You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself. That is something you have charge of.
I’m one of thos people who are extremely hard on themselves, if I fuck up bad, I give myself a serious lashing and maybe an occasional send to the naughty corner to cool off and rethink myself for a minute or two. If say I mess up a report that is meant to be presented to Directors, even before my manager can say a thing, I done already cracked the whip on myself hard.
I remember one of my previous managers saying something like: ‘don’t be so hard on yourself’, now what I have with me is a working formula, has worked for me for as long as I can remember, even the single most petty thing that I mess up, I have a tendency to turn it into a big thing. Either it be a test I almost failed, or a gym session or meeting I missed because I was late. This sense of self responsibility has gotten me very far be it as self lashing as it may be, I always put in a 120% because I know if I do not, then I might do minimal below par work, as a result of this, I do amazing shits, I put in the hours and the discipline and the outputs flow on the same gravity as my work ethic.
“Concern yourself more with accepting responsibility than with assigning blame. Let the possibilities inspire you more than the obstacles discourage you”
With this being the case, I do admit that I tend to expect the same amount of discipline and work ethic as that I put in when I deal with people.You see I believe in not lying to myself, if I get below par marks, then I did not study enough, if my car gets stuck in the middle of the road with no gas, then I was dumb not to have checked the petrol gauge, if I get fat, then I definitely been eating too much fatty foods and not working out. Harsh realities you expose yourself to assists in taking responsibility as change starts within, if you gonna blame an external source for your mess-ups then there definitely will be no takeaways or lessons learned; which will then just take you back to the position you were in before, then there you go applying the same useless solutions to a problem you were not honest to self about.
I remember watching a talk on Eventual Millionaire whereby the dude was talking about a seminar he had, in the seminar he told all the people attending that they should all write down 10 things that were stopping them from being successful either in their personal lives or in business.
The lists went on and on and some even went above 10 and 20…………
{The seasonal changes caused a decline in my sales} {My parents did not want to take me to university} {The bank did not approve financing for my business} {I got horrible employees who treat customers badly} {The government schooling system did not prepare me for university} {I was born in a poor family} {My girlfriend is always wanting to spend time with me so I never get a chance to do anything} {I got too much debt} {the kids take up too much of my time} {the recession affected my industry badly}
Now the speaker went on to Borne Identity the whole situation, flipped the whole script and made everyone realize what the real problem was.
He told them to all take a close look at their lists and notice one thing, the list did not at one point have in it that THEY WERE THE REAL REASONS WHY THEY AREN’T WERE THEY WANNA BE….. all the excuses the world could formulate, but just one real piece was missing in the list, themselves…
At one point you are gonna have to realize that blaming externalities only shifts blame and brings about no real change or improvements in your life, if the winter season spoiled your sales in business, then given that you knew that ‘winter is coming;, what then did you do about it? you knew about it! then what were the mitigating factors that you put in place? If your friends are a bad influence, then what did you do about it? If your parents cant afford varsity, did you then search for alternative funding? did you make sure your grades are good enough for you to get a bursary? because I mean there are way too many underprivileged kids for you to be crying foul while some don’t even have a meal to go by for the day.
** Talking baut “God’s been testing me” nah fam! You just need to have studied that’s all **
Now I’m not saying all scenarios are the same, not everyone will get their way, but what are you doing to overcome whatever limitation promises to hold you down, be your own voice of reason, your own personal mentor, it all starts with the self.
If this article offends you, well just know that advice seems offensive to those it applies to.
Man up, lady up and take charge of your life, no one owes you any favours and no will definitely ever fight for you as hard as you can fight for yourself, only those willing to better themselves are the ones who actually ever reach that pinnacle.
“The greatest day in your life and mine is when we take total responsibility for our attitudes. That’s the day we truly grow up”
