1: Mountain? What Mountain?
What you don’t know can indeed hurt you. Obliviousness is a way of sidestepping accountability and keeps you from your potential. In their “Satisfaction Wheel” exercise, Salem and Robert provide a simple way to combat obliviousness by taking account of the areas of your life in which you are not satisfied.
2: You Didn’t Tell Me I’d Need Hiking Boots!
How often do you accept blame? We all like to point our fingers at traffic, or our bosses, or the weather for why things are hard but, ultimately, are we willing to point to ourselves? We must take ownership of our realities or continue to be at the mercy of external forces. The “What-Now Tool” and “Tracking Blame” resources show readers how to rise above the crutch of blaming the world for our problems.
3: My Gear Is Heavy!
Where would you be without excuses? Excuses and blame are two sides of the same petty coin. Excuses enable you to say that everything bad, or inconvenient, or limiting is essentially deserved—you aren’t smart, talented, or good enough to have better things happen. This victim mindset robs you of the tantalizing things at your fingertips. “I Can’t Because I’m Not …” is an exercise designed to flesh out the juicy excuses you love to keep you from your goals and determine “Is this fixed or can I affect change?”
4: I’ll Never Get Up This Slope
When faced with a challenge, the easiest solution is giving up. Sometimes, we see an obstacle, take stock of what we think our abilities are, and conclude that it would be impossible. Not trying is often a solution we accept. In reality, you’ve just reached the Valley of False Accountability. From quitting smoking to the Four-Minute Mile, there are challenges that people took as impossibilities. Yet people can and do break through these obstacles. When you give up without so much as an attempt, you are lying to yourself to let yourself off the hook. The “Build Your Own Dream” exercise gets readers to take the first step towards conquering that insurmountable boulder in their way.
5: I’ll Wait for the Helicopter
Waiting and thinking things will get better rarely gives us the results we want. They tend to get worse. Making minimum payments or a credit card, ignoring red-flags in your marriage and health, or thinking other people will fix your issues are all waiting and hoping. And that doesn’t work. Be radically honest with yourself and let others see your efforts to find out what you can do to move ahead.
6: Crossing the Ravine
The path forward from here requires a leap of faith. Like crossing on a rickety old ladder across the chasm. This is coming face to face with the fact that if you want to change things in your life, you’re going to have to do something different. This is where you tell yourself “Nobody Cares…until I do.” It’s also where you move from being a victim and start the journey toward a victorious life.
7: Start The Climb
The climb begins with a consideration of reality. You probably think you have a handle on the reality of your life. You likely feel that you can define your reality clearly and accurately. You might be wrong. Before you can begin this climb up Accountability Mountain you need to learn to view yourself 100% objectively. Because until you do, reality will elude you as only your version of reality will be within reach.
8: I Can See The Valley Below
This is the point in your climb up Accountability Mountain that might bring you to your knees. You might feel battered and broken, asking yourself “Why am I doing this?” So, it’s time to make a decision. If you want to keep going or even stay at this height on the Mountain, you will need to work. And let’s be clear—staying put is alright. By this stage in your journey, you’ve taken ownership of your life. The question from here is, are you willing to do the work you need to get to the next level?
9: The Final Ascent
The summit is within reach, but you have hard work ahead. During the final ascent, you will stop fighting reality and embrace it. That means recognizing and acknowledging the things in your life that you aren’t satisfied with, accepting them, and taking the action to improve them. Those things are no longer subjects of blame, but problems that you can solve on your path to a life of satisfaction. Keep climbing!
10: Reaching the Summit
By the time you’ve actually reached the summit of the Accountability Mountain, the hard part is done. You’ll know you’ve reached the top when you start to do exactly what you say you’re going to do. And that’s transformational. When you do what you say you’re going to do you’re being your truest self, and people trust that you will be true to them as well.
11: Falling Down
It’s impossible to stay on top of the mountain forever. You’re going to screw up and fall down. Everyone does. When it comes to failure, it’s not a question of if, but when. So, even though you’ve reached the top of the Accountability Mountain, be prepared to fall, but always remember, falling isn’t permanent as long as you never quit.
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The Journey to Accountability
Having the life you really want is like a journey up a mountain. We call this the Accountability Mountain in our book Nobody Cares…until you do. Click the begin button below to navigate through each chapter of our book.
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