“An excuse is worse and more terrible than a lie, for an excuse is a lie guarded.” – Pope John Paul II

When you make an excuse, when you knowingly do something less than what is your best, you are purposefully lying to yourself and others. Think about that for a moment . . .

When you create an excuse you are lying to yourself- you are using your self-talk to convince yourself that it is OK to take the easy way out. Our work is incredibly difficult and there are panoply of available excuses for us. We deal with parents, poverty, state mandates, under appreciation, lack of resources, large classes, lack of planning time, and the list goes on and on. Our challenges are innumerable, but they can’t become excuses.

Yes, be realists. It’s perfectly acceptable to talk about choices and tough decisions. It’s perfectly acceptable to identify barriers. We must collaborate to solve problems and continue to seek every opportunity to do business better. We can’t – and we won’t – make excuses. We can’t – and we won’t – try to make ourselves feel better when we are unable to reach a goal.

Our relentless pursuit of excellence – our willingness to embrace the productive discomfort of our work – will take us to new places. We will experience failure; we will learn and grow from failure. We will not lie about our progress and we will not make excuses.