Responsibility

It is very easy in an age of constant media stimulation to lose track of where your own life begins and where it ends. In a recent conversation, a friend said she was postponing plans for a long-anticipated trip to Europe because of the earthquake in Japan. When I asked her what logical process led to her decision, she was unable to articulate one. This is troubling.

Establishing your personal practice entails discovering and enforcing your own boundaries. In developing a sense of your true self by honestly acquainting yourself with your own motivations, habits and needs, you begin to see where your life ends and the lives of others begin. This usually entails letting go of delusions about your ability to effect or control your environment and the people in it.

Taking responsibility for your own real happiness by living healthily in mind and body will take up more time than rolling through life in a delusional, reactive dream. From a position of sustainable joy in life, you will be more likely to lighten the load of others in your environment. You will be a better coworker, boss or teacher. By seeing the futility of controlling people and situations, you will see your own path through your life, as a contributor to and supporter of the happiness of others.

The fascination with spontaneous celebrity in current society is a terrible distraction for many young people who are really motivated to work for the greater good. The glamor of celebrity does not relate to the humdrum of daily responsibility. However, a close look at those who have gained celebrity, based on years of doing the responsible thing for themselves and those around them will reveal a different view of celebrity, coming from hard work and conscientious dedication to a craft or an ideal.

Daily responsibility begins from the way you greet yourself in the morning. It entails what you eat for breakfast. It entails how you maintain your personal hygiene and your living environment. It entails how you interact with the world from the first contacts of your day. It is rooted in mindfulness and grows with compassion for yourself and others. Daily responsibility in practice resides in each mindful moment of each day.