Who are you accountable to?

Today I was thinking about accountability.  Who am I accountable to?  Yes, I'm married, but I'm still my own person.  My husband doesn't really expect much from me, he loves me unconditionally.  I'm not really accountable to him.  The dictionary defines accountable as being answerable to.  I don't really have to answer to anyone.  Anyone but myself, anyway. 

I was following a topic for discussion on the MySpace forums this week concerning rich people vs. poor people.  You can't really fault the topic starter, he was just a kid, but he wanted to know why rich people didn't give their money to poor people, to make things fair.  His argument was that the things that are more prevalent in poor neighborhoods (drug abuse, lack of education, violence, etc) were a direct correlation to them being poor, and that if the rich would stop being so tight with their money, these things would go away. 

The problem with his theory, is that this doesn't hold people accountable for their own actions.  You don't have to live this way.  You can choose not to be a drug addict, choose to get an education, basically choose the opposite of all those things.  You can choose to remain poor, and not do anything to change your situation. 

There's a quote floating around, many companies use it as one of their catch phrases.  The quote goes something like "If you do what you've always done, you can expect to get what you've always gotten".  I know it's not phrased exactly like that, but the meaning is the same.  If you don't do anything to change your life, your life is never going to change.  The odds of winning the sweepstakes or the lottery are something like 1 in a billion.  The odds of you making a living on your own, significantly smaller.  It's time to hold yourself accountable for your situation in life.  Whatever hard road you've been forced to travel, it's time to stand up and say, "I am accountable for my actions, I will choose my own road from here on out". 

I invite you all to join us in making yourself accountable for your financial future.