I was having dinner with a friend the other night and somehow the topic of “Excuses” came up. And, frankly, I strongly believe that:

No one cares about your excuses.
Ever.
So don’t even bother giving them.
Ever.
The end.

Now, your REASONS for something… maybe.

Most people, generally, don’t seem to understand the difference between the two. Of course, we all intellectually understand the difference when we stop and think about it for even a moment, but in our day-to-day practice, we often don’t.

As I’m fond of saying: “Ignore what people say, watch only what they do”

Bosses, parents, and teachers are prime culprits for tossing reasons into the “Excuse Basket” without even really listening. Anything that even starts to sound like an excuse… in the basket!

And subordinates, children, and students are great at trying to pass off excuses as reasons.

(And we’ve all been in both roles. Indeed, we usually inhabit both roles within each day)

Sometimes it is hard to tell the difference (a point I’d like to return to in “A Timely Reminder, part 3“).

And sometimes it really is important to explain the reasons for something not getting done on time, or breaking down, or whatever. Sometimes the reasons are the key to preventing it happening again.

To dismiss them out of hand is, then, is obviously foolish.

But how many times in the last month, say, have you just stopped listening as soon as something had a whiff of “excuse” about it?

How confident are you, in retrospect, that you were right? What kind of consequences could have ensued if you’d been wrong?

How do you know you weren’t and that they didn’t?

And the flipside:

How many times in the last month have you offered an excuse and tried to dress it up as a reason?

Why did you do that?

Did you “get away with” it?

Do you see this as a problem or a victory?

What–within you–do you think this kind of behaviour is indicative of? Where does it come from?

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Thanks for visiting & I hope you find some good stuff here! Leslie