Some reflections concerning life: 2.- Being Protagonist

Created by:

Carlos Lasserre

I was lucky to hear once, this revealing example that now I want to share with you: A teacher asked a student to hold a book in his hands as much time as possible. After a while, and the difficulty of keeping holding the book, the student dropped it. The teacher held up the book and asked the class: "Why the book fell?". A student answered: "Because my classmate dropped it." "Well," said the professor. "Anyone else?". "Yes, because law of gravity." "Okay," said the teacher, and then complements "The correct answer is actually both". The book would not have fallen if we do not let it fall, but neither if there were no law of gravity.

This means that there are variables that are endogenous, that is, we can control, such as dropping the book. And others are exogenous, we can not control, such as the law of gravity. This is based on the main difference between the protagonists and victims. The first ones focus on what they can change, and second ones, what they can not. And as they can not change it, they victimize themselves. "You do work in getting strong to hold the book for longer, let someone else to take charge of gravity".

There is a saying that contributes another key to this concept, Denis Waitley says: "There are two great alternatives in life: to accept conditions that exist or to accept the responsibility for changing them."

The magic word in this sentence is "responsibility". A feature of the protagonists is that they take responsibility for what happens around their lives, and therefore they attributed themselves the power to modify it. Victims usually do the opposite, by handing over responsibility of what happening to others, giving all the power they need to acquire to modify it.

Once we follow through with the concept, we begin to see life from another perspective. It is likely there are many things in life that we can not control, but the success that we get in our plans is not hidden behind that playing cards we've got, but is in what we do with them. Change the "Why?" With "What for?". But to get there, you must first be in the game and play it. This increases our chances of altering the outcome and make it our own, much more than if we only are dedicated to being spectators and complaining. There is nothing worse than carry other's people failures.

It's important to specify that the protagonist's life usually involves to carry the decisions' weight and are not always easy or have a happy ending, since the counterpart of responsibility is sacrifice. And the victim normally either does not make decisions or is carried away by others' decisions, in this constant struggle to dodge responsibility. Well then you must remember not making a decision is in fact making a decision indeed and therefore brings a consequence, and not taking responsibility does not mean not having it.

Two practical examples to develop this subject:

Example 1:

Prepare a list of everything you don't like your life, and in a second column write down the reasons. Then in a third column, write down a specific action you can take to modify the aspects you don't like. After you finish the third column, erase the second one. For example: "I have not traveled enough," then "I can't afford it, because I don't get well paid at my job," and finally "I promise to save x% each month to get it." In a fourth column records a commitment date. This turn the dream into a target.

Example 2:

Prepare a list of everything you achieved and consider important in life, and in a second column write down all the actions you did to get them. One tip: once the list of Example 2 is completed, recheck the list of Example 1. Surely new ideas  will appear to complete the third column. We are our best example.