If I were to have words painted on the wall my office, it would probably be those. They were given to a group of us when we were in the midst of trying to problem solve through blame shifting(?!). The words immediately rang true; no matter how legitimate the excuses may be, we cannot change anything unless we believe we have ownership of the issue and our reaction to it.
You cannot change what you do not own.
Believing in the words commits us to step up to the plate and lay claim to the issues of the day. It is that ownership that give us power to change, edit, experiment and learn. Critical thinking allows us to explore the many facets that any issue invariably presents, including the recognition of the elements that are truly out of our control. When we explore an issue critically, however, we are usually fortunate enough to find that many of the items we thought were out of our control are indeed items to which we can lay claim.
So, how do we own the issues that previously seemed out of reach? Here's the thing: one of the most powerful levers that we can control (and we often conveniently forget this) is ourselves.
We can change the way we react to a situation or others. We can alter our expectations. We can expand our internal explanations for behaviors. We can improve the way that people respond to us by changing the way we interact with them. All of this, however, requires that we own all of the above and through that ownership we can alter both our own destiny as well as the destiny of others.
There is no personal power if one believes they cannot change. There is no hope in martyrdom. Blaming everyone else for the state of affairs is an abdication of responsibility as well as personality.
Conversely, if we grab hold and resolve ourselves to work for change for the better, then we have ownership.
And ownership is very, very powerful.
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My book "Courageous Questions, Confident Leaders" is available on Amazon Kindle.
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