Responsibility comes from the Latin responso (responsum), which means to answer for (respond for). Responsibility means being answerable for one’s actions, thoughts, and feelings.
Victimhood means when we suffer and attribute our grief to someone else. When we do not answer for our feelings or actions, we blame someone else.
This leads to a feeling of being a victim and denotes a lack of responsibility for our own life. It makes us believe that other people guide our life and make us feel happy or sad – not ourselves.
Why are we scared of taking responsibility?
I believe there are three reasons why we do not take responsibility and indulge in victim-hood:
1) Effort
It takes more effort to be mature, disciplined, to live with intention, and to coexist in times of tension rather than fight. It takes action to correct your mistakes, unlike blaming.
When you value action, you value something immediate and controllable. However, action demands presence in the now, not sulking over the past. Action needs love to be initiated, as it is bigger than our fears. But the opposite of love, that is laziness, sometimes blocks our way.
2) Fear
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us.”
- Marianne Williamson
3) Loneliness
According to Scott Peck, living fully in our light and power results in aloneness. Jake Eagle says says most people want peace without lonliness and self-confidence without growing up. He says we all want the freedom and power of adulthood, but we have little taste for responsibility and self-discipline.
Consciousness and responsibility
When we are open, loving, in touch with ourselves, and accessing our wisdom, we are closer to God. And according to St. Augustine’s Maxim,
“When you are loving and diligent, you can do whatever you want.”
But it’s not the “do whatever you want” part, which is our resistance to be on top of the mountain, but the “diligent” part. We don’t fear misusing the power. What we’re scared of is that if we have such power, we’ll have no one to blame except ourselves. We’ll be alone, and Scott Peck says people can’t tolerate that.
“Still, many have so little capacity to tolerate the aloneness of power that they reject God’s presence rather than experience themselves as the sole master of their ship.”
Responsibility too stems from the feeling of “aloneness.”
Both Adam and Satan sinned, and both had to exit God’s heaven. But who was forgiven in the end? The one who said, “Indeed, I have wronged myself.”
What does it take to say that when you’re carried out of heaven or in the stomach of a whale? Taking responsibility for your actions.
Is God sparking life into Adam… or passing His power?
Thanks for reading!
