Yes. A lot of people are not self-reflective though.

I do think there are always reasons for why I do things, but a reason is not an excuse or a free pass, it is just a flag of something I need to look at.

And other people, too. Someone at work is trying to walk on me and I do think there are reasons why she’s doing it. But those reasons are not excuses and she’s on the hook for her behavior even if she is not self-reflective enough to understand why.

Oh, but I just reread the article and I think what I consider a reason is different than what the article was talking about. I meant like emotionally, the reason why something triggers me or someone else to react.

That whole thing of getting caught up in the content (”she did this”) without reflectively asking why is a one-way ticket to a shitty life. It is a really common trait in addicts, I notice. Blaming others for your own shortcomings.

“a person is responsible for the action they take independent of the action of anyone else”

Exactly. I think the reverse of this is also true: a person is responsible for their lack of action independent of the lack of action of others!

llama - I agree. There is a difference between bad circumstances vs. emotional reasons. You can’t control the bad things that happen to you and cause you to mess up…but you can control the bad things you do voluntarily due to your emotions. We have choices after all!

I do take full responsibility, but I have a really hard time forgiving myself for my mistakes. If I do something WRONG in anger, I make myself pay for it forever. HOW DO YOU FORGIVE YOURSELF FOR MAKING BIG MISTAKES, without blaming anyone else or justifiying, how do you simply understand you were wrong and made a bad choice…. after all it’s not ok…. how do you negotiate the space between being human, and being sorry, esp. if there is nothing you can do to fix it… (never let it happen again) but so many mistakes are one chance one time only…. thoughts anyone?

This subject speaks directly with what I have been wrestling with the past while. I am very self reflective and I know that nothing is done to me without some engaging on my part since I am not insulated in a vacuum viewing the world.

The deal is a situation that has activated some very base qualities within me. Things I wanted to believe I had grown past or become evolved enough to look at dispassionately.

Obviously I have not and it is very painful dealing with rage, rejection and jealousy. It washes over me and I just go off spewing venom. I am really looking at it and analyzing deep at where is all coming from. How have I stuffed this down where I didn’t even see it festering? I have come face to face with my own emotion of hatred and I am demoralized. I am very much responsible for my actions, I have always known that since I was a small child. It has not prevented me from avoiding the negativity within me though.

I am praying this is the worst and I will crest and get on a solid path again. Loving detachment is a phrase that set off bells and whistles long long ago, and maybe this is to actually push me to find my way there.

I so relate to Daemoness. I was jealous of someone at a job who was getting favored. I mean, seething hatred jealous. So embarrassing.

For me, I was acting out the parental dynamic. I wanted the boss’s love (not in a sexual way) but she liked my coworker better. Exactly how as a child I thought my mother wished she had a different daughter. But simultaneously, I rebelled from their control and biting remarks, just like my father.

Once I understood that old archetypes (karmic even) were being unearthed and that this was really not about the job, it helped. I was still embarrassed as hell, but it helped. Just FWIW.

Generally speaking, yes, I take responsibility for my actions. I’m often oblivious to the things I do, however…but when pointed out to me, or when I become aware of them, I am usually very responsible & admit the error. Of course, I’m also prone to beating myself up for stuff…not sure why tho’

I like to think I take responsibility for what I do. With a Sun-Saturn conjunction trined Neptune, though, it’s really up in the air: I think I did yet others are unsatisfied or people credit me for taking responsibility for things I wasn’t aware of.

Most of what people see out of me, though, is my rage and I do, conscientiously, own that. Always.

Yes, and as some of the others have pointed out, probably to the Nth degree. It’s like the mirrors in the barbershop, in front of you an behind you so that your reflection goes on into infinity. Is there an end to responsibity or does it just go on forever?

I sure as hell do. I’m a Leo, and my integrity is important to me. Plus I have a lot of Libra (Moon, and Jupiter on Libra DSC), and as independent as I am, there’s that part of me that wants to be socially proper and acceptable. (The Aries ASC and Sun/Mars in Leo winced as I wrote that! )

OTOH, there’s this woman in my DH’s family, also a Leo, who barrels through life, not caring what she does or who she hurts. She steals, lies, cheats, on and on, and never took responsibility for anything she did. She gives Leos a bad name. Anyway, she has a Sun/Venus conjunction in Leo, both planets trine Jupiter, but they both opposite Saturn. This is the kind of person that gives easy trines like these a bad name. She’s misused them too much and too often. When Saturn catches up with her, I won’t be around to see the fallout–I disassociated myself from her years ago. I tel white lies here and there, to get people off my back, but never at the level that she does. I couldn’t live with myself. I have no idea how she does…or all the millions of self-unaware clods out there do.

omie - I relate. I take responsibility when i shouldn’t. When the other person is really taking advantage. Trying to learn to let go and not always feel as if I am doing wrong, or it’s my responsibility, or that everythign is my fault but that’s difficult.

I learned at an early age that everything was my fault. That’s left me with a fatalistic “well it needs doing, someone has to do it and if no one else does then the shit falls to me to do it”

Sadly that’s burned me out and left me quite bitter at a few jobs.

Am now working towards a more “bounded” self-employed life that I only have to take responsibility for MY commitments and the rest of teh world can go jump in a lake. Am also slowly teaching others that they cannot leave the mess for me to clean up and that they cannot commit me to something that I haven’t actually committed to.

Slow, frustrating progress. But still, you ask a very valid and difficult question omie…

thanks everybody,

I think for me, I do own my mistakes.
In my current situation I can’t have any resolution, the person doesn’t talk to me. Everyone thinks they are the bad guy, and just awful for not talking to me, no one has ever done this to me before, and if anyone had, I prob. would have not cared: I’m ok with having enemies, as long as I feel like I have done nothing wrong.

In this case they were awful, but I was not impecable, and when no one wants to hear your apology it is hard to have closure.

It is interesting, I forgave them right away, fully and completely (a first for me) We have sune moon and venus trine neptue in our composite chart,

AND

We have sun, moon, and venus sextile pluto in our composite, as well as pluto trine the asendant, as well as saturn square pluto and mars square pluto.

It was all a big deal. I felt more love for this person than I have ever felt in my life. (hey, at least I know I can feel it)

I am also going through my pluto square (’course)

and getting divorced from someone else

are you guys laughing at me yet? I’m laughing at myself.

It’s all about letting go for me, and not being the center of the universe.

Tough stuff and I work on it every day.

thanks everyone.

Omie, it sounds like you are doing your best.

Good luck.

Good post, Isthmus. Something I’ve always wondered about myself. Also your last sentence is bang on.