5 ways you avoid telling the truth

Do you ever find yourself responding to others the same way over and over.  Using the same responses to questions people ask you. I have before.  Instead of just admitting, I try to hide my excuse by coming up with a long response using one of the five ways below.  Truth doesn’t need to be embellished.  Truth can be short and sweet.  Truth is Truth, it is whatever it is.  So when we use some of the phrases below, we are just avoiding telling the truth.

Used to:  Have you ever met that person that says I “used to” do… input whatever you want here.  Things like workout, read books, work long hours, eat well, attend church, etc.  They say “used to” as if it was a recent thing that they just stopped doing.  Meanwhile, you are looking at them and saying “used to”, I have known you for three years and I have never known you to do whatever it is they said they used to do.  When you use the “used to”, in your mind you actually feel like you are still doing it, but it is obvious that you are not anymore. So stop using this phrase.  Instead say I need to do it, or I will do it.  Quit kidding yourself.

Something else came up: This probably is not you, but you know someone who is like this. “I was going to workout, but something else came up.”  “I was going to follow-up with my contacts in my database, but something else came up.” Some people look for other things to come up, so it keeps them from working on what they know they should be working on.  I am not saying that important things don’t come up, I am just saying that if you want to make a significant change in your life, you have to not allow things to jump ahead of  the important things on your list.  You must protect your time and your list of things to do, and don’t let things come up that can prevent you from achieving your goals.

I killed it yesterday, so today I don’t have to:  Come on, you know this system.  We all have used it before haven’t we?  “I only had 1200 calories yesterday, so today I can have 4,500.”  “I conducted 10 appointments last week, so this week, I can get away with only conducting two appointments.”  “I saved $300 dollars last month, so this month I can spend $350 and still be on track.”  You know the mentality I am discussing here.  You or someone you know uses it all of the time.  I do it as well.  When we use this, what we are really saying is we haven’t developed the disciplines yet to accomplish what we want to accomplish. Or we don’t care enough to accomplish it. So lets not kid ourselves.

When I:  “When I am rich, I will invest”, “When I am out of school or get the promotion, I will get back to the gym”, “When I land the big client, I will work the rest of my leads.” When I… When I… When I… input whatever you want to complete that sentence.  I have determined that whenever I say or use “When I”, I am actually saying that whatever it is, isn’t important enough for me to pursue, do, or accomplish right now. And there is a very high probability that it wont be important enough “When I” get to that point that I said I needed to be at to pursue it either.  Do it now, don’t wait.  The best time you have is “right now”, it is really all the time that you know you have.

I could never do:  “I could never get up that early…”, “I could never commit that much time…”, “I could never…” Lets be honest here.  Instead of saying “I could” never,  just be honest with ourselves and say “I would” never.  Meaning “I would” never do that because I don’t care enough.  “I would” never because I don’t really want to.  Whatever it is you are talking about,  it is “I would never”, not “I could never.”  Because you are a human being, which means you can do anything you want, as long as you want to do it.

Which of the ways above do you avoid telling the truth?  What are you going to do to change it?

To your success and your future.