Your /locus of control/ is simply the belief about where control over your life comes from.
Do you ever feel like you’re not in control of your life?
Like you’re just a pawn in a game that’s being played by someone else?
That if it weren’t for a bad decision that /someone else/ made, you would be happier,
wealthier, and better off?
If so, you’re not alone.
A lot of people feel this way.
You have what we can call an /external locus of control/.
A person with an external locus of control believes that their life is largely out of
their control and that they are simply at the mercy of other people, luck, or fate.
And if you have this type of mindset, I have some bad news for you: this mindset will make
you weak.
If you want strength, you have to shift your locus of control.
People with an /internal locus of control/ believe that they are in control of their
lives.
They believe that they can make things happen.
If you take on an external locus of control, you give up responsibility for the outcomes
of your own life and become a victim.
And as a victim, you become powerless to change your own fate.
But if you take on an internal locus of control, you take responsibility for the outcomes of
your life and become a creative agent.
And as a creative agent, you become empowered to control your own destiny.
A great example of someone with a strong internal locus of control is Alexsandr Solzhenitsyn.
In 1945, after writing a letter criticizing Joseph Stalin, Solzhenitsyn was arrested and
spent eight years in Russian prison and labour camps.
And after that, he was forced to spend three more years in exile.
And amazingly, instead of blaming others for his situation, he took responsibility for
it himself.
In /The Gulag Archipelago/, he said that, no matter what situation you were in, it was
possible to go over your past with a fine-tooth comb and determine an error that you made
that landed you in your current situation.
You can always find the mistake that caused you to suffer.
And this is a pretty radical idea, Solzhenitsyn even said as much in his book.
This isn’t an idea that everyone can accept, but for those who do, they free themselves
completely of the victim mindset.
They adopt on an internal locus of control, and they take complete responsibility for
the outcomes of their lives.
So Solzhenitsyn took complete responsibility for ending up in prison, even when it would
have been easy to play the victim and blame the government, the police, the country, the
community, or the people.
He didn’t blame anyone but himself.
And what was the result?
He wrote, “All the writers who wrote about prison but who did not themselves serve time
there considered it their duty to express sympathy for prisoners and to curse prison.
I… have served enough time there.
I nourished my soul there, and I say without hesitation: ‘Bless you, prison, for having
been in my life!’”
Because he took total responsibility for the outcomes of his life, he grew in prison!
He said he nourished his soul there.
He adopted an internal locus of control and took complete responsibility for his life,
and as a result, he became empowered.
He took what could have been one of the worst situations in his life and made it the best.
In prison, he made himself wise.
And in 1956, 11 years after imprisonment and exile, he moved to central Russia, where he
began his writing career.
He dedicated his life to communicating the wisdom he had gained in prison.
And in the year 1970, he won the Nobel Prize for literature.
Would Solzhenitsyn have been as great of a literary figure if he had an external locus
of control?
I don’t think so.
A great literary figure needs insight, and insight comes from knowing yourself.
Solzhenitsyn even wrote, “’Know thyself!’
There is nothing that so aids and assists the awakening of omniscience within us as
insistent thoughts about one’s own transgressions, errors, and mistakes.”
And so if Solzhenitsyn had an external locus of control, he would never have gotten to
know himself in prison.
He would be too busy blaming others for the outcomes of his life.
And as a result, he would never learn the relationship between his actions and their
outcomes.
And all great writers must know the relationship between actions and their outcomes.
That’s what we call insight.
And without insight, Solzhenitsyn would not have been a great literary figure.
So in my estimation, the adoption of an internal locus of control played a significant role
in Solzhenitsyn’s greatness.
But it’s up to you to decide.
Will you have an internal or an external locus
of control?