Locus of control

 

“You have power over your mind, not outside events. Realize this and you will find strength” Marcus Aurelius

Do you feel like you have control over your life? Or does it feel like the days are just passing through your fingers like sand you’re unable to grasp? As is commonly said, the days are either running you or you are running the day. Are you the driver or the passenger in your life?

In psychology, a person’s “locus of control” is used to describe the extent that a person believes to be in control of his or her environment. People who believe they are in charge of their lives and make things happen are known as having an internal locus of control. On the flip side, people who believe circumstances are out of their control and things just happen to them are known as external locus of control.

The reason this concept is important is that having a high internal locus of control will lead you to confidence in your personal judgment, cause you to think for yourself, and become more skeptical of other sources of information. You will have a lower tendency to conform and to follow what everyone else is doing. The alternative is to rely luck and find anything else to blame when things don’t go your way. By having a high external locus of control you become the passenger in your own life, looking around at everyone else living their life and wishing your life could be better.

Here is the point: you have a life and it is up you to make it better.

Thank you,

Rogelio H. Charles