The concept of responsibility is fascinating because every person understands it differently. To me, a responsible human being is someone who acknowledges his or her influence on the life of other people, as well as on the world in general, and acts wisely.
A responsible person cares not only for his or her interests but also for the interests of others. If a responsible person wants to buy a car, he or she will evaluate not only his or her financial ability to do so, but also whether or not his or her loved ones will be affected by this decision. For instance, if a person buys a car, and then later he or she does not have enough money to pay for his or her daughter’s acting class, this is not a responsible person, because he or she did not act in consideration with other people’s interests. Personally, I feel responsible not only for my actions but also for the influence that my actions have on other people.
For example, if I went for a walk with my friends and came home late, I would feel responsible for worrying my mother, since it was my action that caused such a reaction in her. However, I do not feel responsible for other people’s choices, even if I had an influence on them. If my best friend asks me for advice and the advice I provided does not help her at all, I will not feel responsible for providing bad advice, because it would be her choice to follow it.
A responsible person should be thoughtful of others’ feelings and emotions and try to remain positive, caring, and polite in all conversations. Feelings of other people are very important to me. I feel that it is my responsibility to find the right words so as not to offend or upset the person involved in a conversation. An individual who does not consider his or her words, or who acts hastily and hurts another person’s feelings is not a responsible person.
Responsible people are also considerate of their influence on nature. Every day, people all around the world damage the environment by throwing away plastic, using aerosols that damage the ozone layer, driving cars that release harmful gasses into the atmosphere, and so on. Most people do not think about the influence that their everyday actions have on nature because they do not see it clearly: the change in the environment is gradual, and it does not affect our lives directly yet.
However, responsible people understand that they need to be considerate of the environment and that they have to try and minimize the damage caused by their day-to-day activities. There are many easy ways to benefit the environment, such as riding a bike to work instead of driving a car, doing recycling weekly, cutting down the use of aerosols, and using solar panels to save energy.
In conclusion, I would say that there are a lot of defining characteristics that make a person responsible. These features are not the same for everyone and different people have different ideas of what responsibility means. I believe that our concept of responsibility is based on the values and views held in our family. Some parents teach children only to carry responsibility for themselves; others, on the other hand, encourage children to be responsible for other beings: pets, siblings, friends, and so on. However, even the values taught to us by our families are not completely fixed: responsibility can be developed over time, depending on the person’s circumstances and life experience, which makes the exploration of this concept even more interesting.