Choosing to Be Responsible
“When it snows, you have two choices: shovel or make snow angels.”
~ Anonymous
If ever there was a time for optimism and belief in new beginnings, it is now. Certainly these are interesting times. But, seasonally, with the advent of today’s Fall Equinox, the promise of new beginnings, new opportunities and new expansive experiences is literally in the air. It truly is a potent time for choosing to be responsible and align with what is working in your life.
It is true that we often do not have a choice about the circumstances of what happens in our life, but we do have a choice about our response to these circumstances. That is all that is meant by being responsible for your life….”choosing to respond - not react.” I am not advocating denying the feelings of your experience, but you can choose the perception of your experience. From the perspective of a chooser, any frustration, anger, worry, and even depression can be a doorway to surprising opportunities, expansive insights and true growth. In fact, what seems like a breakdown can become a breakthrough for the responsible chooser.
What does choosing to be responsible mean? Jack Canfield writes in The Success Principles that it means being responsible for “level of your achievements, the results you produce, the quality of your relationships, the state of your health and physical fitness, your income, your debts, your feelings….everything.” This may seem scary at first, but when you consider that you can step out of the victim/saboteur role that is the consequence of not taking responsibility and instead step into an authentic heroic empowerment role… then choosing to be responsible becomes very attractive.
Here are more suggestions from The Success Principles about how to be 100% responsible and choose positively:
- You give up all your excuses
- If you don’t like your outcomes, you change your responses
- You decide: “I’ve heard there’s going to be a recession, I’ve decided not to participate.”
- You accept that everything you experience today is the result of choices you have made in the past. Without beating yourself up, you make new life-enhancing choices. Without regrets, each day you choose to begin now.
- You know if you keep on doing what you’ve always done, you’ll keep on getting what you’ve always got.
- You give up blaming and complaining
- Rather than complaining, you choose to make requests of the appropriate people and take action that will achieve your desired outcomes.
- You pay attention to “yellow alerts” - advance warnings - in the form of telltale signs, comments for others, gut instinct, or intuition that alert you to the impending danger and give you time to prevent the unwanted outcome. Alerts give you time to change your responses to life.
- You are not afraid to ask for feedback. The truth cannot harm you. You can then choose to take inspired action.
- You know that all suffering comes from believing our thoughts that don’t serve us…our limiting, conditioned beliefs.
- You slow down and pay attention. Life will always give you feedback about your behavior and your actions.
“Every human has four endowments- self awareness, conscience, independent will and creative imagination. These give us the ultimate human freedom… The power to choose, to respond, to change.”
~ Stephen R. Covey
Canfield goes on to write: “results don’t lie.”
Are you happy?
Are your relationships joyful?
Is there balance, beauty, comfort, and ease in your life?
Do your daily habits and work systems serve you?
Are you getting what you want?
Is your net worth increasing?
Are you healthy, fit, and pain free?
If not, then something needs to happen and that starts with you. The formula is simple: be, do and have more of what is working and try on new behaviors to see if they produce better results. The time is now to choose a life that works for you.
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