Excuses -- Part One -- Those We Give Ourselves

In an earlier article, we discussed how giving up the power of control in decision-making can be a useful strategy. However, giving up control is not the same as giving up. While choosing what we don’t do is a key part of choosing what we should do, excusing ourselves from what should be done can be a worse problem for many of us. Excuses are not good or bad in themselves. They have their uses as well as their pitfalls.

There are excuses that we give ourselves to rationalize our choices, and there are also excuses that we give others to justify our actions. This article focuses on the first category: the stories we tell ourselves. It explains a few techniques for separating useful excuses from damaging ones. It also explains how to approach what must be done in a way that makes finding excuses for avoiding it more difficult.