Reality Check: Excuse Me…

By Leif Smith

I recently had a consultation in my office with a woman who had found me on the Internet. She was familiar with some of my work with sports teams, and was impressed enough to pursue a consult for one to one work.

From the moment we sat down together, however, I knew that there was no way I could work with this woman. She wanted help, but had to explain every situation and obstacle she was facing in excruciating detail, to the point that I couldn’t even respond. None of her problems were of her own doing. Not her divorce twenty-one years ago. Not her failure to leave her church after feeling criticized by her pastor, nor her failure to keep a job longer than two months, and certainly not her inability to maintain a relationship with anyone for longer than a couple of months.

After fifty minutes of listening to her explain how her predicament was not of her own doing, I suggested that we would not be a good fit for working together, given my penchant for pushing my clients a bit further than they are used to being pushed. It then took her ten more minutes to leave my office, even after I explained to her that I had another client waiting. She didn’t care that she made me late to see this client, and she didn’t care to hear a thing I had said during our hour together.

Lesson here: Nobody controls your life but you. Some situations and events are outside our sphere of influence, certainly, but in the end, it is you that controls how you react to things around you. You are directly responsible for the quality of your daily life, and for the quality of your relationships.

So, before you begin complaining about your lot in life, stop for a moment and figure out what it is that you have done to bring about these consequences. You may not have had a choice in being fired, or divorced, or any other unfortunate event, but you certainly had a choice in how you responded to that event and portrayed it to others. Work to eliminate excuses. You’ll find that you actually have more influence over your life than you previously thought. You’ll also be a more productive and well-adjusted individual.

Now, if you’ll excuse me…

Leif Smith, Psy.D., President of Personal Best Consulting, LLC, has worked with athletes and coaches from The University of Iowa, The Ohio State University, and the College of Wooster. He specializes in improving performance and production, and has also worked with corporations such as America Online. Subscribe to the free monthly email newsletter, "Personal Bests: Techniques for Living an Extraordinary Life" when visiting his Web site at www.personalbestconsulting.com.