Responsibility

One of the things which interests me, is the way we humans are so intent on taking responsibility for other people's emotional well-being.

We delay making the changes in our lives we know we need and want, because we imagine our loved ones will be devastated and destroyed. So instead of giving them the chance to grow and change, we sabotage our own growth.

Now is this protecting ourselves from emotional fall-out? Is it a passive/aggressive martyr thing? Is it a misguided but essentially well-meaning desire not to hurt anyone? And for those on a spiritual path it can be from a belief that it is their duty not to cause ripples, make someone uncomfortable or follow our own ‘selfish’ desires.

One of the hardest realisations but also one of the most rewarding is that we aren’t responsible for anyone else’s emotional well-being or any of their reactions to anything we do.

This isn’t a license to deliberately cause pain, but a truth - that we cannot control (nor should we seek to) what another person does or thinks.