The Theory of Responsibility

Posted on January 2, 2012 by potatosandwich

Just like Albert Einstein, while sitting in an office realised that Newton’s law of gravity was somewhat incorrect, I kind of stumbled across the same notion about The Theory of Responsibility.

Before I embark on what The Theory of Responsibility is, here’s the definition around the term “responsibility”.

On a social aspect:

1. The state, quality, or fact of being responsible.

2. Something for which one is responsible; a duty, obligation, or burden.

On a business aspect:

A duty or obligation to satisfactorily perform or complete a task (assigned by someone, or created by one’s own promise or circumstances) that one must fulfil, and which has a consequent penalty for failure.

OK, so it’s safe to assume that responsibility is something to do with the fulfilment of something either given to you, or something you have taken on, to a certain point.

So, what’s my theory you ask?

Where Theory of Responsibility is R

Where Creativity is C

So in words – More Responsibility = less creativity

Mathematicians across the globe will probably throw their hands up in laughter at my feeble attempt to encapsulate my theory as a sum, but the (-) signifies creativity decreasing as responsibility increases.

There’s a famous saying, the more responsibility you have the better a person you are. OK, so in terms of being a more experienced human being, this may well be the case. However, the way I view this, the more responsibility you have the less creative you become.

How?

Where is Creativity born out of? To be creative you need to be imaginative! To be imaginative you need to have the freedom to think! To have the freedom to think, you need to have less on your mind for that space to exist.

Today, we are shaping the next generation of children to be more responsible much sooner than what we were, however, the danger is that we may end up taking away their ability to be creative because they simply don’t have the freedom to think in this way. I am not saying we educate the next generation to be any less responsible but that we tread carefully not to harm their ability to be creative. Let’s delay the point at which they need to be pushed out to the big bad world to fend for themselves, let them stride across countryside, take adventurous walks, spend hours looking for motivation and a reason to be creative.

If we fill their minds with things they have to do, when will they get the time to do the things they want to do?

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