When you take up responsibility, a cognitive shift happens in you. Your mental setup changes.

Many of us live life like slaves. For example, if you work eight hours in your office just following orders you will feel dull and tired. Instead, if you take up responsibility and initiative, that same eight hours will become much easier and more enjoyable. For example, take the case of a person who is running his own business and another person who is working for a company. The owner of the business has the full responsibility of his business, but the person who is working for some other company does not really feel the full responsibility. If he does not feel the responsibility, the whole job becomes like a burden on him. There is little or no self-motivation. He keeps looking at his watch to see if it is time to leave! For him, only the first of every month is sweet, since it is payday! In a month, he sacrifices twenty nine days of his life for one day of joy.

A sense of personal responsibility can help turn around any situation. A sense of personal responsibility can achieve great things. When you stand up with responsibility, you become a solid force. Until then, you remain a burden for yourself and for others.

We often think that we are in an ordinary job. We wonder why we should take up more responsibility when our higher authorities at work are not doing so. Let me tell you, in an office, when a janitor does all his duties perfectly, he will inspire people. You see, the head of the organization has to be responsible. No credit is given to him for that! But someone in a lesser position demonstrating such responsibility is a true inspiration.

Ramakrishna Paramahamsa beautifully says, ‘A sannyasi has to think of god. No credit is given to him for it. A samsari is given credit every time he thinks of god! When a sannyasi forgets god even for a moment, it is a sin; whereas, when a samsari thinks of god even for a moment, it is a great thing.’

In the same way, a leader has to be responsible. No credit is given to a leader for being responsible. If a janitor is responsible, he can inspire an entire institution. There is a greater chance of people at a lower post inspiring others through their sense of responsibility than people at a higher level doing so. So don’t wait to get some authority to become responsible. Secondly, don’t think that you are in a lesser post, and therefore you need not be responsible. Thirdly, allow the cognitive shift to happen in you. Allow a change in the mental setup to happen in you.

Currently, your mind is in a state of mithyam, lost in the illusionary, the unreal. Your mind is constantly searching for worries and sorrow in the outer world. If you deeply analyze yourself, you will realize that if you are intensely enjoying yourself, you are suddenly engulfed with a feeling of fear that there is nothing to worry about. Then, immediately you start thinking of things to worry about. You feel that you have lost something, and you start re-collecting all your worries. Mithyam means to go in search of sorrow and the ephemeral, going in search of that which is not there. We have to change the state of the mind from mithyam to nithyam, to the eternal, to the present moment. This is called the cognitive shift.

This will happen when you stand up, saying that you are responsible. If you stand up with this feeling for just 24 hours, things that were lying unfinished, things for which you blamed others, will get finished. Your entire life will change and blossom with a new sense of happiness. A new kind of ecstasy will engulf you. You will become a natural leader. Life will become a celebration!

There is a beautiful story about Buddha. It is said that when Buddha went to beg, He would appear like a king, and the kings who gave Him alms would appear like beggars! Appearing like a beggar or a king is not because of your status or the property that you own. It is because of the state inside you. When you take up responsibility for the entire cosmos, you will expand and look like a leader, you will become a leader. Even if a leader sits on his throne and does not take responsibility, but instead points his finger at others for responsibility, he will appear small. The state is that which gets the status, the status can never get the state. The state of Nithyananda is different from the status of Nithyananda.

source: Living Enlightenment