On Responsibility.

Responsibility.

The word itself might as well be four-letter word for many of us. We avoid it's dooming claws, finding clever ways to dodge it like an oncoming football player.

The problem isn't in the nature of the word. By definition, it's an amazing word; respectable and worth embracing. The problem isn't in it's own definition; the problem is in ours.

We've demonized the term by associating it with negative experiences. The loss of free time due to working is "responsibility." The prudent managing of money due to loans and living is "responsibility."

These experiences are essential in life, much deserving of the term "responsibility."

Responsibility, however, has been vilified by those who fear it the most. When someone we know dodges not the "responsibilities" of life but the typical and expected career or personal path, we're quick to label him "irresponsible." We're quick to quarrel and concern ourselves with all of the ways he/she is being irresponsible, when really, what we're doing is absolving ourselves from our own failure to take the road less traveled.

When a high school friend chooses to attend a quirky out-of-state school rather than their parents' alma mater, how do we feel? When someone quits their promising desk-job to join the police academy, what do we do? When a co-worker quits to travel the world and start a non-profit organization in Beijing what do we say?

We call them irresponsible.

But we're jealous.

Pointing the finger is much easier to do from the security of an air-conditioned office.

We've been given the blessing of one earthly life in which we are charged with living boldly in the barracks of insecurity.

We're given passions and we're given skills and ideas and strokes of genius and we ignore them, trading them for the blessing of comfort and security.

To ignore these passions, I would argue, is being irresponsible.

Life is Epic. Come Alive.