We all tell ourselves excuses every day. We want to feel justified in our procrastination or lack of achievement, but excuses help no one, especially when faced with a humdrum life or living your dream. Here are seven excuses that people tell themselves that are actually a waste of energy.
1: Lack of Time
Everyone has 24 hours in a day. You have the choice to use it how you want, but many people use busyness as an excuse. If we dig a little deeper, however, we will find that most people’s “busyness” accounts for little more than Netflix and social media sprees.
The amount of time you have is directly correlated with the amount of priorities you have, and lack of priorities means you have time for nothing but wasting your life.
2: Being Broke
While it’s true that some dreams cost money, many don’t. You don’t have to be rich to make a new friend or to smile at a neighbor or give a friend a call when they are having a hard time. For starters, begin with your dreams (or the parts of your dreams) that don’t cost money, like improving yourself to become the person who is able to sustain your dream life.
For what it’s worth though, learning money management and evading the subliminal message of consumerism will let you have more money in the bank, regardless of how much you actually make. So break out the budget making tools and the savings accounts!
3: Being abused
Overcoming trauma is horrifying and exhausting work. Some days you don’t feel like you’re going to make it out. But having trust issues or PTSD from past abuses doesn’t make you less of a person, nor does it give you excuses to abuse someone else.
After finding your way far enough out, you can deal with new challenges and new dreams. But if you’re still in your healing process, understand that you healing yourself is doing something good for the world, and don’t let yourself off the hook by making excuses for treating others badly just because you were.
4: Past Failure
Everyone has an embarrassing story or two that they’d rather not look back on. Many of our stories that end in failure cause us to recoil and possibly even avoid the situation altogether next time. This isn’t our fault, we’re taught from a very young age not to make mistakes, but the fact is, everyone does.
The great thing about failure is that now you have one more experience about a situation that someone just starting out does not have. You, after failing, are indeed one step closer to success.
5: Fear
It seems like the biggest reason most people hold back is out of fear. It’s said that fear can stand for two things: forget everything and run, or face everything and rise. I suppose that goes back to our fight or flight response.
Here’s what I want to say though. Just because something is scary, doesn’t mean it will go away if you avoid it. Life doesn’t magically become less important just because you are afraid, and often the most scary things we deal with are the ones that we are the most proud of once we reach the back end. If you avoid things out of fear, then you are also avoiding the accomplishment and pride you will feel towards yourself a week, month, or year down the line. Don’t keep yourself from those wonderful things.
6: Ignorance
Another excuse people use to avoid pursuing their goals is that they don’t know how to achieve them, and then they stop right there.
Nobody knows how to achieve and sustain their dream life, but knowing is not the first step. First you dream, then you learn. As you learn, you do, and after you’ve done it, then you know. So knowing is actually the final step, not the first.
7: Lack of self-esteem
Maybe you have a dream, but you don’t think you have what it takes to get there. Well, I’m here to tell you, you don’t have to “believe in yourself” to achieve your goals.
What do you believe in? If you believe in others, you can achieve your goal. Maybe you want to be a model or a pro athlete. Find someone who has done it and then learn everything you can about them, their friends, study them and do everything they do.
And if you can’t believe in yourself or others, believe in your future self. You don’t have to be great now, but you can dedicate yourself to become great in the future. Identify what kind of person you’re trying to become, find out what it takes to get there and then do it every minute of every day.
What are the excuses you tell yourself? Tell us in the comments below. Also, be sure to share on social media so others can see that they can still attack their dreams without these false perceptions.
Powerful post. It’s easy to get caught in a spiral of self-pity and forget to make an effort to be our best selves. Thank you for sharing your thoughts.