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Taking responsibility isn’t easy. We all have things in our past and in our lives that we want to point to and say, “well look at this, if you had this you would be this way.” “If you were born into the family I was born in, or if you had this tragedy in your life, you would be this way.” If you are over 25 years of age you are responsible for your actions in the life that you’re living now. I say 25 years old because you do most of your maturing between 18 and 25.
For us to take charge of ourselves, we have to stop believing the false arguments that everything is tied to something else in our life or in our past. And while our past culminates in who we are today, it does not determine what we will be tomorrow. You have the ability to choose what you will do and what you will say starting right now. You have the ability to choose what you will think and what you will believe starting right now. It is up to you to make the choice to be who you choose to be and not be who you think other people want you to be.
Dr Wayne Dyer, in his book Your Erroneous Zones, says this,
Learning to take total charge of yourself will involve a whole new thinking process, one which may prove difficult because too many forces in our society conspire against individual responsibility. You must trust in your own ability to feel emotionally whatever you choose to feel at any time in your life.
Take Responsibility For Your Thoughts
When we begin to understand that everything we listen to, every episode we watch on television, and everything we read, influences the way we think about ourselves and about the world. If you think back to your childhood, to the songs you listened to as a teenager, you probably still remember those songs. I remember songs from when I was a child standing in the little Methodist Church I was brought up in, but I also remember the lyrics to every song on a Metallica Black Album.
And when we repeat these things in our head, they begin to take hold. Think about when you watch the news and you see what those people are doing. By those people, I mean anyone you disagree with. Think about how you feel, how anger rises and how you become because you can’t believe what those people are doing. Because, what you are feeling cements those beliefs in your head. It’s not necessarily the news that’s bad, it’s what you think or feel about the news the changes you as a person.
When you begin to take responsibility for what you read, watch, and listen to, you understand why the adage is so true.
Garbage In, Garbage Out!
Whatever we put into our heads is what controls our thoughts and our thoughts come out in our feelings in our talk and. So if you want to have better thoughts and think better about yourself and others, take control of what you put in.
Take Responsibility For Your Success
You know if you’ve listened to this podcast at all that I’m not talking about monetary success. I hope you understand, the success I want you to have is life success. Do what you love. Be the person you want to be. Find what you love to do and do it and you will have success. It’s never about the monetary reward for me. But that is for you to decide. The level of your achievements, how much you make, what relationships you have. Are all yours to decide.
In her wonderful book, Do What You Love The Money Will Follow Marsha Sinetar writes,
Our personal “injunctions”—as psychiatrist Eric Berne termed those internalized commands that run our daily lives— are deeply embedded in us. Not only do many superficial dictates Drive our conduct and attitudes, but also we are powerfully governed by the more serious deeper injunctions of our culture, families, religious organizations, and the media. While each person has a unique moral code and must stick to it or suffer the consequences of real and painful guilt, it is also essential that each uncover the false rules by which he is emotionally imprisoned.
You have to decide what success means to you. Since I was raised by a father who blamed rich people for all of his problems. As a result, it took me a long time to be okay with money. We grew up in a small town in Arkansas. I’ve stood in line to get government food. So I know what a poor mindset can do to people. But I also know that when I take responsibility for the way I view success, my life changes. Money is not evil. The love of money is evil and, like I believe Dave Ramsey says, those who have at the least usually love it the most.
You can choose today what success means to you whether it’s having money. Whether it’s not having money. Whether it’s being able to take a vacation anytime you want. You can take responsibility and whatever level of success you have in your life.
Take Responsibility For Your Health
This was probably going to be the most ticklish of all three subjects, but I’ll take a shot at it. We all have problems, I get it. But this is another one of those things that we see on TV every day that tells us we are not responsible for our health. And that, just like everything else I’ve talked about up until now, is not true. You are responsible for your mental and physical health. And no, I don’t believe you can think your way out of cancer or depression or other things like that. There are physical and mental things that happen that are completely out of your control. But you do have the control over what you eat, what you drink, what you smoke, and whether you exercise regularly.
My wife is a nurse. She sees dozens of patients every day who, if they would take a little bit of responsibility, would not have half of the problems that they have. So, now they have patients who register complaints if the doctor even begins to suggest that they lose a little bit of weight. What does that say? it says I am not responsible for my health. Yes, you are!
I’m not saying this from a vacuum. I’ve lived with terrible spasms in my back and neck. I have seven herniated discs in my neck and one really bad one in the center of my back. So, 2 years ago I started walking. At first I walk for 30 minutes 15 minutes out 15 minutes back. Overtime what this led to was strengthening muscles in other parts of my body. The spasms started to go away. I started doing stretches and my wife and I joined a gym and actually went. We started very slowly I’m talkin 10 to 15 lb of weight. Where I was taking 8 – 12 ibuprofen every day, I take one or two tablets a week maybe.
I know we’re all different and I know we all have our own set of problems, but just taking a little bit of responsibility for some of those problems could help us all.
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