It’s a principle you hear talked about in almost every self development book you pick up… Usually it’s the very first principle of the book too, because the author knows of its ultimate importance in shaping the way you live.
It’s a principle that when not understood causes so many people so much grief in every day life and yet it’s one of the simplest and profound truths of success. So what am I talking about?
I’m talking about ultimate accountability (UA).
Ultimate accountability simply means being accountable for what happens in your life. It means knowing and accepting that whatever happens or is happening in your life that some way some how you have created it, you have caused it and you are accountable for it.
Now you probably have issues with what I just said already. After all not EVERYTHING is your fault! What if someone runs their car into the back of yours Blah Blah Blah… And we’ll get to that in a second… First let me outline the power of practicing ultimate accountability.
First let’s take a situation. We’ll make it a really obvious one to illustrate this point clearly. Let’s imagine tomorrow that you get fired from your job. You arrive to be promptly told by your boss that your services are no longer required and to start packing up your desk. At this point there are two kinds of people:
One group of people says: “WHAT! This guy is an a**hole, how can he fire me! I have done such good work over the last few years for him. What is his problem?! This company is a bunch of losers anyway. They’ll be sorry.
While the other group says (likely after getting over the initial shock and emotion of the situation): What have I done to cause this? I wonder how my work was lacking? I wonder what more they wanted from me? I wonder how I could have prevented this from happening?
Do you notice the difference between the two reactions? One group of people makes the boss and the company accountable and one group makes themselves accountable. We all know this right? If it seems too simple and you want to say “I KNOW!” just stick with me…
What’s interesting is what happens to each group of people next.
Group 1: Eventually the member of group one will get a new job. They won’t have learnt anything from the previous experience, after all they did nothing wrong, it was the bosses fault they were fired. They will likely make the same mistakes again and likely, after time, be fired again.
Group 2. The group two member quickly gets another job. After reflection they have come up with a number of ways they may have caused their previous ejection and have implemented new behaviors that will ensure the same result doesn’t occur again.
Put simply one person is better because of their bad experience and one person is exactly the same.
We HAVE to be accountable for our actions, our circumstances and our lives…
Now, most people with maturity develop some level of responsibility. This means that sometimes when bad things happen they are smart enough to do what it takes to fix them because they recognize that they caused them. You always hear parents say things like “take responsibility for your actions!”… So how is ultimate accountability different?
Ultimate accountability to me means not just being accountable for YOUR actions but for ALL actions… (which if you are familiar with the law of attraction you will know is now a physical reality anyway – but we won’t get into that here)…
If your job sucks… YOU’RE ACCOUNTABLE!
If you’re not making enough money… YOU’RE ACCOUNTABLE!
If you’re children are misbehaving… YOU’RE ACCOUNTABLE!
If you’re overweight… YOU’RE ACCOUNTABLE!
If you’re constantly arguing with your partner… YOU’RE ACCOUNTABLE!
If you’re always late for work… YOU’RE ACCOUNTABLE!
That’s right… it’s all your fault! All of it! Every circumstance in your life, every aspect of who you are, is your doing… you are accountable!
This however is not the attitude adopted by the average man. We live in a society of blame. The majority of people much prefer to blame someone else for their circumstances and avoid accountability because hey if we’re not accountable we don’t have to do anything about it! No one likes to be accountable because no one likes to feel like bad things are their fault. We don’t like to make mistakes, we don’t like to be made wrong. Not only that but for the most part we are lazy and don’t want to have to take ACTION to fix something when we learn that we are wrong. By not being accountable we get to avoid a lot of pain.
So if we get to avoid so much pain by not being accountable why the heck would we want to BE accountable and have everything that happens be our fault?
When we are ultimately accountable we experience ultimate power because we become the CREATORS of our experience. No longer are we sitting back and REACTING to whatever the world throws at us, we are creating each individual circumstance. If we are CREATING each individual circumstance we have the power to change it, influence it and make it whatever we want it to be.
Are you starting to see the power of this? Here’s an example:
1. You arrive home late from work and your partner becomes extremely mad and yells at you. You feel awful for the rest of the night so you ignore him/her wondering why she is such an angry person and wishing she would give you a break. It doesn’t seem like you did anything wrong. All you did was walk in the door then suddenly you were being screamed at.
If you are not accountable in this situation you will continue to be angry, wondering why your partner was in such a bad mood, wait for him/her to apologize and probably go to sleep feeling terrible. You have no power here. You basically have to WAIT around passively until your partner makes themselves accountable, (which may never happen) and HOPE the situation comes to a worthwhile conclusion.
If you are accountable you will ask “What have I done to cause this?” You will realize that this situation has come as a result of your own doing. Maybe you stayed back too late at work finishing things off when you promised him/her you’d be home? Whatever it was you are now in control of the situation and it’s outcome. Realizing that your actions probably caused the trouble you go and apologize to your partner, learn more about their feelings and resolve the situation happily.
Again this is an oversimplified example but can you see how much power is gained by taking ultimate accountability?
Get into the habit of making EVERYTHING your fault. Even when you feel like something has occurred that is totally NOT your doing, by making it your “fault” and being accountable you have the ability to control it and the ability to change it.
Now before you get into a real huff there are exceptions to this rule. I can hear some people saying already “I was abused as a child, I’m not accountable for that!”, and that’s true, you’re not. What you ARE accountable for is how that abuse effects you today! You are accountable for the way you let that event shape you and you are accountable for the way it effects your life. By taking the correct measures you can change what a situation that has happened in the past means to you NOW and in doing so reclaim your control over that situation. This is not always easy to do but remember the alternative is to continue to be powerless and let the terrible experience run your life.
If it feels like I have driveled on for too long to explain such a simple point, GOOD! This one issue is the single greatest cause of human mediocrity. Think about it: How can someone change their life if they aren’t even in control of it?
By being accountable, we create our world; We become the creator and not the creation; we become all powerful instead of powerless; We gain the ability to handle ANY situation and we develop the confidence necessary to charge forth toward our dreams. Accountability is power!
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