We all have so many excuses for why we “can’t” do things instead of coming up with reasons why we can, or should. A lot of the time we spend more time being creative with excuses to why we can’t than giving something new a try. Even when we know it’s something that we know is best for us in the end. I had so many reasons to put off quitting smoking. There was a stressful situation coming up, or a concert, or we were going down the shore and our room had a balcony…..any excuse I could come up with to put it off because even though I knew quitting smoking was the best thing for my health, my wallet, my breath….deep down I was too scared. I let that fear cause me to lead an unhealthy life for months if not years longer than I would have. I kept coming up with things I needed to do to “Be prepared to quit” instead of just bucking up and quitting.

It made me think.

How much time so we waste under the guise of “preparing” to do something. “I want to start working out, but first I need to go on Pinterest and find recipes for my new eating lifestyle and then I need to make a list of all of the ingredients I’ll need and then I need to sell some of my furniture to make room to work out, and then……”

EXCUSES!!!!!

A quick Google search showed me that the average cost to raise a child born in 2013 to the age of 18 is roughly $245,340 in todays dollars (With inflation it would be even more but that’s enough for my purposes.) Can you imagine how many children would have been born in 2013 if every parent thought “I can’t have a child until I have $245,340 saved up” Other than some celebrity kids, there would probably not be a whole lot of babies that year.

The truth is, when we want something bad enough, we find a way to make it happen. The “I don’t have enough time.” and “I don’t have enough money” excuses fall to the wayside when you really, really want it bad enough. Fear of the unknown is powerful, and it causes us to stay stagnant and in places where we aren’t taking the best care of ourselves.

Get over the fears, drop the excuses, and live the best life you can!