Friday; June 11

Have you noticed how easy it is to make up excuses? Basically, if we don’t want to do something, we can always find a reason not to do it. Notice that I didn’t say a “good reason” because sometimes our excuses are nothing more than justifications we delude ourselves into believing.

When I was growing up, I used to hear excuses defined as tissue paper lies. While that sounded good, I don’t know that I fully understood what it meant – but now I kind of get it. When I think of “tissue paper”, I typically think of three things: First, it makes things look better than they are … second, it is thin and not good for much else … finally, it is fragile – it can’t withstand much pressure. Excuses are similar to tissue paper in that they typically make our actions sound better than they really are, they are easy to see through and it doesn’t take much effort to rip them apart. There are some legitimate reasons we do what we do – especially when we fail, but all too often, the excuses we make are just that – excuses! They may make us look (or sound) better, but there isn’t much substance to them.

Let’s do our best to be honest and open with ourselves. If we have legitimate failures, let’s work on correcting them, not excusing them.

Think About It!

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