Happy Sunday Everyone:
Based on a variety of things that happened this past week around hearing excuses from people, including myself, I’m realizing a simple concept; people that have big excuses live little lives and people with little/no excuses live big lives.
Kim, my wife, is part American Indian. Her Grandma would tell her not to judge another Indian until you’ve walked a mile in their moccasins”, which I agree with. I want to be clear I’m not suggesting by any means that people who have excuses are lesser people, they’re just simply allowing excuses to get in the way of living a bigger and better life, me included.
Excuses help create negativity. Excuses help create ruts. Excuses help create bad habits. Excuses help create justifying bad behavior. Excuses pile on top of each other to create walls that get higher and higher. Excuses help create victims. Excuses help create the inability to get out of your comfort zone. Excuses create lack of trust. Excuses help create unfulfilled dreams. Excuses minimize pushing forward. Excuses, from what I can see, provide zero value…. so why use them? As a side note-it’s just as bad to suggest “I have no excuse” for the simple reason of avoiding saying your excuse…I know this one from experience, it’s a personal favorite and makes me feel more accountable.
Why am I writing this? I’m hopeful it might make you consider excuses more when giving them and minimizing them, and at some point stopping them all together. When you make less excuses you own up to more, when you own up to more you take more responsibility, and when you take more responsibly you make more positive decisions. I believe this to be true.
Another thing I realized, which will help me minimize my own personal excuses is the fact that the only person that wants to hear the excuse is me. When someone else is giving me an excuse, I can smell it, hear it, feel it, coming a mile away….wait for it, wait for it, wait for it….BOOOM….the excuse gets delivered. Your truest friends will sympathize with your situation but they won’t allow you to make excuses.
I don’t want to be around people that make excuses. When I think about the people I respect the most, their excuse factor is very low. Doesn’t mean they haven’t made a ton of mistakes but they don’t make excuses, they take action, they deal with it. Pick 5 people you respect…my guess is “they make a lot of excuses” is not something that comes to mind.
My point may be getting long in the tooth but for any of us to work on being better, a first step is stop making excuses and owning up to our stuff. Excuses suck, no one wants to hear them…I think that’s the best place to start as you begin to deliver one…take a gut check and switch direction. So much more satisfying to take action vs. being stale with an excuse. Formula moving forward, “BIG LIFE = NO EXCUSES”.
Have a great week.