Christopher Daly
Disciplined Behaviors | How to Find the Root of Your Excuses
Time to Stop Making Excuses
In order to stop making excuses, you have to find out the root of your excuses. Excuses are often holding you back from your best performance and a strong work ethic. Excuses keep you safe. Excuses prevent you from falling. When you prevent yourself from falling, you prevent yourself from learning. Here is what is holding back most people…
In a word, Fear.
Fear is the driver of most of the excuses we experience as human beings….
- Fear of Failure
- Fear of Professional Embarrassment
- Fear of Change
- Fear of Ambiguity
- Fear of Making Mistakes
- Fear of Social Embarrassment
- Fear of Becoming more Responsible
- Fear of Becoming Successful
Our excuses manifest themselves in attitudes that are part of the Fixed Mindset. They include a lack of responsibility – Blameless. Self-limiting beliefs on being able to do anything or capable of doing anything – Static. Pessimistic outlook on everything – Stationary. Living and working in a Comfort Zone – Static. Lack of inspiration – Isolated. The list of excuses goes on…
- I don’t have enough money so I might lose money if I fail.
- I don’t have enough experience to do that job so I won’t apply.
- I don’t have enough education to do that job so I won’t apply.
- I don’t know how to do that job so I won’t apply.
- I am too old to do that job so I won’t apply.
- I am too young to do that job so I won’t apply.
- I am not attractive enough to do that job so I won’t apply.
Here’s how to find out the root of your excuses.
What Excuses Are You Making?
What excuses are you making?
- If your excuses surround real economic challenges are you making the challenges insurmountable and really do not exist?
- Are they imagined or is your challenge something else?
- If your excuse is around your ability, are you masking that you do not have time or enough interest in learning how to do something that you want to do?
- Is your excuse around who you are as a person that you cannot change and enabling you to stop trying because you have resolved that you are unable to do something?
These are issues of confidence. Confidence in yourself and confidence in your abilities to learn and grow and do things. That lack of confidence may include that you are unable to learn. Very few people are actually unable to learn, more likely you are unwilling to learn.
Why are you making Excuses?
Often, we make excuses because what we really think is something will require our time or attention and that we simply do not have enough of it. Nothing is further from the truth. Often, we do not realize how much time we actually have and we do not prioritize the things we want over the things that we automatically do. Our lives are on “autopilot” and we do things without thought rather than being disciplined with our time.
How do your excuses prevent you from achieving what you want personally or professionally?
- If your excuses are around your work and profession, and they keeping your form moving forward?
- Is that fear of your talent or is that fear of an organization requiring more of you and higher performance?
Often your self-doubt will preclude you from accepting a challenge or taking a risk in a new organization. “That culture does not fit me” or “My experience in this one job attribute makes me less of a candidate”
Many of our excuses come from literally talking ourselves out of something we want to do or think we might want to do. We justify it then by making up an excuse that we are unable or even unwilling to try. This is the very essence of the Fixed Mindset and often relates to personal and professional fear of additional responsibility, fear of heightened expectation, and fear of something new.
Identify the root causes of your fears – once you have them and understand them more clearly then it is time to Stop Making Excuses.
What do you think?