One of the most beneficial lessons I have learned in 14 years of martial arts training is the ability to hold myself accountable for my actions.  This was no easy feat.  In fact, it required a complete mindset change for me.  For a long time I wasn’t living up to my potential as a leader and mentor because it was far too easy to blame my failures and mistakes on my circumstances, or worse, on someone else.  If you have the mindset of a victim, then nothing is your fault.  Every bad decision you make is easy to write off with the comfort of “It’s what anyone would have done!” But how far will that perspective get you?  From my own experience I can tell you that you will lose a lot of respect if you go down that road.

There are two ways of thinking when it comes to Responsibility. The first is The Victim.  If you are a victim, your life will revolve around what others can do for you, and when things don’t go as planned, it is never your fault.  No great leader ever settled for this mentality.  Would you ever follow someone who constantly blamed their mistakes on someone else? Or would you begin to lose any respect you had for them? That is the question I asked myself when it came time to change my worldview.

The second mindset is The Warrior. The Warrior acknowledges that every action they make bears consequences, whether good or bad. But more than that they recognize that when it comes time to face those consequences, it is far better to deal with them directly, and own up to their part in it.  The Warrior uses consequences as a time for learning and personal growth.  As soon as I made the change to the Warrior mentality, I realized that I had put aside childish things and started to become a responsible adult.  But I never could have made that switch by myself.  It was a result of the influence of my mentors: my parents, Coach Epps, and Coach Jessie.