We're all doing our best to be successful, to be our best selves, to make a difference, and to fulfil our duties. However, when life throws us issues, curveballs, and roadblocks, it's all too easy to lose our enthusiasm, desire, and incentive to keep growing.
When progress slows or stops, it's aggravating. It occurs to the most well-intentioned of us. Nobody is safe.
That's when we have to be careful not to fall into the "excuse trap." Many people unknowingly and frequently subconsciously activate this harmful thinking cycle in their minds.
This is the thought cycle that keeps repeating the reasons why it's not our fault—the economy, your family, the timing—any excuse your mind can come up with. Say goodbye to your aspirations and dreams once it's on because the list never stops.
But the most damaging message this mental trap sends is that "it's not my duty" and "I'm not in charge of my own future."
How do we break free from the cycle? The excuses are confronted head-on.
We can use a variety of excuses to avoid taking responsibility for our own actions, but the most common excuse for not doing, being, or having what you want in life is these five words: "I don't have enough time."
To break free from the excuse trap once and for all, we must all come to terms with the excuse of time. You must take efforts to help you take control of your attention and energy if you want to be in charge of your time.
Here are three easy steps to taking control of your time and life.
Step 1: View Time as a Friend, Not an Enemy
The guideline is simple: if you look at time as an enemy or an excuse, it's easy to blame and avoid taking responsibility. When you see time as a friend and ally on your side, assisting you in achieving your objectives, you can finally accept complete responsibility for your actions.
You must reconsider your connection with time and see it from a new, more positive perspective. To begin, you must unlearn how society has taught you to think about time.
How many times have you heard something like this?
“How am I going to find the time?”
“There is never enough time for me.”
“Where did the time go?” says the narrator.
“When I have the opportunity.”
“If time permits.”
But who gives you the “permission” to do things? It's not about the time; it's about you!
Recognize that you are the one who makes the decisions, not the time. We all have the same amount of time available to us. It's entirely up to you whether you spend your time working toward your objectives or becoming sidetracked by things that aren't beneficial to you.
Time is an extremely important commodity. It's possibly the most valuable possession you own.
Consider your entire time on this planet to be worth a billion bucks. Everything is yours, and you can do whatever you want with it. It can literally buy you anything you want in life. It can, however, be taken from you and emptied. You must decide where you will use it. It's up to you to steer it. You must ensure that it is spent on things that are important to you because no one else would. The rest of the world will merely strive to take it away from you.
It's your time, and it's your obligation. You create your own time; it is a part of you, and you are not distinct from it. It's a natural gift from your life, an eternally precious resource available to you as you strive to be the finest version of yourself. Feel appreciative for your time and cherish it, and be aware of how it is being spent.
When you stop fighting with time and start taking responsibility for it, you regain your energy, your day flows, and new chances appear organically. Time becomes both an ally and a friend to you. It is in your corner, ready to assist you in all of your endeavours.
Make the decision once and for all to accept that time is on your side to assist you in being your best. We are all given the same amount of time. What you do with it is entirely up to you!
Step 2: "Time Excuse"
Here's how you can master your time management: Stop making the excuse that you don't have enough time to do, be, or have what you want in life.
Start convincing yourself, "I am entirely accountable for my time." I own it, I have authority over it, and it originates with me!”
You're on a "time excuse" diet from now on. When you want to get in shape, you go on a diet and cut out the foods that keep you from getting in shape. It's the same with getting your time back. You must eradicate the toxic beliefs that are limiting your success and personal accountability in order to reduce the amount of time lost to distractions.
Begin by deciding what you want to accomplish with your free time. Every day, remind yourself that it is your time and that you have the power to do whatever you want with it.
When and where we use our time is determined by what we choose to say yes or no to and what we decide to do. We live in a perpetual condition of scarcity and victimhood without even realizing it when we feel the time is outside of us and manipulating us.
There are many kinds of time excuses provided as the number one reason people aren't finding the success, happiness, and achievement they desire after dealing with thousands of people. People are suffering, delayed, or trapped because of this pervasive incorrect mindset.
It is never time that is to a fault; it is your decisions and priorities with the time that are to blame. When something is our top priority, we can always make or find the time. When you break a bone, you suddenly have a lot of time to get to the doctor and have it treated.
It all boils down to personal preference. Remove the excuse of not having enough time from your head and choose to be in charge of your time instead!
Step 3: Practice Self-Compassion Every Day
This final step may seem paradoxical, but it is critical to accepting responsibility for your actions. Spend some time being thankful for yourself.
Taking responsibility for all of your time, how it's spent, and everything you do or don't do is a lot of pressure, to say the least. You will not always be successful in every task. So, if you start telling yourself negative things like "I'm not doing good enough," you'll lose your motivation and start making excuses.
Positive reinforcement is critical for changing your mentality from one that is full of excuses to one that is full of motivation and solutions.
Here's how we play mind games with ourselves: If you believe and know that you will be beaten up more frequently if you “go for it” and fail, you will be more prone to make excuses, procrastinate, hold yourself back, or not go for it at all over time.
However, in order to be successful—and to accept full responsibility for our actions—we must be willing to take risks and accept failure. That's the only way we'll be able to reach new heights and advance to the next phase of development. When we are knocked down, we must be willing to get back up.
According to research, being kind to ourselves and showing compassion to ourselves improves our performance by instilling healthy expectations in us. Self-compassion boosts our happiness and ability to take risks. We will be more responsible for our behaviours, both positive and negative if we are more kind.
The greatest kind of self-responsibility is self-compassion. It's standing by yourself in the face of adversity, hurdles, and challenges in order to keep going. Giving yourself an emotional pat on the back for wanting to take responsibility for your actions is justification enough.
We can be in a positive and receptive space to reengage and learn from adversity, integrate new lessons, adjust our strategies and tactics, take full responsibility for our actions, and get back out there and accomplish our goals with an even higher level of confidence, resilience, power, and tools to succeed once we show compassion to ourselves and tend to our mental and emotional needs.
In Summary
You have a particularly poisonous combination of mental traps stopping you from your goals and objectives when you fall into the "excuse trap" with the assumption that "I don't have enough time," which our 24/7 connected technologies and lifestyles instinctively force us into.
In their minds, excuses justify people's failures and advise them to give up. They believe they can't accomplish it because they lack self-compassion. They might grow to believe it if given enough time and setbacks. They might even want to believe it because it relieves them of responsibility and allows them to accept their lack of accomplishment. That isn't you, though.
You want to be held accountable for your acts. You want to be in charge of your own fate.
You've chosen to take charge of your life, to eliminate any excuses (especially the time excuse! ), and to be self-compassionate in a way that reclaims control and responsibility. You may deprogram your mind from feeling powerless to feeling completely empowered by following those three steps.