Daily Mood Quote
Day 96 – August 7, 2011
You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.
~Abraham Lincoln
Funny thing about responsibility, it affects everyone; no one escapes. Sometimes, we have to be responsible for the actions of others, whether we choose to or not. It has a lot to do with the decisions we make and how late we enter the process. Sometimes, the last guy in is the one holding the bag. It isn't his bag and he had nothing to do with developing the bag, but he is the one who will ultimately be responsible for the bag. That is the choice we make when we Step-up and Step-in© and accept responsibility. How many of us have witnessed a job that was vacated, or left by an employee who was let go, who did not do the job they were assigned and the new employee is left holding the bag? They are stuck solving the problems. And, being the one who accepts the responsibilities for all their predecessor's decisions and actions. In some cases, the successor ends up losing the job, before ever having a chance to make a change and fix the mess. I guess that's the risk we take.
Winston Churchill said, “The price of greatness is responsibility.” From choosing to be a parent to choosing to run for the Presidency of the United States; people take risks. When people assume lead roles they not only assume responsibility for themselves, but for others and sometimes that includes those to which they have no connection to, or any control over. That is the price of responsibility and greatness.
In the movie Twister, Bill (played by Bill Paxton) said to Jo (Helen Hunt), “...Things go wrong. You can't explain it, you can't predict it...” The point is sooner or later everybody is faced with the responsibility to stop kicking the can down the road and do something before the “can” becomes the size of a tractor trailer, that is so far off in the ditch we can't even see the right road anymore. Just the direction from which we came, via the damage path. Yet, so many are quick to judge and quicker to criticize. The view from the cheap seats must be pretty good...(thanks Michael Douglas from the movie The American President). The world is full of Monday morning quarterbacks; from sports to politics, to business and family decisions, there is always going to be someone who is second-guessing. The fact is great people step up, assume the risk, accept the responsibility and try regardless. Sometimes, that means cutting a new, and often highly criticized, path back onto the right road. And the rest...well, they're the rest.
Will you be a quarterback on the field today or a critic tomorrow?
Tune it tomorrow to read the daily mood quote
Thank you for reading
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