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Do you blame yourself for the ‘bad’ stuff in your life? The failures, mistakes, problems, challenges – it’s all because somewhere along the line, YOU messed up. You are to blame. Something about you is not good enough, you made a mistake, you were wrong, bad or incapable.
Maybe your kids aren’t doing that well at school, or you’re not earning enough money or you have problems with your health. Perhaps it’s just a general sense of not being where you want to be in life and you place sole responsibility for that on your own shoulders.
What about the good stuff? Do you like to sing your own praise? Do you like to talk about how great your life is because ‘you put in the work’? All those successes are because of your capability, your skills, your decisions – you made the right ones. So, your wins are also firmly on your own shoulders.
This is certainly a little more empowering than just blaming yourself for the bad stuff… however, it still misses an important piece of the puzzle which is: that your life is not all on you.
Individualistic thinking makes us forget the bigger, beautiful picture of life
Individualistic thinking says I make my life how it is. My life is all on me. If I just take the right actions and put in the work then it will all happen as I want it to. This is often taught as a very empowering message in the world of self help and motivation.
But it doesn’t account for the fact that none of us exist in complete isolation. All aspects of our lives are affected by other people, culture, society, systems, resources, past and present. Sometimes those things are in our favour and sometimes they’re not. And most of the time, they are not within our control.
So how can we say ‘it’s all on me’?
By far the biggest variable in our lives that I find is omitted is the presence of a divine creator. That which I call God.
So many of my life experiences have been way more beautiful, surprising, rich, complex and magnanimous than I could ever imagine, let alone create by my own mind or hand.
The way certain situations were knit together, serendipities, synchronicities, the gifts and the miracles… I got them, but I didn’t do them. The way I was carried through pain and provided for during tough times even when I couldn’t see a way through… I experienced it, but I didn’t do it.
That’s on God. That’s Grace. Grace is present in our lives. Perhaps we should make more room for it.
I’m not suggesting that you give up all personal responsibility
I’m not saying that we lay down like inanimate blobs and say ‘well, my life’s not on me then is it, it’s on God, or systems, or culture, or other people’.
You have power and effect in your life. We live in a universe of cause and effect and what you do has an impact, it generates results.
So we should take responsibility for our choices and actions. We must endeavor to do our best with what we have and where we are, and to do what’s in the highest good of all.
But we can’t control where the cards ultimately fall, or exactly when and how things come together or indeed, fall apart. Because there’s so much more at play here than you and me.
Perhaps there’s a finer art to life
A fine art that lies in the awareness of the beautiful interplay between you as an individual, a divine being with creative power, sovereignty, agency and impact, and:
- the whole of physical reality through all of space
- the whole of time through past, present and future
- and the ultimate Creator of it all – God.
When you see that you are part of this bigger, interconnected, beautiful picture, which we are both contributing to as well as receiving from, something that is within us and we are within it… how can you say ‘my life is all on me’? It just doesn’t do it justice.
Life is so much bigger than you
When you get this, life becomes lighter, freer and much more Graceful. You can let yourself off the hook – not in a lazy way, but because you realise that there’s so much more at play here.
And so, you don’t need to carry it all on your own shoulders. And you also can’t take full credit for all your wins. Your shoulders aren’t big enough either way.
I believe this is how we are meant to experience our precious time here on Earth. Not as individuals, alone, carrying a heavy load or lifting trophies above our singular heads. But as divine, interconnected beings, playing our role in a huge cosmic soup that spans all time and space, supported, guided and held, by God.
Would you take that… or, ‘it’s all on me’?
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