I’m too busy to do anything else. What a great excuse.
THE lazy excuse we love to use. “I’m too busy, I can’t get to it.”
This lazy excuse takes different forms.
Your request is not important
“..too busy is simply code word for either not interested or simply a means of not being able to manage your life correctly because you’re lazy.” From the Huffington Post.
Some reasons why we use this excuse…
- I have my priorities and your request or this thing is not important.
- I don’t want to tell you, “No.”
- I feel I have to respond to every request, my to-do list fills up, and so I’m too busy for you (or my family, myself).
Self serving excuse
“I’m too busy” can be self gratifying.
You are wanted, no, you are needed. You are a big deal. At least this quick thought or some variation flows through your mind.
In fact, you are so needed, so important, to do stuff, that you can’t take time for family, friends, planning your future, working out, or whatever it might be.
Your job requires you answer all the emails, send the quotes out, get the response to planning, notify engineering immediately, meet with the boss, customers, partners.
Yes, all that may be true.
How is that some people can run a business, volunteer, travel, spend time with their family, meet with partners, customers, and seem relaxed and take time for other things?
And then other people work one job and have trouble getting things done asked of them and are crazy busy?
Are you managing your time effectively and efficiently?
Have you looked closely at how you spend your limited time during the day?
According to the article, “Why is everyone so busy?” in the Economist, “to be pressed for time has become a sign of prosperity, an indicator of social status, and one that most people are inclined to claim.”
“I’m too busy” is a lazy excuse.
This lazy excuse comes from indecisiveness. Indecisiveness leads the crazy busy busiest of us all to prioritize all our tasks as first, number one. Everything is equally important in our mind. We can no longer distinguish what is important from what is urgent.
The “I’m too busy” excuse also comes from an inability to prioritize. Those among us who cannot prioritize cannot discern what is crucial, what will be effective from what is immediately demanded. They constantly trade away longer term benefits for chasing some sort of short term wins. In the long term, it appears we bounce from task to task not really making any progress.
An inability to prioritize means there is no clarity of values, vision, or a conflict of values. Either way, the hard work of clarifying and prioritizing values, a vision was not done or not communicated effectively.
However…
Some argue being lazy is what we are built for.
Here are the five excuses why being lazy is okay according to “Cracked.com.” Pick your reasoning for your excuse.
- Evolution has made us this way. That’s why we are not still out there hunting down our food each day.
- There will be a pill for it someday. Yes, they are working on it.
- It will bring us closer together. It gives us more relaxed together time.
- Everyone else is lazy…I’ve got low energy.
- You are changing the world. There is always an easier less effort way to do things.
Others argue social norms lead us to busy-ness. According to the Economist, “Once hours are financially quantified, people worry more about wasting, saving or using them profitably… And the more valuable something becomes, the scarcer it seems.”
What if …
You understood what was important to you. Let’s say you took the time and, yes, the effort to be crystal clear about what you value and why you like and dislike things, activities, jobs, roles.
You knew the direction you wanted to take for yourself personally and professionally. And, it aligned with your company?
Then you could make decisions about what was important, what was a waste of time, what was urgent versus important.
You could even start to decide what you could do to improve the processes that were important and urgent.
Imagine …
Getting focused on direction, that you were excited about.
Making decisions. That means saying “Yes” and “No” straight up. No excuses.
Executing your job well and loving it.
Managing your time and resources well.
All this is doable. There is a trade off though.
It takes initiative, training, practice and determination.
What is your next step? Or are you too busy?
Helping Leaders Breakthrough
“Dominate your life with Focus, Decision and Execution.”
