There is always going to be an excuse for anything and everything that we do.
I’ll be the first to admit this – making excuses are easy. I find it so easy to find an excuse.
I’ve noticed that my mind just automatically makes excuses the moment that I come across something that I don’t want to do, or somewhere that I don’t want to go.
I mean, there are plenty of excuses that anyone can easily come up with, and sometimes we come up with them in a fraction of a second.
Somehow, someway, no matter how high or low our brain power is, we’re always able to find reasons why:
- We haven’t done something.
- We don’t do something.
- We can’t do something.
And yet, it’s hard sometimes to simply find a way to do whatever it is we need to do. It’s so easy to find an excuse, but it’s more challenging to find a way.
I learnt about this “disease” called excusitis, a concept mentioned in the book, The Magic of Thinking Big by David Schwartz. One way or another, we may have found ourselves having the symptoms of this certain “disease”.
So to understand the “disease” of excusitis, lets break this down.
We Either Find a Way or We Find an Excuse
Lets say we have two people – Person A and Person B.
They both went to the same doctor because they are both finding themselves in poor health.
Both of them have the same habits – they never exercise because they apparently never have time to do so, and they don’t have healthy diets because they don’t know how to cook and have no time for it.
Of course, the first course of action this doctor recommends for both of them is to change their diet and start incorporating exercise into their daily routine.
Person B always finds an excuse for everything. He says that he can’t exercise because there’s no time during the day that he is able to go to the gym. He always takes the elevator because he is simply too tired to take the stairs. He always parks in the parking spot with the shortest route to work, because he prefers the easy way. Although the gym is on the way home from work, he’s still tired from a long work day.
It’s the same with his eating habits. He has so much work to do that he has no time to cook anything. His weekends are made for relaxing and not for meal prepping. It’s so much easier for him just to order takeout.
Person A on the other hand knows that the one thing that is preventing him from following the doctor’s advice is his lack of time. So, Person A decides to find a way because he can’t be in poor health forever.
He starts off with small steps and just takes the stairs instead of the elevator. Then he proceeds with parking further so he can walk longer to his work building. Eventually, he figures that he might as well go to the gym since it is on the way home.
He does the same with his eating habits. He was always eating a high-carb breakfast before work, and ordered takeout for lunch, and gets fast food on the way home from work because of its convenience. Following the doctor’s instructions, he starts small and spends just 20 minutes of his Sunday to do some meal prepping. Now, all he has to do is grab the food and go.
If you know how the compound effect works, in a short period of time, both individuals wouldn’t see a massive impact and change to their health. In the moment, it looks like the changes that Person A has been doing wasn’t really making much of a difference. However, over a longer period of time, a visible difference and most importantly, either an improvement or a further decline in health would be seen.
This was the case when both individuals went back to the doctor. The doctor would declare that Person A was improving in his health, while Person B was declining in his health.
So what was the difference between Person A and B? – Person A had found a way while Person B had found an excuse (or many excuses).
You may have noticed, that initially both individuals had declared time as a problem, but after seeing the doctor, it was Person A who had a changed perspective and decided to not make time an issue anymore. He decided that since his health was important to him, he found a way in the midst of a busy schedule while Person B continued to make the same excuses.
This same example can be applied to any situation. I’ve been telling myself that this blog is important to me. However, if I was always making excuses for why I can’t write blog posts, would you believe me? Since this blog is important to me, I had to make sure that I was training my mind to find solutions to get a blog post up, instead of making excuses.
A more shameless example for me was in terms of my Netflix binge sessions. Before, no matter how busy I was during the day, I would always find a way to fit in a Netflix binge. You can say that because I was training my mind to find a solution instead of an excuse, Netflix was really important to me.
Also, when I wanted to implement a reading habit into my life, I had to train my mind to find a time in the day to do so, instead of finding an excuse. I even at one point made it a goal for myself to find time in the day to read like how I do with Netflix.
Pretty much, if something is considered important in our lives, we aim to train our minds to find a way instead of finding excuses.
It will only get worse if we don’t deal with it right away
Just remember though, that just because we make excuses from time to time, it doesn’t mean that we never accomplish anything.
It is only when our mindset is completely fixed on always finding a reason why we don’t do something.
Like any sort of disease, if we don’t deal with it immediately, it will eventually get worse. This is because once an excuse is found, it’s something that would tend to always stick with us even if the benefits outweighs the downsides.
One example is going to the gym – the moment we find an excuse not to go, such as “not feeling well”, it tends to be our go-to excuse for not going. We end up sticking to this excuse even though going to the gym gives more benefits than downsides.
And each time we make an excuse, it’s just like someone who continuously repeats a lie to themselves that they eventually believe it – the excuses we make would eventually be embedded into our mind as well. (I’m guilty of this… on many occasions).
Becoming an excuse-remover instead of an excuse-maker
It’s easy to be an excuse-remover if it’s easy to find ways and solutions.
However, it’s hard to become an excuse-remover if it’s hard to find ways and solutions.
Like with my blog and my Netflix binges – it was hard to become an excuse-remover with my blog because it was challenging at times to write blog posts, and find solutions to my regular writer’s block.
On the other hand, with my Netflix binges, it was so easy to be an excuse-remover because I had easy access to Netflix and I could easily find a time of the day to watch it.
If you haven’t noticed already, it’s more challenging to become an excuse-remover if everything we have to do is hard. It’s during those moments when we find ourselves finding excuses rather than finding a way.
So how can we prevent ourselves from falling into this trap? Becoming an excuse-remover rather than a excuse-maker?
Lets list two considerations inspired by the Magic of Thinking Big:
#1 – Remember that you “GET TO” not “HAVE TO”
This is a classic little advice that I like. Sometimes it’s always just a little mindset shift that changes everything. It’s small, but it could make a big difference on how we see everything.
It’s not “I have to eat healthier” it’s “I get to eat healthier” – because not every person around the world gets the option to do so.
It’s not “I have to study”, it’s “I get to study”. – because not every person around the world gets the option to do so.
It’s not “I have to clean”, it’s “I get to clean” – because not every person around the world don’t have the option to clean anything to make their environment more hygienic.
To be transparent, I have to remind myself of this sometimes. Like I have to catch myself making an excuse for something that not all people get the privilege to do….
#2 – Evaluate the Importance
Legitimate excuses are made from time to time, because of course, life happens and it’s going to prevent us from doing something.
But what about those excuses that we make over and over again for the same exact thing?
Whether that’s a particular commitment or task, if we’re always finding ourselves making excuses over and over again, is it really that important to us?
If that’s the case, then maybe it may be time that we rethink this so-called priority or commitment.
For instance, there was a time when I tried to get into drawing and painting. I was always finding excuses on why I wasn’t able to draw and paint regularly, and I wasn’t motivated to find solutions to fit that activity in (like what I would do with my Netflix binges). You could say that becoming an “artist” wasn’t really that important to me after all.
However, sometimes there are commitments or priorities that we could never take away because we need to give it more importance instead. For example, I kept putting off and making excuses to not see a chiropractor for my poor posture. I eventually had to find a way to go see one since I needed to give it much greater importance.
But if it’s a priority or commitment that isn’t going to impact us greatly (like with my painting one), then it may be worth a thought to either stop doing it or put it on hold, until we’re able to find more ways than excuses.
Find a WAY or Find an EXCUSE
There are always going to be reasons to not do something.
There are always going to be reasons to not give greater importance to something.
There are always going to be excuses – BUT there are also going to be many ways and solutions to do something if we train our mind to do so.
It’s ultimately going to be up to us – we are either going to train our mind to immediately find a way or let it find an excuse. It’s our choice.
Book(s) this post was inspired by:
(not sponsored in any way!)
Disclaimer: If you think that any of what I had written was good, the credit actually belongs to the one whose book was the inspiration for this post. If there’s anything on here that you think is quite stupid, that’s 100% blame on me 🙂
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Hi, this is Lauren! I’m a law grad from Melbourne, Australia. On laurenbarri.com, I create content on all things personal development, productivity, self-care, and habits! I am super passionate about these topics because of how they helped me in all areas of my life, and I want to share it with others!
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