I remember when I had a lot of personal therapy back in early 2000s. I read a book I loved by Shirley Smith titled ‘Set yourself free’. It was all about releasing from trapping patterns and actually linked in with the idea of 12 step programs. I found it really powerful and it’s still one I’m happy to revisit at points.

Shirley Smith split the word responsibility to being ‘response able’ and said how it’s a challenging thing to take for ourselves. Being in a codependent state while being painful does have a pay off of not taking responsibility and seeing things that happen to us as luck/chance.

I thought I’d worked through all this but then today in a session with a Coach who helps me my level of responsibility was questioned again.

In the session I quoted certain in fact good successes in business but then externalized the success as being more due to chance rather than my actions.

I thought at first that it was an esteem issue and that I should take responsibility and feel good about what I’d done. My Coach helped me see there was another important angle here which was that by externalizing it and seeing it as more due to chance I was in fact letting myself off the hook to prevent potential further progress and going to the next level. It was quite an experience to see that I was in fact finding a way to not take responsibility.

It’s here that I guess fear was part of the equation that I didn’t acknowledge. By seeing that I had been in a good part responsible allowed a boost in esteem which was good but also meant that I was taking the more challenging path by seeing I had created it and could work to do more of certain things rather than just waiting for things to happen.

I’ve been learning more how the brain is always trying to keep us safe. One coach once said something along the lines of that the brain works to keep you safe so if you want to be really happy and live your best life then that’s really up to you.

It was interesting to me how maybe the brain in this sense is always trying to find an opening to pull more to safety rather than growth towards the good life. I was able to see where I can in fact take more responsibility and therefore take more creative action to work towards designing my own life.

I wanted to share with you then ask you if this resonates in your

life ? Are you taking responsibility as well as you can ?

I’m working to be more aware of this and make it a discipline while recognizing it as a potential issue and downfall.