the situation and allow it to take its own course. People who say they believe in fate usually go down this route.

When you assess your life what do you see? Do you see a life that you are happy with? Is it a life that YOU created? or is it one that you stumbled upon by chance?

Do you blame your parents for your childhood experiences that affect you today? The questions can go on. Taking responsibility requires introspection before real change can occur.

accepting responsibility I used to blame my parents for my childhood experiences and why I never succeeded at school due to problems at the home.

I used to blame them for my inabilities to build positive relationships with other people because they never showed me how.

It was easier for me to put the blame on them. I didn't need to find a solution to my own problems. I'd just blame them and get on with what I'm doing.

People would say "Marvin, your so rude, you don't have any manners." My response would be "Don't blame me, blame my mother. She raised me this way."

I blamed the fact that my Dad being womaniser was the reason why I could not commit to another woman. It was easy to do and it kept on giving me a reason to remain the same. But was I happy with these aspects? Certainly not. Taking responsibility for your life requires more than excuses.

If you find yourself making similar excuses then it may be time to have a look at where you can improve or change your thinking.

These things may have been true and had an influence over my rationale. However, I learned to accept responsibility for them. It took me years to get to that point but I got there.

Blaming them only made me make excuses for not making any changes that I could see needed change. It allowed me to justify my shortcomings and continue to underachieve in various areas of my life.

By taking responsibility, I knew that I was in charge of my results, experiences, outcomes and my feelings. I knew that if I wanted to enjoy more fruitful relationships with people, I had to make the effort to do so and not wish I had been born to different parents to teach me!

It wasn't them who were mistreating the people I interacted with. They weren't even there! So how can I blame them? I was the one who was behaving that way. I was the one people had the problem with not my parents.

I had to commit to educate myself. I had to be more attentive towards my friends so I could really understand them. In turn, ensuring they could understand me. I had to treat women with respect. Deep down I knew these were things I had influence over.

If you have no influence over things then it is fair game. You may not need to accept responsibility. For example, you may not have influence over what happens in politics, the economy and other such things. Although these things will have an impact on us, all we can do in these situations, is adapt and cut our cloth accordingly.

As for self improvement and your life, are you committed to getting better? Becoming a better you this year than you were last year? Improve your confidence within yourself to pursue the activities you want?

Do you want to feel good about yourself because you know yourself and understand your direction in life? Do you want to experience better relationships with your family, peers and partner?

Perhaps you want to improve your health or improve your spiritual development? The list goes on.

If you can say yes to any of the above you should commit to ongoing and never ending personal growth and start taking responsibility for your life now. Even if you don't say yes you still should commit to continual personal growth.

Simply because to stop growing and improving means to begin dying and that should not be your aim.

Taking responsibility for your life gives you control over your life and will empower you. Knowing that you're in charge is very empowering. Blame leaves you powerless, weak and vulnerable to others. You allow their expectations of you to become your own.

The day I decided to take responsibility for my experiences, I began experiencing great pleasure and sense of pride for my life which is priceless.

You too will experience similar feelings from taking responsibility for your life once you make the decision to do so.

Taking responsibility for your life requires you to drop the excuses you've been making up until now. Even if you feel that someone else contributed to the outcome, accept it anyway.

This way you can start to build your life without looking back at it through the wrong set of eyes. The eyes which are more concerned about pinning the blame on others.

Inside Out.

Before you can influence the outside circumstances in your life, you have to start within. Taking responsibility for your life is just the beginning. Take this opportunity to continuously work on yourself.

Learn to identify your values. Seek out what's most important to you. Understand which beliefs cause you to behave and act accordingly. Begin by working on your character before pursuing happiness outside of yourself.

Failure to Take Responsibility For Your Life.

This is the ultimate failure. This will lead you to suffer from low self esteem, low motivation and even worse a lack of meaning or purpose. Don't make the mistake of handing over the reigns to somebody else.

If you continue to neglect your duty of not taking responsibility for your life then you will continue to experience the unhappiness, discontentment and outcomes you are experiencing today. Don't be that somebody.

How to Start Taking Responsibility For Your Life?

1. Honest acknowledge. Firstly, you need to take a step back and ask yourself do you really accept full responsibility for everything my life? Be honest, after all this is YOUR life and the decisions will affect you.

If you continue to do what you have always done then you will get what you have always gotten. Honesty is key in taking responsibility for your life. After that you move to step two.

2. Give up the excuses and blaming. Do not claim victim stories such as why does this always happen to me? All the reasons why you have or haven't done something up until now. Caput. Get rid of them. Take your power back and stop blaming others.

Let the excuses fade away with the night. You are the right person, the authority on your life. Do not own excuses. They're expensive and lack quality.

3. Make a decision. Taking responsibility for your life requires you to commit to accepting and taking control of the decisions and results in your life. You have to consciously tell yourself this otherwise it will be a fly by night decision.

Decide what you want from your life, but more importantly what are you going to give to yourself. Give yourself the gift of self worth and responsibility to navigate your own life. Then exercise patience, growth takes time.

4. Make a plan. What areas do you want to work first? Which ones would make the most impact if they were to be improved upon? Write down some of your aims and which areas you will work on first then go to work on them.

5. Act on that plan. Start small but always seek to accept that your in control of the events that happen. Work on yourself and your plan daily. Maybe you can record your results and feelings about your experiences.

6. Stick to the plan. Do not quit. You can't harvest the results if you give up. Persistence is key. Slipping back into old habits is possible. However, with your commitment keep at it, never quit and you'll make it. You owe it to yourself.

7. Constantly review and evaluate your life. Another step in taking responsibility for your life is at the end of each day, review the day just gone and reflect on your thoughts and feelings. Then look forward to the next day, maybe you could begin a journal about what you anticipate happening.

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