Get Off Your Butt, America!

                                                         CHAPTER FOUR
                                   WHAT ABOUT PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY?

“You must be the best you can be FOR YOURSELF before you can be any good to anyone else.”

           Read that statement a few times.  Do you believe it?  There is some element of selfishness in it, isn’t there?  That statement also covers a lot of ground to include becoming the best you can be mentally, spiritually, and physically.  It may even trounce on some toes if you take it a step farther to mean “don’t make any children until you can first take care of yourself”, but that’s another whole book for a different day.

            Who is “anyone else” in that statement above?  They would be your spouse, your children, your co-workers, and your friends.  For all you liberal-minded “world-ists”, it would also include all of your fellow world inhabitants traveling round and round the sun on this little rock called “Earth”.

            Your spouse looks to you as his or her partner in life’s work to make a better home, a safe refuge, and a warm nest for the family unit. He or she looks to you to provide the necessities and the little extras once those necessities are met.  Don’t forget about love and the other emotional components that make the spousal relationship complete.

            Your children look to you to provide the blueprint for life’s construction. What more important job is there in the world than that? If you show them that you do the right things to take care of your own mind and body, then it follows that they will do those things for themselves in order to emulate you.  Those “right things” will become part of their routine.  Their lifetime habits of diet and exercise are established in childhood just as their habits of achievement, manners, and use of language. Our daughters see my wife and me exercise regularly in our home gym.  They try some of the exercises themselves and even invent little exercises and routines of their own.  They clearly understand that regular exercise is a normal and necessary part of life’s activities.  One of our girls is an avid softball player. The other one wouldn’t give you a plug nickel for the sport, yet she is constantly on the run playing this or that. She’s also a cheerleader and goes to gymnastic cheerleading clinics and camps.  The point?  They like to do different things to get their exercise.

            Your coworkers depend on you everyday to show up and do your part, shoulder your load, and earn your place, which allows the entire work operation to run smoothly.  When one person is unable or unwilling to do that, the entire business suffers.  Others have to pick up that slack in addition to doing their own jobs, which causes resentment and affects workplace harmony.

            If you are physically, mentally, and spiritually unable to do your job, then you are a drain and a detriment to everyone else. Even if you have good reasons, it eventually gets to the point where others don’t care what those reasons are once your absence or disability is a regular thing and seemingly a daily event.  They only know that their work day is harder, and they have to do more because of your absence. They only hear “Well you know Jimmy’s not gonna be here again today because of his blah-blah-blah-blah.” They don’t give a rip what’s contained in the “blah-blah-blah” portion. They just know that they’re going to have to take their work up a notch or two because ONCE AGAIN JIMMY AND HIS VERY LAME ASS CALLED IN SICK.  And today’s employers know if they trim away that deficit (Jimmy) in the workforce, a lawsuit will probably follow, so everyone has to put up with it. The company’s “human  resources” department will have to go through that 3-step foolishness and document everything from here to Kingdom Come about “Jimmy’s” absences.

            Everyone gets sick or has a family situation that requires absence from time-to-time.  However, since many of the chronic conditions which affect one’s ability to work regularly and effectively are self-induced as described before, the overall economic impact on our society is extremely significant.