“The tragic truth is that the language of ‘victimisation’ is the true victimiser – a great crippler of young minds and spirits. To teach young people that their lives are governed – not by their own actions, but by socioeconomic forces or government budgets or other mysterious and fiendish forces beyond their control – is to teach our children negativism, resignation, passivity, and despair” (Louis W Sullivan)
We, constantly, are all faced with the decision of whether we ourselves take charge or allow external factors to govern our choices. When life does not go our way or we inadvertently make a mistake, it is so easy to make excuses, place blame on others, or argue that circumstances were against us. We only progress in life, however, to the extent that we take responsibility for our actions and attitudes and put forth the initiative necessary to create our own circumstances.
The action film star, Chuck Norris, talks about taking responsibility by relating his own experience: “I was sixteen and found a job packing groceries at a Boys Market in Gardena, a Los Angeles suburb. It was the 1950s, and in those days, grocery stores used boxes for heavier items. I thought everything was fine, until the end of the first day, when the manager told me not to return. I wasn’t sacking fast enough.
I was a painfully shy kid, and I surprised even myself when I blurted out, “Let me come back tomorrow and try one more time. I know I’ll do better!”
Speaking up went against my very nature, but it worked. I got a second chance, moved a lot faster, and for the next year and a half, boxed groceries from four to ten on weekdays for $1.25 an hour and sometimes all day on Saturday or Sunday.
That moment when I spoke up is burned in my memory, and so is the lesson: If you want to accomplish anything in life, you can’t just sit back and hope it will happen. You’ve got to make it happen.
I was not a natural athlete when I began studying karate, but I trained harder than anyone else and was a world middleweight karate champion for six years. Later, when I decided to become an actor, I was thirty-six and had no experience. There were maybe sixteen thousand unemployed actors in Hollywood, and I’d be competing against guys who had already been in movies or on TV. If I had said, “I don’t stand a chance,” one thing is clear: I wouldn’t have. People whine, “I haven’t succeeded because I haven’t had the breaks.” You create your own breaks.”
Dr Stephen R Covey (Everyday Greatness, Readers Digest) notes: “In the years I have been consulting with organisations and making presentations in front of audiences, no topic has stimulated more interest or more discussion than that of taking responsibility for your life. It’s the notion that despite what happens to us, we have the capacity to choose our responses – our attitudes, thoughts, and actions. It’s the concept that suggests that on the climb up any ladder of success there is no room for just sitting back and idly hoping for luck or woefully waiting for better circumstances. The best way to predict our futures is to create them. As such, the principle of responsibility is one of the most powerful, life-enhancing, life-changing principles we have at our disposal if we just learn how to master and channel it toward worthwhile purposes.”
