Taking Responsibilityby Kidest Mengistu

It’s amazing all the ways in which we try and divert our attention from our individual responsibilities. The bottom line is that we’re each responsible for what we do with our time here in this birth-death cycle we’re born into. We’re responsible for what we do to our mind, our body, one another, our planet, and everything in between. We’re each responsible for what we create and for what we maintain or perpetuate. Every person, every soul, is responsible whether it is acknowledged or not.

The most common diversion is to talk about what other people have done or are doing. What “those people over there” are doing. What other’s have said or have been saying. But the truth is who cares? Who cares what someone else is or isn’t doing? Who cares what someone else is saying and thinking? What you do, and what you’re responsible for is just yourself and what you do in thought, in speech, and in action. Clean up after yourself – clean up your mind, clean up your words, clean up your body, clean up your actions, clean up your own relationships, and clean up your environment. This is your reality. This is your responsibility. You’re responsible for the cleanliness of your life, no-one else. Once you clean yourself up, then maybe you’ll be useful to someone else.

“They” are non-existent. This is about you. This is about what you teach yourself. This is about what thoughts you keep. This is about the things that you do. This is about what you’re doing to yourself, to this life, and this planet in every moment that you’re here alive and living. There’s no future-accountability or the accountability of other’s to be obsessed about. The future is not here. The after-life is not here. “They” are “over there” and not here. You’re here. You’re in this moment. What’s here is this moment. And in this moment, all that exists is you and what you do with your moments here – what you do with your thoughts, your words, your actions, and your environment.

You can divert attention away from yourself all that you want, but it’s always going to come down to what you do with your time here. It’s always going to come down to what you’re passing your moments doing right here and right now.

If you want to call yourself “just a body” or “just a person” or a “nobody,” know that all that you’re doing is avoiding responsibility. No one is going to come and clean things up for you. This is your work and no one else’s. You are responsible for what you do with your gifts. Your mind is a gift. Your body is a gift. This life is a gift. The people in this life are a gift. This planet is a gift. What you do with these gifts is your responsibility and no one else’s. What you do to your mind, what you do to your body, what you do to the people, what you do to your life, and what you do to this planet is what it all comes down to. It is all about you. There is no one else. There is you and what you do.


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