The 8 Aspects of Personal Accountability. Embrace Them & Reach Your Full Potential

Don’t you hate it when someone tells you what to do? We want to “be our own boss”  and “do it ourselves”. That’s what personal accountability is, right? Not at all! Many people don’t realize that the “do it myself by myself” mindset diminishes your chances for outstanding success, and it ignores the remarkable advantages of mentoring, accountability partnerships, and the buddy system.

Being extremely independent may sound appealing but it can lead to control issues, a victim mentality, an inability to let go, difficulty in delegating, distrust, or stifled creativity and productivity. On a continuum where independence and dependence are the extremes, interdependence is often the more realistic and balanced stance. When you open up to creating an awesome support network, you’ll finally feel free to blossom into the person you’re meant to be.

What does personal accountability mean?

Personal accountability means you are in charge of and responsible for your life. No one can live your life for you. Therefore, it’s your responsibility to seek out how to be the best YOU possible. Don’t settle! 

Personal accountability encompasses these eight aspects:

1. Suspend judgment: Assess or view a situation objectively, seeing what happened, why it happened and learning from it, and moving on with greater self-knowledge. Judgment is labeling yourself (winner/loser, smart/stupid, worthy/unworthy), which isn’t helpful. Avoid defining your worth or identity based on a situation. 
2. Practice mindful self-awareness: Slow down and mindfully engage all your senses. This shifts your energy. It moves you from a place of fear, anxiety, avoidance, or doubt, to a place of observation, acceptance, and empowerment.
3. Make intentional choices: Pinning all your hopes on a desired outcome limits possibilities, keeps you in your comfort zone, and sets you up for disappointment. Adopt intentions in tune with your values, i.e., I am thrilled to see where this takes me, and no matter what happens, I will be loyal/kind/at peace.
4. Empower yourself: Practice self-care compassionately and with self-discipline, as you become fully aware of and understand your body/mind/spirit connection.
5. Keep your self-commitments: We’re being disloyal to ourselves if we choose to allow the requests of others to cause us to act in a neglectful or harmful way. Learn to verbalize your self-commitments to others, so they can support us. 
6. Own the consequences: Victims blame others. We mustn’t take ourselves too seriously. Taking personal responsibility for the good and the bad is one of the most empowering things you’ll ever do. Only then can you shape your future. Consider this: the word responsibility is made up of two words…response and ability. You get to choose how you respond.
7. Exercise resilience: Keep in mind that our thoughts and feelings are formed from where we’ve been rather than where we are. It’s like we’re always using an outdated operating system to understand our present reality. Flexibility is so important. Emotional discomfort is a part of the human experience, which we can learn to embrace.
8. Shape yourself somatically: Your shape is the totality of your experience. It’s the story you’ve collected about yourself, other people, and the world. Make sense of your story, understand where you come from and what you believe, and how your emotions are showing up in your body. 

It’s up to you to build a network that fully nurtures your potential. Whether you hire a Mentor Coach to achieve a certification,  reach out to a business accountability partner, or take advantage of the buddy system in a personal endeavor like weight loss, you spark a combination of competition, accountability, and support that often ensures outstanding success.

How Mentoring, Accountability Coaching, or the Buddy System help you build the life you want…

Accountability partners listen to your plans for change and help you fine-tune them. They don’t “take over” but support you as you control your goals. They encourage you and help you connect to your strengths and original intention, offering praises as you achieve milestones toward your goal. (As you read this, are there one or two persons coming to mind? Excellent! These are potentials for your support network.)

Five ways to make personal accountability work for you…

Ask someone for help when you want to accomplish something worthwhile, and you can’t do it alone. Here are some tips that keep the buddy system working well…

1. Write out your big goal and action steps. This gets your thoughts outlined so you can clearly communicate them to your Mentor/buddy. She needs to know what you expect from her. Make sure you include your reason(s) why this goal is important to you, your schedule for accomplishing each step, and potential roadblocks that might get in the way of your progress.

2. Get on the same page. If you need support weekly, but your buddy is only available monthly, the relationship will be off balance and won’t be sustainable.

3. Limit the commitment. Deadlines create greater productivity by keeping the momentum going and motivation high. Plus it’s good to remember your buddy has limited time and resources to spend with you.

4. Set benchmarks. Progress must be measurable. Losing two pounds in a week, writing 50 pages in a month, or making three business calls per day are measurable by quantity within a specified time frame. Be sure to create realistic goals that keep you moving toward your ultimate accomplishment.

5. Be consistent. Whether you meet in person or check in via phone call, email, or text, consistency is the key to success. Make sure it’s often enough to be helpful, but not so often as to become burdensome. To respect the time limit for each call, have a specific list of questions that enables you to gauge your progress. Also, have a contingency for times when you need extra support.

While you should take your partnership seriously, don’t forget that the aim of a good accountability relationship is to make goal achievement a lighthearted experience. And in the process, you may forge a friendship that lasts a lifetime. Do you want to add me to your support network? Feel free to contact me about a 30-minute free consultation. Let’s talk about what you hope to accomplish. 

Thank you for the photo Prateek Katyal