The Infection Killing Your Dreams

Accomplishing any big dream or goal in life or business will require that you steer clear of infections that can kill them.

Eight weeks ago, I got a new treadmill after my previous one passed away after ten years of service. My treadmills get a great deal of use. For example, before I got this new one, I typically ran or walked three miles a day. With this new treadmill, I decided to increase my daily walks and runs to five miles a day and I have maintained the five miles each day since owning the treadmill, until last Friday. Last Friday was one of those crazy days in business. You know, the kind where you leave the house in the wee hours of the morning and you do not get back until after bedtime. I simply did not get my five miles in that day. And it bothered me. The fact that I was not going to get my five miles in chewed at me throughout the day and stayed with me as I laid in bed that night.

The worst excuses are the ones we make to ourselves.

I had a bunch of excuses as to why it was OK that I did not get my five miles in on Friday.

It was a long day at work.

I did not get home until after 9pm.

I got a lot accomplished on Friday, other than my five miles.

I rarely miss my five miles, so it’s ok to miss one.

Five miles a day is more than most people do.

At the end of the year missing one day will make a minimal, perhaps a nonexistent difference in my health or weight.

Forget about it, it’s just five miles.

Excuse.

Excuse.

Excuse.

As much as I tried so hard to make myself feel better about not completing the five miles on Friday, I finally gave in and understood that I was making excuses to myself.

Making excuses to yourself is the worst person you can make excuses to because you are the only person tasked with deciding if you are going to accept the excuses. That is, you are both the one being held accountable and the one who is accounting.

By the time Saturday came, I made a resolution to make up those five miles. Saturday I completed six miles. Sunday I completed seven miles. Today six miles. Tomorrow six miles. By tomorrow, I’m back to my five-mile-a-day average.

My eleven-year-old daughter watched me lament over the fact that I didn’t complete those five miles on Friday, to which she said, “Mom. Don’t be crazy. You can take one day off.”

That’s when I explained to her that excuses are dream killers. Excuses are deadly to the big dreams and goals we have in life. Just like infections, excuses are wildly contagious too.

I asked my daughter this question, “If I let myself get away with, or justify taking a day off from my walk, what are the chances that I’ll take another day off in the near future?” My daughter was correct in calculating that if I let myself off the hook easily, I’d take more days off in the future. I then asked her, “If I force myself to make up the miles over the next few days, how likely am I to take another day off in the future.” Again, she correctly calculated that I’d be less likely to take a day off in the future, realizing the amount of work it would take to make up.

Excuses are highly infectious in that it only takes one to create a chain of future excuses. Take a look at how excuses can ravage not just your dreams, but those of others too:

1.      If I allow myself this excuse, I am more likely to allow myself other excuses down the road. As well, not only do my excuses affect this dream/goal, but also I am more likely to allow myself excuses on other dreams/goals that I set for myself.

2.      If I allow myself this excuse, and hence other excuses which are now more likely to follow, who is watching my example and therefore more likely to allow themselves to accept excuses in the future? In this case, my daughter was watching and since I didn’t allow the excuse to take root and spread on this occasion, there is a higher probability that she will think twice about allowing excuses to take root and spread in her own life, especially in proximity to the time in which she noticed the example that was set.

3.      If I allow myself this excuse, and hence other excuses which are now more likely to follow, who will lose the benefit of the big dreams I could have accomplished if I had stopped the spread of the disease/excuses?

4.      If I allow myself this excuse, and hence other excuses, thereby increasing the probabilities that those watching my example also accept excuses (in this example, my daughter), who will lose the benefit of the big dreams she could have accomplished if she had stopped the spread of the disease/excuses?

One little excuse can start a pandemic.

The moral of the story is simple. If you have goals in business or life, it is going to take discipline to accomplish them. Discipline is a byproduct of your ability to steer clear of obstacles. The greatest obstacle in your way is you. Avoid excuses at all costs because not only do those excuses slow down your progress, they also can ravage your dreams and goals by increasing the likelihood of you accepting more excuses from yourself down the road. Excuses are a deadly pandemic in that they spread once the infection has been rooted. Even a face mask can’t protect you from this infection, only vigilance as to what you will accept from yourself when nobody is looking.

Postscript: There is a fine line between a reason and an excuse. As the saying goes, you can put lipstick on a pig, but it is still just a pig. Just because you call it a reason, doesn’t mean it’s not an excuse.