Mar 22, 2006
How to Stop Lying To Yourself
One of the things that separates us from “having the time we want” is that we constantly, blatantly, and unapologetically lie to ourselves about our scheduling abilities and our priorities. It’s like we’re all a bunch of pathological liars – present company included – I don’t deny I do it myself.
We even have a sanitized word for it – “rationalization.” It’s a cleaned up word that means, “You’re lying to yourself about how the situation really is.” And it kills your time, it slaughters your schedule, and smashes your plans to tiny little bits.
(Hmm … maybe I shouldn’t write blog entries right after a really intense workout …)
But in all seriousness, we do lie to ourselves – and that lying is our excuse for not taking action. For example, when you say “I don’t have the time to …”, that’s almost certainly a lie. I don’t know you personally, but from my decades of walking this earth and observing other people, I know that nobody operates at 100% efficiency.
You don’t have time, you say? Well, let me ask you …
- Do you watch television?
- Do you oversleep?
- Do you engage in conversations with people that are little more than small talk?
- Do you surf the web aimlessly, looking for something entertaining?
- Do you read anything that’s not of long-term real value?
- Do you procrastinate?
In reality, we waste time every day. We can say we don’t have the time to learn more about marketing for our business, yet we watch 10 hours of television a week, or we go out partying on the weekends. We can say we don’t have the time to hit the gym, but we have the time to go out for lunch …
I think you’re seeing a pattern here. There’s a world of difference between “I don’t have the time,” and “I choose to spend time on things that will not make a difference in my life 5, 10, 20 years from now.”
But you see, we’re cowards sometimes. “I don’t have the time” gives us the justification to not even try to change things. It’s accepting mediocrity by lying like everybody else does.
If we were to stop lying to ourselves, we would have to take action to change things – and maybe sacrifice some of the “escape activities” … and that’s not easy.
But that’s no excuse.
You’ve got to look at yourself in the mirror and ask yourself, “What am I doing with my time that doesn’t really have long-term value? Or do I want to be at this same level in my business a year from now, saying ‘Boy, I may not be making any more money, but sleeping in and watching The Simpsons’ was sure worth it!’
No excuse.
If you’re reading this far you’re one of the few who hasn’t copped out because they don’t want to deal with something uncomfortable. I congratulate you. I know that it’s difficult, because it’s a battle I have to face every day. Sometimes I win, sometimes I lose … and I win more often than not … but when I lose, it’s always for the same reason – I made an excuse.
Anything you don’t have in your life, you don’t have because of an excuse. Somewhere you haven’t been willing to give up comfort and push yourself into the land of the uncomfortable to get closer to your goal. You’ve made excuses that an obstacle is “too big” for you to handle right now.
Excuses, excuses, excuses. Lies, lies, lies.
I had to face this just this weekend. I was talking to a friend about an important aspect of my life that I had let slip lately, and I started giving all the reasons to justify and rationalize it … the day job was really busy … the kids have been sick … and halfway through I realized that it was just a load of B.S.
The real reason it slipped is because I decided to head to bed every night rather than give up a half hour of sleep to get something done … because I had let distractions at work derail me a little … because other things just seemed to “urgent.”
I’m glad I caught on before I lied to myself any further. Now I’m taking the action I need to. And I’m going to urge you to do the same.
Let me ask you something – if your doctor said you had a medical condition, and you had to do 30 minutes of exercise a day or you would die, wouldn’t you shift your priorities, make a little sacrifice to make that happen? You bet you would.
And when it comes to your business – if you knew that you had to free up 10 hours a week to devote to building your marketing skills or your business would be dead in a year, would you do it? Or would you make excuses? You’d do it. You’d get honest and start cutting out the things that aren’t important in your life.
If you want more time, then you have to summon up the courage to be honest with yourself and realize that it’s going to take honesty about where you’re spending your time and the courage to make small (and sometimes larger) sacrifices to make your goals happen. There’s no way around it.
I’m going to encourage you right now to post a comment to this entry if you feel like something’s standing in the way of you following through on this. I’ll do my best to get you an answer that can help you out. So post a comment now, get honest with yourself, and start seeing your schedule transform for the better. You’ll thank yourself for it.
All the best -
Dave Navarro
13 Responses to “How to Stop Lying To Yourself”
This is quite true, due to a disability which is getting more difficult (tiredness etc) I find I am working very hard two days of the week, and I now how much work I need to do before the end of the week. Then its Saturday and i feel deflated because ‘Im behind’ with what i wanted to achieve.
Then I spent the weekend worry and beating myself up and then try really hard the next week and only manage two full days and I’m tired and sore.
Valid reason, but if I said, Right, two days of solid work and the rest of the week I can do background research, reading and working on other things less tiring.
Thanks the key thing i need to learn is manage my time better
I have failed all my life due to lack of respect for time and time management, I have fallen in to compulsive lying to cover up my so called forgotten and missed deadlines to my work my family . God has given me a chance of lifetime in career and my personal life. Things could never be better but i am now screwing up every thing bit by bit by not taking care of this . I have to get out of this, because it matters to my family my wife and my baby deserve better from me . I have never written in a blog in my life but this is inspite of the fact that anyone can se this , I want to get this out of my system .pray for me
Oh my god, I have been having this realisation over and over for years. It’s recognising true setbacks (such as injury or illness) and the need to get them out of the way, which are rare and usually at worse, time adjustments and when the negative monster inside takes over and says I can’t be bothered, etc.
So, I have a degree, why aren’t I in professional employment? What series of decisions have I made that have led me to where I am now, even if that wasn’t my intention? What decisions am I going to make now?
I keep doing ten day challenges, mainly to improve my moods. I do have control over my emotions and it makes a hell of a difference to my day when I do whatever it takes, exercise etc in order to keep my mood up.
Great post, I might stick What’s your excuse this morning? Next to my alarm as I keep sleeping through the 5am one.
Ms Sunshine’s last blog post..Monday
i have a chronic problem of lying to myself. i am always tired, depressesd and wasting time..must exercise,must finish my minutes,must write my thesis to graduate in October.
I agree 100 percent. I have a lot going right now and haven’t liked my results. When I hit the point of frustration, I start looking to make excuses. If I am not careful, I start buying into the b.s. and doesn’t do anyone any good.
pgahawk´s last blog ..Ping G-15 in Four Swings
Hi Dave.
First of all, i’d like to say that your material and the way you present it is awesome. You Rock
I’m 49 years old, i’m a straight commission sales guy who has experienced alot of success in my life.
About 3 years ago a friend approached me with a business proposition and i loved the opportunity and i said yes, i’m in. I was suppose to start next week, which turned into next month, which eventually turned into next year. Now its 3 years later and i feel like an idiot.
The opportunity has never left my mind and i never wanted to kill the dream, so i picked up the materials and read about it every couple of weeks. Well, about a month ago i bumped into this guy that presented the opportunity to me. It turns out that he quit his job after about 1 1/2 years because he was earning 3 times what he was paid at his job. His wife quit her job and this year (2009) he has been on 4 vacations so far.
I’m very happy for him and he deserves it but it really got me thinking. If we don’t force the issue sometimes in life and be uncomfortable and push ourselves, we miss out on so much.
Ed
Am committed to re-creating the ability to be focused, motivated and self-supportive again. It’s being particularly difficult this time around…
Have been here a few times because whever I reach such high points, I seem to always give that power/energy away to some relationship or cause that becomes the excuse for not applying that energised focus and healthy routines ( regular exercise, good diet, etc) to directly benefit my life (career development, improved finances.. )
At present it’s all gone out of the window, and at 44, I am a very, very low web. It’s been so frightening that procrastination is hitting all areas of life.. not prety..
I seek all the relevant help and guidance I can get, but I have no wish to turn this into yet another procrastination artifice.
Thank you.
funny that ive heard this in for the past year or so and i havent done athing to change it,oh yeah ive done excuses. the thing is we let our self befeated by the thought `that is hard”, and we dont do it, when it really only takes sacrifices and determination.and in the long run,and short it will make a btter stronger person. ive been saying to myself and to people that im going tochange some aspects of myself that affect me ina bad way,and by procrastinating so much ive hurt loved ones, myself and the relationship im in. we give less credit to ourself, we dont believe, when reality is we are capable of achieving lots of things. it hurts cause u feel like everythings is against u when ones being againts oneself, thatsthe reality. i need to change, im stuck.
it’s so hard to be honest with myself about what i should be doing because i will think of a way to get out of it, mostly i will put fear or a bad situation in my mind of what could happen, any ways to stop this?
I have been lying to myself and procrastinating for so many years. I feel like I’m split inside and can’t be whole, can’t be honest in a relationship in a real intimate way. I feel badly about myself, I don’t respect myself because I’m so avoidant, but have been unwilling to change. Why am I so committed to keeping myself “safe” by running away and how can I change this? Its like I’m even afraid of calling myself out on it because I’m terrified of the change, but I want more than anything to be whole, have wonderful relationships and really love myself. What’s the deal?
What I adore about blogs is that they spark an concept in my brain. When that happens, I really feel as I need to comment with the hope it might be interesting to some people. Because you will find plenty of blogs and forums with numerous points of view, they question your comprehension. It is at these moments when you’ve important insignt other individuals may not have experienced, together with the blogger him/herself. I find myself coming back again to to your writings only simply because you have a number of very good insights and also you’ve been at this a really long time, that is very inspiring and tells me you understand your stuff. Maintain triggering imagination in other people!
thank you for your words, i just had an ‘ah ha’ moment today and realized i have been lying to myself lots lately. i’ve always been saying ‘oh i can’t do that because… or oh i don’t have the time’ etc. and i have been time wasting when i should have been going after my goals tenfold. now that i have realized this, it’s a huge help. i have to make it habit not to lie to myself, since i’m sure i’ve done it many times without even knowing. they say you have to do something atleast 21 times to make it a habit, it’s about time i start.
This has been bugging me for my last three relationships. I kid myself that I’m in love because they can provide me with something. I’m not a gold-digger, these guys aren’t anything like rich, but since my first marriage ended because he was violent I can’t seem to look for anything other than stability.
I do get flashes of clarity that say I should be single, learn who I am, figure out what I really want so I can actually do something with my life. I know it’s all about fear, I have always wanted to be a writer but if I keep putting obstacles in my own way then I never have to take that chance and be disappointed with the outcome.
I don’t want kids, although I have kidded myself I did, so I have nothing to lose by being single. I wish I could remember that long enough to stop me getting involved with someone else. I have just split up with someone who I realised that I didn’t really love and I’m only upset because I’m alone again and I’m a little glad and relieved that I’m not with him anymore.
I need something to stop me entering this awful cycle again! Short of a tattoo across my forehead!!
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