Life without Excuses

Posted by on

This post was inspired by a tweet from Patrick Antrim where he asked: “What would life look like if you were not able to use excuses?

My initial thought was … it would be a lot less entertaining.

SNAGHTMLf4f52c

I was flashing back to all the excuses I’ve heard and may have perhaps used from time to to time.

The old standbys like those below can only go so far.

  • I had to wash my hair
  • My shoes were untied
  • The dog ate my homework
SNAGHTMLfd0a22 SNAGHTMLfe4760 SNAGHTMLff1e4e

What would your life be like if you couldn’t use excuses?

  • What are the best excuses you’ve heard?
  • What are the best excuses you’ve used?
  • Did they work?

Come on. Share! inquiring minds want to know.

Thanks to Patrick for the great question. You can follow Patrick on Twitter here.

Added Comment:
I think Patrick had a more altruistic line of thinking about a “Life without Excuses” and I think there is a lot that can be written, spoken and sung about this point. Ultimately from a Leadership perspective the word accountability and the phrase taking responsibility for one’s actions come to mind. There is not enough of either in the world today.

clip_image002About The Author:
I have spent the last 20 years working in various aspects of the ECM industry. I am currently with Kodak as a Director of Business Development. In my past I have spent time at Kofax, Microsoft, FileNet, K2, and at Captaris (which was acquired by Open Text). Prior to that I was a Unix VAR running my own company. Follow me on Twitter, check my blog, send email or find me on Facebook or LinkedIn.

Comments

@patrickantrim said…
Jeff,

Thanks for the mention. My experience in professional sports and leadership has taught me to push through many situations making adjustments along the way to ensure success.

It seems that in the corporate world I discover a higher degree of excuses that would not be accepted in truly competitive environments. Sometimes these excuses simply explain away non performance or setbacks.

Thank you for your post and I look forward to further discussion.
September 11, 2010 at 5:35 PM
Martin J Sallberg said…
It is obvious that excuses paralyzes self-improvement. There is even evidence that extreme recoveries from brain damage and other severe mental disorders, unexplainable by conventional neurology, are linked to tolerant environments (references: "Mind, Brain and Education" by Kurt Fischer and Christina Hinton, "The brain that changes itself" by Norman Doidge). However, the existence of the nocebo effect (the destructive version of placebo) shows that "tolerance" on the lines of "do not blame him/her because he/she cannot help it" does not work for this purpose. It must be radical non-blaming, which means avoiding to blame without excuses so that no excuses at all have to be used. And considering the stupidity that is destroying the world, such an intellectual leap is exactly what the world needs.
May 30, 2013 at 5:57 AM
Post a Comment