Have you ever neglected the responsibility for something in your life? Have you tried to explain why you did or didn’t, could or couldn’t, should or shouldn’t, do or have done something? Do you find yourself making excuses? Congratulations, you are a storyteller. The problem is – your inspiration is corrupted. It should not be ignored as you are living a corrupted story. Living with excuses prevents you to live at your full potential.
“The only obstacle between you and your goal is your favourite story that you keep telling yourself as to why you cannot achieve it.”
What is an excuse?
As I said we are story tellers (trust me everyone is), so the excuses are the stories we make and tell ourselves – about people, situations or events. The justifications we invent to defend our behaviour, to avoid something, or simply to disown responsibilities. In a way excuse is a method of putting the blame of internal issue on an external factor. We seek excuse to lessen the blame attached to a fault or offence.
Why we make excuses?
There can be many reasons, you know yours. Everyone has a different reason for making an excuse. If we look closely, all the excuses arise of two reasons – Fear and Perception.
Fear is our worst enemy. To remove excuses from our lives, we must first remove fear. It traps us in our comfort zone, as it feeds on lack of knowledge, power, intellect, information, resources and experience. When there is a lack of anything it grows stronger, and when the fear is strong we lack confidence and fail to take necessary steps to achieve our goals. As a result, we make excuses about situation and consequences to defend ourselves. We never realise that our enemy is holding the weapon that we have created for our defence. The excuses are our stories corrupted by fear to serve its purpose.
Perception is also our creation. It is being dragged here because it is an accomplice to our excuses. When we perceive that we lack the confidence or resources, we make excuses. Basically when we perceive anything negative – we make excuses. Perception is a dangerous thing, it always sides with the stronger – in most cases the fear. While it supports the existence of fear, it also strengthens the existing excuses.
We all create these beautiful stories – some recognize it, and some don’t even care. We make excuses to help boost our morale and perception is always there to support them. However, all we are creating is an illusion of security. We are covering up the ditch, as if it is not there. It remains there hidden, and will be there until we fill it up by overcoming our fears.
Some of the phobias we need to overcome, to get rid of excuses are mentioned below.
- Atychiphobia or Fear of Failure
- Socialphobia or Fear of Embarrassment
- Achievemephobia or Fear of Success
- Neophobia or Fear of Change
- Phobophobia or Fear of Fear
- Hypengyophobia or Fear of Responsibility
- Mistakephobia or Fear of Making Mistakes
And their supporting force – perceived lack of …. – Basically anything
Why should we avoid them?
As I mentioned earlier that you are a storyteller, living in your stories. That part is all right as we all write our own stories, there is nothing new to it. The problem is the number of excuses we want to put there. We always have the option to choose if we want a life full of them, without them, or with them as interludes. The reason why they should be avoided is – they not only prevent us from reaching our full potential, but also restrains us from acknowledging opportunities, talents, and skills. They are the only reason we fail to overcome our problems.
If we don’t challenge ourselves, we will never know what we are capable of. Opportunities are hidden everywhere, however we will never find them if we look through the window of excuses.
“He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else.” ― Benjamin Franklin
Let me make an excuse for the above quote. He who is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else, because he is using his resources making an excuse. As simple as that.
The idea behind writing this is not to discourage anyone. It is to share a view on how we use our creativity to cover up a problem. Imagine if it is used wisely – the world will be a better place. Everyone will be busy creating their stories, sharing new ideas, overcoming their phobias and so on.
Please share your idea of an excuse. It is always nice to hear new stories. I intend to write another part to it, may be some time later. Till that time ask yourself – What’s your excuse?
P.S. If you are reading this, please share your views or ideas or feedback. Or AN EXCUSE WILL DO.
