You Cannot Change What You Refuse To Own

Someone else doesn’t have to “give you your life back.” That’s the uncomfortable, freeing idea we’re wrestling with today: who is writing the story of your life, especially after a major life transition you didn’t choose?

We walk through the Next Baseline C2R2E methodology and land in the fourth phase, reclamation, where everything starts to get real. We make a crucial distinction between blame and ownership. You may not be responsible for every chapter that happened to you, and not everything is your fault. But you are responsible for the chapter you’re about to write. If your future depends entirely on someone else changing, you’ve handed them the pen. And if your peace depends on the past being different, your peace stays trapped behind you.

We get practical about what an ownership mindset looks like in ordinary moments: keeping promises to yourself when results are slow, having the difficult conversation, setting healthy boundaries, choosing discipline over distraction, apologizing when you’re wrong, forgiving when you’re ready, and getting back up after setbacks. These small decisions compound over time and return influence to your life. We close with four reflective questions you can sit with this week to stop waiting and start creating your next baseline.

If this helps you, share it with a friend who feels stuck, and subscribe so you don’t miss what comes next. Leave a review and tell us: where do you need to pick the pen back up?

Transcript

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Who Is Writing Your Life

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Who is writing the story of your life? And I think that's a fair, simple, but powerful question. And I think it may be one of the most important questions that we can ever answer for ourselves. Because as I think about that question, I often think about what happens after a major life transition. And I think it's easy to believe, depending on what that situation was, that we can sometimes feel someone else is holding the strings or is holding the pen to our very lives. And maybe, and I think many of us can resonate with this, perhaps we felt it was a former spouse, girlfriend, boyfriend, partner. Perhaps we feel that it was a past employer, a family member. Perhaps it was a difficult childhood, a betrayal, a medical diagnosis that we were not preparing for, or even a decision that we just never saw coming. And what's crazy and interesting is life has a way of handing us chapters that we would have never chosen for ourselves. And here's the thing. Eventually, every transition reaches and it's going to reach a turning point, just like seasons in life. A season in life, or seasons like any in a year from winter to spring to summer to fall for those that are fortunate enough to experience all those different seasons, those come to stay, and we know when they're coming, and then eventually they're going to go and they're going to transition. And the same is true for our lives. There's always going to be a turning point at some point in time. And it doesn't mean that's when life becomes easier. And it doesn't mean when turning points happen that all the pain that we are experiencing, whether it's physical, physical pain or emotional pain, is going to, it doesn't mean it's going to disappear. But when we ask ourselves, who's going to write the next chapter of our lives, that is exactly what we are going to explore and talk about today.

The Next Baseline Framework Recap

SPEAKER_00 2:40

So with that, welcome back to another episode of the next baseline. I'm Danny DeJesus, and this is the podcast where we explore one central and key question, and that is what do we build now to reach our next baseline? So as a recap, we spent the last several episodes walking through the C2R2E methodology: collapse, confrontation, realignment, and then the rest is reclamation elevation. We haven't gotten to elevation yet. We're still working through this, and where we're at even today is on reclamation. So again, as a recap, we started with talking about collapse. And collapse showed us the signal that something wasn't working in our lives as planned. It was data for our lives. It was a signal that just like a check engine light, something needs further investigation and something we need to explore. Confrontation, phase two, challenged us to honestly face our lives with the reality in which it is in, to be brutally honest about the phase and the place that we're at in life. And it asks us to be brutally honest with ourselves. Phase three, realignment. Realignment invited us to slow down, to pause to create space and examine the values that will shape our next baseline. And so today we now enter the fourth phase: reclamation. And I believe this is where everything begins to change, where we start to see everything, all the work that we have done up until this point, start to take shape. Because understanding your life is one thing. But this is where we're going to talk about taking ownership. And that is a completely different thing altogether. That is a different mindset. And taking ownership, the act of taking ownership is active. Understanding you have time to sit, reflect, to ponder. And so when we went from collapse to confrontation to realignment, there's just a lot of cognitive processing that happens there. But in reclamation, there's something very active about reclaiming. It's a verb. We are here to reclaim. Okay. So with that, let's let's move on. Let's let's dive deep

Ownership Is Not Blame

SPEAKER_00 5:40

here. So the difference between, we're going to dive into the difference between blame and ownership and what that means. So before we go any further, I want to make a what I feel is a very important distinction. Ownership is not the same as assigning blame. You're not responsible, which is which is often true for a lot of us. We're often not responsible for everything that has happened to us. People make choices, relationships end, companies downsize, life changes, unexpected circumstances interrupt our plans, some chapters are written plainly without our permission. And here's the thing C2R2E, collapse, confrontation, realignment, reclamation, elevation, this methodology has never suggested otherwise. But while you may not be responsible for every chapter that you've lived, while you may not be responsible for every chapter that has transpired in your life, and I want to give that to you, and I want to acknowledge that. Not everything is your fault. However, you are responsible for the chapter that you are about to write for yourself. And I think that's the shift. Because you can't change what you refuse to take ownership of. And throughout my life, I've come to believe this very thing I'm about to tell you. Something that has shaped the way I coach, the way I live, and what I teach, what I impart to people. You cannot change what you refuse to own. As long as your future depends entirely on someone else changing, your future is always going to belong to someone else. As long as your peace depends entirely on your past being different, your peace remains trapped in the past. As long as every answer that you can come up with begins, if they would just fill in the blank, you would have handed someone else the pen, and the authorship of your life. And reclamation is a decision to pick it back up. This is where your personal agency returns. So let's focus on for a moment what it means to become the author of your life.

Questions That Shift You Forward

SPEAKER_00 8:29

What does that actually look like? And I think it looks like asking several different questions. So instead of asking why did this happen to me, it may be more beneficial to explore and to begin asking, what am I going to build from here? And then instead of asking who's responsible for for where I am, instead, you can begin asking, what responsibility is mine today? And notice the difference there. One question is going to keep you keep you looking backward. And again, that question is, why did this happen to me? That's going to keep you looking backward. But the other question is going to begin to help you look forward. Not because the past no longer matters. You know, a lot of us get held up in the past. And here's the thing, I'm guilty of that too. It's not sometimes the letting go of the past is not easy, and I'm not asking you to forget it. Because we still need to understand our own histories so that we're not doomed to repeat it. Understand what went well, understand what didn't go well, and understand everything in our past are lessons to be learned that we can apply in the writing of our next chapter. So I'm so again, I'm not saying that the past doesn't matter. But your future deserves attention as well because the decisions that you make today is going to be the present that you will live tomorrow. So with that, when you're able to take ownership of your life 100%, whether you created a certain situation or not, it is going to help you create influence for your future. And one of the greatest gifts of ownership is that it returns influence to your life. When everything is someone else's fault, everything is also someone else's solution. But the moment you can begin to own your response and your decisions, your habits, your mindset, and your values, you begin to reclaim influence. You may not control everything. And here's the thing: none of us do. None of us can control absolutely everything in our external environment. But I think you begin and you can focus on what you can shape. And here's the thing: you can you can shape everything that has to do with you. You can shape and control your character, you can shape what it looks like. You can be deliberate about your choices, your routines, your relationships, your integrity, and your next step. And for some people, you're gonna tell me, well, that person, there's a person in my life that can consistently triggers me. Well, you can train yourself to take a different approach. You can walk away, you can end that interaction. Now there's more nuance to that. The point is there are alternatives available. And so when we're able to shift to that mindset, that mindset of ownership, I think that's where change, real change, is actually possible.

Reclamation As A Daily Practice

SPEAKER_00 12:27

And here's the thing: this process of reclamation, it's an everyday practice. It's not a one and done. It's an everyday, it's a lifestyle, it's a way of being. However, I do believe it does happen in the everyday ordinary moments. And here's what I mean. You keep the promise you made to yourself. You know, that that reminds me of New Year's resolutions when people make these resolutions in terms of what they're going to change and what they're going to do moving forward. A lot of it, a lot of New Year's resolutions, you hear people saying, I'm going to lose 10, 20 pounds, whatever it is. I'm going to get on a fitness routine. I think that's a lot of the New Year's resolutions that I think I tend to hear at the beginning of the year. But truth be told, a lot of people fall out from that because they're not seeing results right away. And here's the thing: reclamation, just as I mentioned, it's about keeping those promises. And sometimes those keeping those promises, you're not going to receive results tomorrow. But it's important that you keep that promise to yourself. You know, another point to ponder is you can have the difficult conversation. And that's not going to be easy. But having difficult conversations and being able to handle the difficult moments in life, the better that we can get at that, the more comfortable that we can get at doing that and practicing that, the better we're going to be. Because by not facing the difficult, you're only going to kick the can down the road. You know, something else, you establish the healthy boundary, whether that's with yourself or with somebody else. Only you can define, and I would encourage you to take some time to think what are healthy boundaries? Are you the type of person that reacts more than you should? Anything, any little thing that triggers you. So understanding and being aware of what boundaries are for you, but then also for another person, you know, there might be some value there. Next is you choose discipline over distraction. And we live in a world where we can be easily distracted by our phones and the technology that's available. There's so much tech nowadays that we can't even unplug. And so working on our discipline to do the things that we need to do, whether we like them or not, but we do them despite whether we feel inspired or motivated. Because a lot of times, here's the thing inspiration and motivation, those are short-lived. But developing disciplined habits is what's going to carry you moving forward. Also, you know, moving on here, you can also apologize when you're wrong. And a lot of us are guilty of this where we refuse to apologize when we're wrong because we don't want to appear weak, or maybe the ego takes, you know, the ego has the best of us. But again, we have to let that part of ourselves die. And we have to acknowledge if we're wrong, we're wrong. And there's power in apologizing. That doesn't make you a weak person. And here's the thing: I'm not telling you anything that I haven't navigated through myself or that I struggle with on a on a regular basis as well. And there's days that I have to even fight with myself to do the right thing. So, again, going back to what I said earlier is that reclamation is an everyday practice. The other piece here is you forgive when you're ready. And a lot of us live in a lot of unforgiveness, thinking that the person that we can't forgive, just remember they're out there living their own lives and they could probably care less whether you forgive them or not. Forgiveness is for you. So part of reclaiming your life is the ability to forgive. If you cannot forgive, it's going to affect you more than the other person. So think about that. You don't have to forget what they did. But for your own sake, there may be something beneficial for you and your own mental health and your own ability to move forward. And you can achieve that by forgiving. You know, I'm going to use this. It may sound cliche, and you've heard about you may have, may or may have not heard about this before, but unforgiveness is like a poison that you drink, hoping that the other person would die. You're going to die before that person does. So just something to think about. You know, next up here, you know, you get you get back up after a setback. And here's the thing: life is built on collapsible moments. I have the saying that, you know, life is built on collapsible moments. And and that's just a universal truth. You're not just going to have one major setback in your life. You know, I created this whole C2R2E framework for life transitions because transitions happen every single day in life, and they don't necessarily have to be loud like divorce. They can just be, I'm not happy with my life today. And it's not anything externally wrong with your life per se, doesn't collapse. It's not always like that. It can just be you you want something different, but you don't know what it is. So, so again, setbacks don't have to be super loud, they can be really quiet moments. But the point is what matters at the at the end of the day is what you do to get back up and to keep moving forward. And overall, when we look at these situations, you know, whether we're talking about ordinary moments, promises to ourselves, difficult conversations, healthy boundaries, discipline, apologizing, forgiving, learning to get back up, or how to navigate setbacks. Every one of those moments, I think, says the same thing. I'm going to take ownership of my life. And those moments compound over time. And not because they're anything extraordinary, but because they're consistent. And when you have consistency in your life, those are going to amount to big wins in the future over the span of time. Consistency plus time is one, it's just one equation for success out of many out there. So now, as we begin to think about being consistent, you know, I think it's a good segue to talk about creating.

Create Instead Of Waiting

SPEAKER_00 19:59

Creating instead of waiting. And this is where I believe the methodology of C2R2E really begins to shift in a very powerful way. Because up until now, we've been learning a lot about observing, reflecting, understanding. But now we are in a place where we can begin creating. And not because we're finally have some sort of certainty, and not because we're no longer afraid or afraid of the unknown, but because we accept something important. And that is no one else can build our next baseline for us. People can support us, they can encourage us, they can love us, they can teach us, and they can even walk beside us. And as I mentioned at the very beginning, all of those things are going to matter, but they cannot, but those people cannot live our life for us. And at some point, we have to become the creator, the builder, the author. So with that, you know, we've been going over 20 minutes at this point. You

Four Reflective Questions

SPEAKER_00 21:08

know, I have some closing reflective questions as I always do. So before we finish today, these are the four questions that I have for you in this episode. Where in your life have you been waiting for someone else to change before you decided that you were going to move forward? I'll say it again. Where in your life have you been waiting for someone else to change before you decide to take action and move forward? What part of your life is for you to own today? Where have you been giving away your influence? And last question. And what is one decision you can make this week that reminds you that you that you are in the driver's seat of your life and that you're the one holding the pen to all through your life again? So I'm gonna ask you that you sit with those questions, rewind it, rewind it to the very to the very beginning of the first question if you need to. But this is what I want you to take away. Ownership is not about carrying more guilt, but rather it's about discovering that you have more freedom than you think that you do. So with that, I'm gonna close this episode.

Recap And What Comes Next

SPEAKER_00 22:52

So let's recap real quick from the beginning of the methodology here of C2R2E. If collapse is asking you what isn't working, if confrontation is asking you what is true, realignment, if it's asking you what values will guide your next baseline, then this is what reclamation now is asking of you. Are you willing to become the author of your next chapter? Because you can't change what you refuse to own, and you can't build a new baseline while waiting for someone else to build it for you. The moment you pick up the pen, this is where your next chapter in life is going to begin. And next time, when we meet again, we're going to continue to explore reclamation by talking about confidence and not the confidence that appears before action, but the confidence that's going to be built as a result of the action that we're taking. So, with that, it's been my pleasure and it's been an honor and a privilege to connect with you and to have this conversation with you. With that, I'm Danny DeJesus. This has been another episode of the Next Baseline. The links to the complete Elevatis ecosystem is going to be in the description below. And until next time, I'm going to wish you all the peace, love, joy, and happiness for you. And until we connect again, keep asking the question what do we build now to reach our next baseline? All right, with that, take care.