Exploring 100% Responsibility
February 10th, 2010 | 
Author: I’ve had enough experience collaborating with other people to know that if we’re not clear about the 100% responsible ‘rule’, we won’t achieve the kind of success I know I can create. I now call it the ‘IAM 100% Responsible Touchstone‘ (it’s the 3rd touchstone) instead of calling it a ‘rule’. Rather than being rigid about it, I like to see it as something we pick up and look at over and over again.
The IAM 100% Responsible Touchstone sets up an understanding of shifting from reacting, to responding, to creating every aspect of our experience. This expectation is essential to creating powerful, reciprocal, healthy, learning, growing, healing, and co-creative collaborations.
I also know that there is a continuum of understanding from ‘I am a victim’ reacting to my life … to ‘I am the 100% creator’ of absolutely every aspect of everything I experience. There are usually catches at certain points: I am 100% responsible – except I could never be responsible for this or that.
These ‘catch points’ are critical in the process of evolving and transforming consciousness because they are indicators of the edges of our awareness. Playing with a shift from saying ‘this happened to me’ to ‘I created xyz’ is great as a way of exploring awareness of the power we bring to every situation. Facing and shifting these catch points is critical when overcoming a victim pattern or lack of success or any limitation you experience.
What are your catch points? For example, look at the following series of statements:
- I created this article.
- I created great results with this project.
- I created trust in this relationship.
- I created this rude encounter.
- I created that green light.
- I created the rain storm today.
- I created my experience of financial lack.
- I created that driver slamming into me.
Where are your catch points? And how might moving beyond a current catch point help you experience the next level of success you know is right there waiting to come to you?
A while ago, several of the Associates of Karen Tax & Associates had a conversation about this 100% responsible continuum. The following are some notes from that conversation (December 17, 2007)…
- Evil comes from a disconnection between ourselves and our divine source or the life giving goodness within.
- Humans are all inherently good and divine – our disconnection from our innate selves causes fear and pain and experiences of not enough, scarcity, winners and losers.
- Until we shift the paradigm from which we live to one of complete abundance, we will continue to experience life in ways where we don’t have what we need, where we are at the mercy of circumstances.
- I’d like to believe I’m 100% responsible, and to what extent is this true? I can see this as true until I bump up against the behaviors of others that impact me.
- What am I responsible for? My actions, thoughts, behaviors, outcomes? What about the choices of others? Do I really have the power to create everything about my experience? What about those times when others might not have the same values as me?
- When something bad happens, it’s hugely helpful to get curious, to move beyond ‘why did this happen’ to ‘how did it come to this?’ I may not have all the answers, but I can reach a place of peace and move on.
- We call this curiosity ‘unpacking’. It’s valuable to explore what feelings I experience in a situation. Have I experienced those feelings in other situations, recently? How can I shift those feelings from fear and doubt, to love and trust?
- When talking about 100% responsibility, it’s important to be sensitive to what a person is experiencing, and to honor the reality of the situation, whether it’s something minor or truly horrible. Just knowing that good comes from terrible things can be enough.
- When trauma is experienced, it can take a long time to heal enough to get a sense of your participation. Knowing yourself as a creator takes time; you get a greater and greater sense of it over time.
- Evil is an easy way to explain tough situations and emotions. The idea of 100% responsibility is a way of inviting a deeper conversation, where we explore our participation in the problems of the world.
- Where we often get caught up with 100% responsibility is when we make ourselves or others bad or wrong. Self compassion becomes key to facing the inner source of our situation.
- Our challenge is to shift from seeing how we created a situation ‘after the fact’ to becoming proactive creators. As we become more conscious and skillful at creating, we learn how we can become the creators of our experiences – before the actual experience.
- So much of our work is motivated by scarcity. How do we create experiences and solutions that don’t cause more damage? That are truly helpful?
- I believe that my personal transformation is related to global transformation. I can only be in charge of me, and when I heal, it will ripple out in visible and invisible ways. Abundance and scarcity is playing out in me – I can heal it in me.
- When I get to the point where I can say ‘I want this’, explore why I want this, and see the fear, doubt and issues of security that may be intermingled, I can see the underlying desire that is harmless and indeed is good for all – which is about my inherent creativity and well being and thus is in service to others as well as my own healing.
- Our goal is to find the value in an experience, not what’s good or bad, but to find the hidden gem – to dig deeper until we find that jewel.
- There is a practical side to self interest. When we help others without helping ourselves, we come across as arrogant and condescending. When we own our agenda, when we tend to our healing, when we name our self interest – we participate as co-creators – we are able to honor everyone in the process in a way that is respectful and truly helpful.
- It may be useful to set-up helping situations and relationships that require an intention of mutual learning and healing.
In what ways are you taking responsibility for what you are creating? Where are the edges where you move to blame, making yourself or others bad or wrong? Those edge places are our opportunities for healing and learning … we’re exploring those edge places and we hope you will as well …
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