Excuses vs. Choices

What we tell ourselves has power.  Are you a person who has excuses for why things aren't the way you want them to be?  Excuses give us a reason to stay stuck where we are and not grow.  Excuses give us a reason to live a mediocre existence; status quo.  Excuses give us a reason to live a life of existing.  Have you ever heard someone give you an excuse for why they are successful? happy? I'm so successful because I just don't have enough time.  NOT 
Choices give us a life of possibilities.  Choices give us a life of excitement.  Choices give us a life of abundance.  Choices give us a life of hope.  Choices give us a life of opportunities beyond our wildest dreams.
I've lived on both sides of this issue and let me tell you living a life of choice is so much better than a life of excuses.
I spent many years living with excuses of why I couldn't lose weight.  I didn't have enough time to prepare the food.  I'm never home and it's hard to eat out and lose weight.  I'm busy with my children and I don't want them to feel deprived.  I don't have enough money to eat healthy.  I work full time and I'm exhausted when I get home.  My husband's ill.  I volunteer.  There are so many events and social functions I have to attend. I have a lot of pain and it's hard for me to eat well when I don't feel well. Diets don't work so why bother.  I'm sure in a few months this new diet will be proven bad for your health so I'll just wait. You name it I've said it to myself. I was so buried in excuses and negativity that I didn't even realize it.  You've heard that old saying "She/He can't see the forest for the trees".  Well that was me!  When you're living the life of excuses you don't even realize it because it is so comfortable and it keeps us from being accountable for our own decisions.  Life happens to us.  It is a victim role.  The negative, hopeless, defeating voices in our head keep us stuck in the excuses.  They feed all the excuses so we don't have to upset the cart so to speak.  But IMAGINE for one minute that you stopped the excuses and decided to make a choice, what if you decided right now to just be aware of the words that come out of your mouth for one day?  What if you wrote down all the negative things you say (or tell yourself) for just one day and then turned them around into a positive statement?  Oh! That's just silly if it were that easy everyone would do it!  Could become; I can make a choice to do one thing today to improve my life.
Just being aware of the lies we tell ourselves is a huge step toward making a positive change.  As Dr. Phil says "You can't change what you don't acknowledge." That is such a true statement because if you aren't aware of how you are sabotaging yourself you will never change.  When faced with lives daily challenges we all have a choice.  We can see the negative and make an excuse for why we are where we are or we can see the possibilities (positive) and make a choice to do something about it.  Life does not happen to us; we make excuses to stay in the negative, the despair, because it serves a purpose for us even if we don't like it.  It may get us sympathy, keep us from changing (which may be scary) or keep us from doing something that is taking us out of our comfort zone.  No one can make us a victim if we don't choose to be.  Think about people you know that have faced adversity much greater than anything you have ever known and they are positive, successful, happy, productive human beings that contribute to the world.  A few people come to mind for me:  Mattie, the little boy who inherited a rare and fatal neuromuscular disease called Dysautonomic Mitochondrial Myopathy.  He lived a very short life with this awful debilitating disease but he used his short life to impact millions of people.  He wrote poetry, was on Oprah and spread the message of PEACE being a real possibility in the world.  His foundation lives on to support the dream of peace.  There are people who are born without limbs, blind, deaf, or have other real handicaps, sexual and physical abuse victims, and yet go on to achieve greatness, live with positivity beyond comprehension.  It is a choice they make.  WE ALL HAVE A CHOICE.  Every choice we make determines the life we live.  To some this is overwhelming; to know that they are responsible for where they are today.  Especially if they have always blamed others.  In every situation we have choices no matter what is happening at the time.  Even if the only choice is to accept what is happening and make the best of it.  Do not let anyone or any situation take away your power to choose the life you want to live because the only one with the true power to do that is you.  When placed in a situation you have a choice to make an excuse or make a choice.  I finally chose to make a choice and it changed my life.  Getting rid of the excuses enabled me to release 134 pounds and GAVE ME A LIFE!  YOU CAN DO IT TO! No matter what excuses you are telling yourself now, no matter how old you are tell yourself:
I HAVE THE POWER to change one day at a time, one choice at a time.
Start today! Make it happen!  It is WORTH IT! YOU ARE WORTH IT!
God Bless,
Nena