Accountability and "owning your shit"

Recently I shared a very personal and detailed account of my my journey through anxiety and depression. One of the things I wanted to point out that was a turning point in that journey was my ability to begin to take accountability for my life. When I was in the darker points of my struggles with mental health, I often placed blame on external circumstances and found every excuse in the book to justify why I was feeling the way I was and acting out in response to those feelings. I lacked a lot of ownership and was constantly trying to figure out the "why's" in my life. This just created a vicious cycle in my life and an inability to take a step forward. Simultaneously, during those times, my self-loathing held me back from seeing that I was able to take control of my life, trust in myself to make healthy decisions, and make the choice to get in the driver seat of my personal journey.

Whether or not I was in a victim mentality or in accountability mode, I always believed in the power of changing your circumstances if you aren't happy with where you are at. The determining factor of if I did it or not was based on where I was at in my journey of taking control of my own destiny and my frame of mind. If I was in a position where I was placing blame, making excuses, or viewing myself as a victim, I lacked the will power to take ownership of my decisions and path. On the other hand, when I decided that I am responsible for a lot of repeating patterns, my emotions, my choices, and my current status, I gained the ability to "make moves". For a long time, I was on a roller coaster of "victim vs. accountability" mind sets (and even to this very day at times). It would be a consistent battle between emotion vs. logic and often time, when my emotions would prevail, I would find that I would drown in them which would make it difficult to think clearly and make the best decisions for myself. When I could step outside of my emotions and reflect on situations more clearly, I was able to come up with a plan to address my current struggle in order to achieve the objectives towards my goals.

Taking accountability is not an easy thing to do. As human beings we are often driven by emotion, circumstances, external factors, experiences, etc. We are creatures fueled by what we have absorbed thus far in our lives which is completely normal and the reason why no two people are the same. Accountability is a very big concept that many people, including myself, can be overwhelmed by. Accountability often requires you to look at parts of yourself and your life that you may not like. Additionally, it requires making difficult decisions in order to make a change. Risk, change, taking steps back in order to move forward, sacrifice, and stepping outside of your comfort zone, all work hand in hand with accountability and can create a lot of fear based on those concepts themselves. We tend to be very comfortable in what we know even if it is something we do not like. The comfort of negativity is something easier to accept than the discomfort of the unknown and potential positive outcomes. The reality is that we tend to use those places of comfort in order to define ourselves or excuse aspects of ourselves and life. For example, "I can't see the bright side because I am someone who has depression." Depression is the real deal and creates debilitating symptoms, and "wires" you a certain way but, you are not your diagnosis. Your diagnosis just adds an extra layer to how you function and contributes to factors in your life that you need to pay attention to and address in order to live the life you choose (and can often make things more difficult compared to someone who may not have depression).

So where do you start with taking accountability of your life and decisions? You start by deciding you have had enough. You decide that you truly do have the tools to make a change in your life and that it is your life and your responsibility to do so. All it takes is a step, a small decision, over and over again. Beginning to take accountability allows yourself to step outside the emotions holding you back and seeing that you are worth having the life that you want. Many times we say we "want" something in our lives when the reality is that we "want to want" it. When we truly want something, we go after it, no excuses, eyes on the prize no matter how hard it gets. We pick ourselves back up after life throws us curve balls or things don't go the way we thought and we keep moving forward. Many people lack true "want" in their lives which holds them back from fully taking charge and remaining steadfast towards their goals. The fact in the matter is that with Accountability, things do no always go as planned or smoothly. The difference between "victim mentality" and Accountability is your resilience threshold. When we feel like we are the victim, every little thing that does not go our way leads up to give up. When accountable, we take set backs as an experience and use them to continue to push forward with knew knowledge and skills. Again, like most things, easier said than done and the decision to take accountability in our lives can often fluctuate like many other things. Sometimes its easier to take accountability and other times it is a lot harder. Life has so many different factors and influences that we constantly are in the position to adjust to our circumstances. But, with most decisions, taking accountability becomes a habit which helps us develop who we are as a person. With that said, who do you want to be?