Taking Responsibility

“Freedom is the will to be responsible to ourselves”



Friedrich Nietzsche




I have a confession . I unfortunately as a lawyer purvey in the exact opposite .Trying to place some responsibility on others be it a driver , an employer or third party for the ills of my client.That is my job and there is a sea of grey in between the black and white of truth .

However there comes a time when I have to advise that it is no other persons fault or there is no fault just fate , pure mischance, an accident.

Similarly the latest financial and economic turmoil does  have culprits who must take responsibility or blame ( if they are ever called to account). Loosely it is the financial institutions in the US who packaged toxic products and misled the millions of institutions and individual clients/customers.The clients themselves for not making the necessary enquiries and trusting the advice they received.Many themselves were retirees and individuals who were not in a position to read the voluminous prospectus and even if they did they probably would not understand what they were purchasing. The whole chain of free market economics where people were misled with valuations and the whole economic dream that you can  get something from nothing.Valuations were always going to increase and no equity was necessary. If it is too good to be true then it is. The financial crisis in USA can also be squarely pointed at the liberal conservative view of market economics will sort itself out.Without regulation the market will always find the lowest common denominator which is always a recipe for a mess.So governments do have a responsibility to safeguard their citizens.

Buffett once said he never bought into a company he did not understand . Meaning he knew what they made or sold. He did not understand the Internet so never invested in the start up companies on the Internet. Similarly ,most people do not spend the time and energy looking at their finances and understanding them. In Australia, the majority of workers who have a superannuation fund do not take the responsibility to understand what their fund is doing.

I came across an interesting piece on the SMH titled , If you don't care about your investments , noone will

The bottom line is that you cannot avoid responsibility for your own financial affairs. You have to be involved because, as any financial professional will tell you, ''If you don't care, no one will.''
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/money/investing/if-you-dont-care-about-your-investments-no-one-else-will-20110819-1j1zu.html#ixzz1VlarNrlJ

Like all things in life a hard lesson to learn .In my training , I can lean on a Coach and I can get all the advice in the world but what I make of that advise , what I do each day , how I train and apply myself are all decisions I make.As they say the buck stops with me.