Taking Responsibility
Life comes with responsibility. Life in Nature, the nature we are all made out of and part of, doesn’t hand out ‘rights’. The human world, or rather the people who run the human world, hand out ‘privileges’ to selected people, which they call ‘human rights’. Now it appears as if being human gives you certain rights within the human community. But it doesn’t stop there. Humans hand out rights to children and to animals too. I am currently wondering what the rights are of the runner beans in my garden! Is there an animal telephone help line, in the same way there is one for children? Why do we need ‘help lines’ with regards to rights we all have?
Human rights are rights given to humans by humans who have given themselves the right to hand out rights. There are serious restrictions on when those rights are applicable and whose rights are ‘superior’ when there is a conflict between human rights, like for instance between the right to free speech of one person and the right to free expression of another person. Is one person allowed to express himself in public the way he wants to while the other is not allowed to say anything about it, or is one person allowed to publicly disapprove of the way another wants to express himself, in which case the latter won’t be allowed to express himself freely? Which is it? But the Declaration of Human Rights goes further by adding the following:
“Article 29: In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.
These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.”
In other words, you are entitled to these rights as determined by law and as and when the situation concurs with what a democratic government and the United Nations decide is morally correct, is not disrupting public order and is for the welfare of the democracy. Now it appears to me as if giving every human being specific rights is going to be a source of permanent discussion and conflict. Two people exercising ‘the same right’ whereby the expression of that right are opposites are in conflict with each other, while neither is doing anything wrong. Hence, we are going to need a tribunal for Human Rights, people who are experts on the laws of human rights, to decide which of these two need to be punished. That means it is not a right of being human, but a right of being a good citizen.
Humanity has invented human rights so we no longer are focusing on responsibilities. Responsibilities we have as being part of nature as well as being part of a community.
Authorities of communities show us that we have the responsibility to stand up for our rights.
Responsibility is something that is your duty to deal with. Nowadays I hear a lot of statements connected to the idea ‘I have to’. These are statements I hear, both in conversations and out in the world, about all kinds of obligations people feel they have. There is a tendency to rely on obligation in how we approach events, jobs, and relationships with friends, family, and partners. Obligation is a way of saying, “I have no choice in the matter. I just have to do this and that’s that.” However, obligation also indicates a refusal of your responsibility for the choices you make, how you show up in relationships, and what you do and don’t do. It’s a way of dis-owning (rather than owning) your part in living out your values, wants, and needs. Hiding behind an obligation is to dodge responsibility. We don’t do things because we’re obligated; we do so because we choose to do them. That is how psychology approaches life, and that is why they tell you not to do ‘what you have to’ but to do ‘what you want to’.
However, when I look at the structure of life I am getting the feeling that I do not have much wriggle room. First there is my basic makeup, which is an expression of my genetic heritage. It is fixed, which means that I can only be myself, only live the life I have been designed for, only make the choices that are available to me. This is followed by a phase of intense and non-critical learning during the pregnancy and the early childhood life I am experiencing. This means that I only learn how my structure, my genetic makeup, can adapt in the best possible way to the outer circumstances that I specifically grow up in. Hence, I am limited in the reaction patterns my person learns and uses, so I am limited in the choices I have. And thirdly, the reaction patterns that have been prepared in my life, based on the possibilities my structure offers, function automatically in response to outer circumstances, which means that I do not have a conscious choice over them. Looking at this, it appears to me that my life is fixed within such limits that whatever my natural reaction is going to be, it is one that I can state that ‘I had to’ be like that or act like that. No conscious choice!
The one other factor to consider is the conscious choices that I can make. Remember the antennae on the cell membrane? There I have a choice. There I can decide ‘freely’ what to do. Indeed. But let’s not forget that in psychology and in neuroscience it is generally stated that 95% of our daily life is driven by the unconscious mind. I guess that means that almost everything that happens every day in your life, you respond to in the way that ‘you have to’. It has been fixed for you. On top of that, we need to be aware of the fact that the remaining 5% is what our conscious mind has learned mostly from formal education, which means that we are adopting beliefs and convictions that others want us to have. So, in a sense, one could say that even these choices are based on what you believe ‘you have to do’, based on the convictions and the truths of other people. No free choice!
The natural system of every living organism is obliged to try and keep that organism alive. So, every response it displays will be elicited by the circumstances and determined by the learned unconscious patterns of that specific organism. It has to respond in this manner because it is, undeniably, the best response for that specific organism. The unconscious mind takes its responsibility. It doesn’t exercise any right! This already shows that 95% of our own life, we, unconsciously, take responsibility for that life. And we do things because we have to. Our conscious mind, however, hasn’t been instructed by nature but by cognitive learning, by reasoning, by logic. Our conscious mind, interfering in our life for about 5%, has been instructed by other people. Now logic may also tell us what ‘we have to do’, even though it does not have the obligation to keep that human organism alive.
We consciously have learned what society wants us, needs us, to know. Social norms are the unwritten rules that guide how people are expected to behave in a group or society. Norms maintain social order, reduce conflict, and help groups coordinate behaviour by setting shared expectations. Breaking norms can lead to disapproval, embarrassment, stigma, or formal penalties depending on the severity of the violation. Learning the ideas of compliance, conformity, and obedience becomes crucial in a society where cultural laws and regulations influence human behaviour. Once you have learned to become compliant and obedient, your responses and interactions with your human environment will also become regulated, which means that you have to behave in a certain way. You are obliged to act the way society wants you to act, the way all members of that society have been instructed to act. Hence, there is no real freedom of choice within our conscious mind either!
Your natural, unconscious, system has the responsibility to keep you alive in the natural world.
Your conscious system has the responsibility to keep you alive, to let you integrate, in the human world.
How important are these? If we don’t follow the norms of our society, life within the group may become very difficult, the community may interfere more and more in our personal life and it may even lead to our death. We have to oblige, otherwise we will not be accepted by the community, by the rulers of the community. Equally, if we are not following the natural lead of life (the part that is trying to keep us alive), our personal life will become a struggle, will start to fall apart end we may die prematurely. We belong to nature and we have to behave in a natural way. You may have a choice to change your community. You cannot change into a different life. You cannot change the community you live in (unless they all want the same changes!), but you can look for a different type of community, somewhere else, somewhere under different circumstances. You cannot change nature. It is the source of life and life happens according to specific Laws of Nature.
When you follow your nature, you must act as your intuition intends.
When you follow your desires, feelings generated by your conscious cognitive knowledge, you believe you are following your intuition.
Study the Laws of Nature so you can learn to accept your personal responsibility for your own life. So you can learn how to work with Nature, as opposed to against it.
All events that are not ‘unnatural’, not against nature, are mandatory. It all happens and the eventual effect on the material part within the energy field is the net result of all possibilities at that moment in time. In other words, it has to be that way! Learning what that way is, over and over again, each moment anew, is accepting the way your life is, and taking responsibility for it. To your outside world, you then say: “This is my life, and I have to live it this way. And I am responsible for my part in the end result.”
Taking responsibility for your life is, in the first place, ‘owning’ your life. Acknowledge that even your unconsciousness is you. Accepting this is the starting point for your conscious contribution to your healing process.
