Responsibilities are the things that are breaking me up right now, apparently. All Gina and I talk about comes back to responsibilities I have, real or imagined. I never saw myself that way – and I still don’t, to be honest – and having always thought that being able to accept a responsibility is a good thing, it’s hard to hear that i should do less of it. Taking less responsibilities is akin to being less altruistic, I feel. Also, it’s not like I have been the most responsible person over the last decade – I have done some dumb things that, if I had a chance to do it all over again, knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t do. I guess that taking on responsibilities doesn’t necessarily mean you posses the wisdom to handle them. I suppose my ability to take on a task is also not a trivial consideration, otherwise you end up doing what I do; running around exerting a lot of energy, spending a lot of time, and in the end not really helping or pleasing anyone. It’s also a bitter pill to swallow, knowing that you tried to do what you could, with the best intentions and that it only ended up disappointing people, some to the point where they want nothing to do with you any more. You know what they say about best intentions, the road to hell and all that.
Like I said, I still haven’t accepted this as gospel truth yet, and I think it might take me a while before the horrible weight of it has sunken in, but that happens, I should make some changes in preparation. I should learn how to say no. More to myself rather than to others. I should make my life just a little easier by not accepting so many challenges since I have enough of them already without making it worse trying to take on new ones. Simplify and focus.
