Excusitis-the disease of average

Have you heard? Theres a new disease going around the world today in rapid fashion. The worst part is it can effect any of us and anytime without our even realizing it. The disease is called excusitis and its the disease shared by every average achiever on Earth! In order for you to achieve success, whatever you define that to be, we must find out if you're carrying excusitis and if so, get it cured immediately! When we go deep into the study of people we discover that every failure in life have advanced forms of it, and that most average people have at least a mild case. We also find that the more successful the individual the less inclined they are to have it. Simply put, excusitis is the habit of making excuses why, and making excuses why not. You see, when we make excuses, we actually create more mediocrity in our life. In John Mason's book "The Enemy Called Average" he uses scripture to explain excusitis and its damaging effect. The Good Book says, "when we make excuses, we always point the blame somewhere else, which causes further judgement to come our way(Rom 2:1). In other words, Mason's argument is that excuses are actually a sin against God. Jesus tells the parable of the great end-time banquet and the men who were invited to the Lord's table. To paraphrase, "but they all alike began to make excuses. The first said, 'I have just bought a field and must tend to it.' Still another, 'I just got married, so I can't come.' And another, I have just bought five oxen and I must try them out, so I can't come." These excuses remind me of the people I deal with each day in my business, the world of entrepreneurism. My job is to recruit people who want to be entrepreneurs and then to train and mentor them to success. We use a recruiting system to find potential candidates and then we interview them to see if there is a fit. Many times though, its after they get involved that I see the symptoms of excusitis rear its ugly head! They tell me over and over how much they want financial freedom and to have their time back, to work from home and make six figures. Yet, when I tell them to join a conference call thats in the middle of their favorite TV show, the excuses begin. Or when I suggest a seminar thats on the same weekend as their child's sporting event, all the reasons why they can't begin to emerge. Excusitis shows up! They say things like, "I want to make money, but...." or "I want to be the next millionaire, but...." I wish life were easy, but it ain't. Adopt the philosophy of my friend and millionaire entrepreneur, Susan Walsh, who says, "get the buts out of the way!" This doesn't mean that the obstacles aren't real. Many times they are very real. However, it doesn't change the principles. If you desire to have success, you simply can not make excuses, rather as the Nike slogan goes, you just have to do it. And the greater the success you desire, the less room in your life you have for excusitis. I tell my story of how I went from cleaning swimming pools in my business to over $100,000/month before my 30th birthday. Everyone that hears it says, "I want to do that too." Yet, when it comes to the sacrifice necessary, they begin to find the reasons why not, versus focusing on the reasons why too. For the parents out there, my mentor taught me years ago to use my children as the reasons WHY I build my business, not the reasons why not. As a bonus, always remember this. Don't ever let your quest for balance become an excuse for not taking the massive action necessary to reach your goal. Very few successful people that I know are "balanced". Jim Rohn explains it best in that there will be "seasons" of imbalance. If you're an entrepreneur this especially applies to you, but it also applies to anything else in life. If you're trying to lose 50 pounds, you will be unbalanced in the weight loss faze, then be able to have a more balanced diet once the weight is off and you just want to maintain. If you're deep in debt, you're going to have to get unbalanced in your budget and money making activity until you're back at even. Whatever it may be, just be aware of the attempt to maintain balance hiding itself in the excuse for being lukewarm. You will find that when all of your excuses are defensive, even when they sound good, you will never succeed. Offense is what creates success. Get on the offensive today. Decide to purposeful season of imbalance so that you can live a life of fulfilled balance long term. There are no shortcuts to success. We can excuse away now and pay later, or we can pay now and play later.