Excuse Maker Quotes

We ache with the yearning that turns half into whole and offer no excuses for the beauty of our souls.

Gulls wheel through spokes of sunlight over gracious roofs and dowdy thatch, snatching entrails at the marketplace and escaping over cloistered gardens, spike topped walls and treble-bolted doors. Gulls alight on whitewashed gables, creaking pagodas and dung-ripe stables; circle over towers and cavernous bells and over hidden squares where urns of urine sit by covered wells, watched by mule-drivers, mules and wolf-snouted dogs, ignored by hunch-backed makers of clogs; gather speed up the stoned-in Nakashima River and fly beneath the arches of its bridges, glimpsed form kitchen doors, watched by farmers walking high, stony ridges. Gulls fly through clouds of steam from laundries' vats; over kites unthreading corpses of cats; over scholars glimpsing truth in fragile patterns; over bath-house adulterers, heartbroken slatterns; fishwives dismembering lobsters and crabs; their husbands gutting mackerel on slabs; woodcutters' sons sharpening axes; candle-makers, rolling waxes; flint-eyed officials milking taxes; etiolated lacquerers; mottle-skinned dyers; imprecise soothsayers; unblinking liars; weavers of mats; cutters of rushes; ink-lipped calligraphers dipping brushes; booksellers ruined by unsold books; ladies-in-waiting; tasters; dressers; filching page-boys; runny-nosed cooks; sunless attic nooks where seamstresses prick calloused fingers; limping malingerers; swineherds; swindlers; lip-chewed debtors rich in excuses; heard-it-all creditors tightening nooses; prisoners haunted by happier lives and ageing rakes by other men's wives; skeletal tutors goaded to fits; firemen-turned-looters when occasion permits; tongue-tied witnesses; purchased judges; mothers-in-law nurturing briars and grudges; apothecaries grinding powders with mortars; palanquins carrying not-yet-wed daughters; silent nuns; nine-year-old whores; the once-were-beautiful gnawed by sores; statues of Jizo anointed with posies; syphilitics sneezing through rotted-off noses; potters; barbers; hawkers of oil; tanners; cutlers; carters of night-soil; gate-keepers; bee-keepers; blacksmiths and drapers; torturers; wet-nurses; perjurers; cut-purses; the newborn; the growing; the strong-willed and pliant; the ailing; the dying; the weak and defiant; over the roof of a painter withdrawn first from the world, then his family, and down into a masterpiece that has, in the end, withdrawn from its creator; and around again, where their flight began, over the balcony of the Room of Last Chrysanthemum, where a puddle from last night's rain is evaporating; a puddle in which Magistrate Shiroyama observes the blurred reflections of gulls wheeling through spokes of sunlight. This world, he thinks, contains just one masterpiece, and that is itself.

People want things to be real. If you give them an excuse, they'll believe you.

The true ENTREPRENEUR is a risk taker, not an excuse maker.

We are all bilingual. We speak the language of indoctrination, but our native tongue is the language of imagination. When we use the language of indoctrination—with its should and shouldn’t, right and wrong, good and bad—we are activating our minds. That’s not what we’re going for here. Because our minds are polluted by our training. In order to get beyond our training, we need to activate our imaginations. Our minds are excuse makers; our imaginations are storytellers. So instead of asking ourselves what’s right or wrong, we must ask ourselves: What is true and beautiful?

As the excuses go up, the bank account goes down. It’ a proven fact that the best excuse makers or what I call, “validators,” have the smallest bank accounts.

The latent abundance of your inner most resources matters less. What matter most is the impact you can make with your inner resources and the distinctive footprints you can leave with what is within you. The excuse not to dare is there for everybody. When you see so many people crowded at the entrance, think of the roofing and if the roofing is too high, think of the next door and if the next door is not penetrable, create a door within the wall.

Change makers take risks and are ready to die for excellence than to give excuses and live for mediocrity.

Our minds are excuse makers; our imaginations are storytellers. So instead of asking ourselves what’s right or wrong, we must ask ourselves: What is true and beautiful?

You’re never too old to go after the dreams God has put in your heart. And for the record, you’re never too young either. Age is never a valid excuse.

... the Scripture is like one big, unbroken story about people who decided to follow God and ended up failing almost as much as they succeeded. After God told Abraham that he was going to have millions of kids, the old man literally laughed in God's face. Jacob was a lying cheat before he met God at Bethel. And he was a lying cheat afterward too. These are two of Israel's greatest patriarchs. Moses was a murderer, a doubter, an excuse-maker. he was chosen to lead God's people out of slavery. David was "a man after God's own heart." But he was also an adulterer. His son, Solomon, was the wisest man who ever lived. But he had hundreds of wives. And Jesus' disciples were all flawed in their own way - from Thomas, the doubter, to Peter, the hothead. With such a long list of people who both followed God and stumbled constantly, why would we assume our experiences would be any different?

ADVENTURERS AVAUNT! There is no greater plague upon the lands than the chartered adventurer. Crown-sanctioned mischief makers, brigands whose thefts, casual murders, rapine and pillage are excused where the same things done by a cobbler or a milkmaid would be answered with severings of hands or other appendages, plus brandings—or all of those and hanging or death by drawing between four horses. Yet there is no more necessary plague. Adventurers make even kings think twice about cruelly oppressing all who pass within reach, teach prudence to high priests and even rogue wizards, and are almost the only curb upon the numbers of dragons and other large and monstrous beasts. On the whole, I think the balance comes out about even. What makes us keep adventuring charters instead of burning them along with their bearers is the entertainment adventurers afford the populace. In hamlets and at waymoots, after one’s grumbled about the weather, taxes, the latest rumors of war and orc raids, and the all-too-paltry gossip about the indiscretions of royalty and nobility, there’s little else to talk about but the foolish escapades of adventurers. Thundaerlel Maurlatrimm Four Decades of Innkeeping published in the Year of the Highmantle

But it makes no sense," she said, "Why would this one death in Paris spark riots throughout the Reich?" "That's what I'm saying, Truus. It isn't the cause of the riots. It's the excuse. When Goebbels said they wouldn't hamper demonstrations, he was inviting this violence. It's what the Nazis do so well. They create a crisis--like they did with the Reichstag fire in '33--which they then use to increase their military control. They want every German to see the havoc they can wreak at the snap of a finger. They want every German to know the violence they can bring to bear on any single person for the slightest perceived offense, What better way to silence citizens opposing the regime than with the prospect that their resistance will jeopardize their families and their lives?" "It isn't just the Nazis now, though. They're saying crowds of ordinary Germans have been flocking into the streets to gape at the wreckage and to cheer. 'Like holiday makers at a fairground,' Joop. Where are the decent German people? Why aren't they standing against this? Where are the leaders of the world?" Joop said, "You put more faith in politicians than they warrant. They cower at the slightest threat to their power, although of course no one but Hitler has any real power in Germany now.

Gulls wheel through spokes of sunlight over gracious roofs and dowdy thatch, snatching entrails at the marketplace and escaping over cloistered gardens, spike-topped walls and treble-bolted doors. Gulls alight on whitewashed gables, creaking pagodas and dung-ripe stables; circle over towers and cavernous bells and over hidden squares where urns of urine sit by covered wells, watched by mule-drivers, mules and wolf-snouted dogs, ignored by hunchbacked makers of clogs; gather speed up the stoned-in Nakashima River and fly beneath the arches of its bridges, glimpsed from kitchen doors, watched by farmers walking high, stony ridges. Gulls fly through clouds of steam from laundries’ vats; over kites unthreading corpses of cats; over scholars glimpsing truth in fragile patterns; over bath-house adulterers; heartbroken slatterns; fishwives dismembering lobsters and crabs; their husbands gutting mackerel on slabs; woodcutters’ sons sharpening axes; candle-makers, rolling waxes; flint-eyed officials milking taxes; etoliated lacquerers; mottled-skinned dyers; imprecise soothsayers; unblinking liars; weavers of mats; cutters of rushes; ink-lipped calligraphers dipping brushes; booksellers ruined by unsold books; ladies-in-waiting; tasters; dressers; filching page-boys; runny-nosed cooks; sunless attic nooks where seamstresses prick calloused fingers; limping malingerers; swineherds; swindlers; lip-chewed debtors rich in excuses; heard-it-all creditors tightening nooses; prisoners haunted by happier lives and ageing rakes by other men’s wives; skeletal tutors goaded to fits; firemen-turned-looters when occasion permits; tongue-tied witnesses; purchased judges; mothers-in-law nurturing briars and grudges; apothecaries grinding powders with mortars; palanquins carrying not-yet-wed daughters; silent nuns; nine-year-old whores; the once-were-beautiful gnawed by sores; statues of Jizo anointed with posies; syphilitics sneezing through rotted-off noses; potters; barbers; hawkers of oil; tanners; cutlers; carters of night-soil; gate-keepers; bee-keepers; blacksmiths and drapers; torturers; wet-nurses; perjurers; cut-purses; the newborn; the growing; the strong-willed and pliant; the ailing; the dying; the weak and defiant; over the roof of a painter withdrawn first from the world, then his family, and down into a masterpiece that has, in the end, withdrawn from its creator; and around again, where their flight began, over the balcony of the Room of the Last Chrysanthemum, where a puddle from last night’s rain is evaporating; a puddle in which Magistrate Shiroyama observes the blurred reflections of gulls wheeling through spokes of sunlight. This world, he thinks, contains just one masterpiece, and that is itself.

Few people are attracted to whiners, complainers, excuse-makers, wimps. Hanging out with a victim is not appealing to most reasonably sane people. Who wants to be around or involved with an emotional cripple? The person in the victim shirt tends to wear out his welcome early. As he should. His thinking, his beliefs, and his behavior are even more repellant to money and wealth than they to other people.

Law Makers who think that they know everything about life just because they are so called "Legal Experts" ... will die one day and face judgement and be Judged by Almighty GOD. On Judgement Day such "Experts" will have no excuse for their blasphemy and will have no hiding place.

The Holy Bible is The Word of GOD. Respect The Word of GOD and be Blessed. Those who reject The Word of GOD or speak against The Word of GOD or despise The Word of GOD do so at their own peril.... Law Makers who think that they know everything about life just because they are so called "Legal Experts" ... will die one day and face judgement and be Judged by Almighty GOD. On Judgement Day such "Experts" will have no excuse for their blasphemy and will have no hiding place.

An addiction to distraction is the end of your creative production. Empire-makers and history-creators take one hour for themselves before dawn, in the serenity that lies beyond the clutches of complexity, to prepare themselves for a world-class day. RULE #2 Excuses breed no genius. Just because you haven’t installed the early-rising habit before doesn’t mean you can’t do it now. Release your rationalizations and remember that small daily improvements, when done consistently over time, lead to stunning results. RULE #3 All change is hard at first, messy in the middle and gorgeous at the end. Everything you now find easy you first found difficult. With consistent practice, getting up with the sun will become your new normal. And automatic. RULE #4 To have the results The Top 5% of producers have, you must start doing what 95% of people are unwilling to do. As you start to live like this, the majority will call you crazy. Remember that being labeled a freak is the price of greatness. RULE #5 When you feel like surrendering, continue.Triumph loves the relentless.

IT BLOWS ME AWAY EVERY TIME I walk into a nice home and meet its proud, overweight, out-of-shape owner. They just don’t get it. Your real home is not your apartment or your house or your city or even your country, but your body. It is the only thing you, your soul and your mind, will always live inside of so long as you walk the earth. It is the single most important physical thing in this world you can take care of. We have a choice: To take care of ourselves, or to simply let time make us worse. And it is right now, at this moment, not later, that we must make this decision. Most people in this world choose to lose. They drag themselves through a second-rate life, overweight and under-energetic. They just let time take its toll. Their waistline increases and their height decreases as they get older and their backs hurt and hunch. Eventually their mobility becomes limited. And they meet their maker well before they should. Then there are the others, the minority who decide to really, truly do something about their health. They exercise, and they watch what they eat, not obsessively, only just enough. They have an understanding of nutritional basics, and workout about 20 – 30 minutes a day, 4 – 5 times a week–less than 1.2% of their time–because that is all they will ever need. They meet life’s obstacles with physical, mental, and spiritual strength. They care about how they look, and they look good. They thrive on the energy exercise gives them every day. How it washes away so many of the bad things in life–depression, anxiety, nervousness, tension, boredom, impatience. It lets them think easily and clearly. They know how much worse their lives would be if they did not exercise, so they simply don’t let that happen. They are in control, not their excuses.

A central function of thought is making sure that one acts in ways that can be persuasively justified or excused to others. Indeed, the process of considering the justifiability of one’s choices may be so prevalent that decision makers not only search for convincing reasons to make a choice when they must explain that choice to others, they search for reasons to convince themselves that they have made the “right” choice.14

With practice, you will learn to understand yourself better and increasingly learn what conviction feels like. As you search for it, you will get better at gearing your efforts to work in a way that will help you get to that feeling. Leaders don’t look for excuses for why they can’t act like an owner. Instead, they embrace the challenge of ownership and encourage their teams to do the same. It helps if, as subordinates, they were regularly encouraged and empowered by their bosses to put themselves in the shoes of decision makers. “Superb professionals define their jobs broadly,” one of my former bosses regularly said to me. “They are always thinking several levels up.” This may explain why many business schools, including Harvard, teach using the case method. This approach certainly can be used to teach analytical techniques, but, for me, it is primarily an exercise in learning to get to conviction. After you’ve studied all the facts of the case on your own, and after you’ve debated those facts in study groups before class and again in class, what do you believe? What would you do if you were in the shoes of the protagonist? The case method attempts to simulate what leaders go through every day. Decision makers are confronted with a blizzard of facts: usually incomplete, often contradictory, and certainly confusing. With help from colleagues, they have to sort things out. Through the case method, students learn to put themselves in the shoes of the decision maker, imagine what that might feel like, and then work to figure out what they believe. This mind-set is invaluable in the workplace. It forces you to use your broad range of skills. It guides you as to what additional analysis and work needs to be done to figure out a particular business challenge. Leaders don’t need to always have conviction, but they do need to learn to search for it. This process never ends. It is a way of thinking. Every day, as you are confronted with new and unexpected challenges, you need to search for conviction. You need to ask yourself: What do I believe? What would I do if I were a decision maker? Aspiring leaders need to resist the temptation to make excuses, such as I don’t have enough power, or it’s not my job, or nobody in the company cares what I think, or there just isn’t time. They must let those excuses go and put themselves mentally in the shoes of the decision maker. From that vantage point, they will start to get a better idea how it feels to bear the weight of ownership.

Yet all these previous persecutions seem almost trivial when we compare them with the sufferings of the Armenians, in which at least 600,000 people were destroyed and perhaps as many as 1,000,000. These earlier massacres, when we compare them with the spirit that directed the Armenian atrocities, have one feature that we can almost describe as an excuse: they were the product of religious fanaticism and most of the men and women who instigated them sincerely believed that they were devoutly serving their Maker. Undoubtedly, religious fanaticism was an impelling motive with the Turkish and Kurdish rabble who slew Armenians as a service to Allah, but the men who really conceived the crime had no such motive. Practically all of them were atheists, with no more respect for Mohammedanism than for Christianity, and with them the one motive was cold-blooded, calculating state policy.” Adolf

zero patience for anybody that came off as a whiner, complainer, or excuse-maker.

He couldn’t resist smoothing his palm over her silky hair. Stroking her like that, over and over again filled him with peace. Concerns about his mill and Steafan and all that Wilhelm might expect from him floated away on a cloud of contentment. Until he felt warm wetness on his skin where her face nestled. “Are ye weeping?” “No,” she said, but her voice caught on a sob. “There,” he said, “now we have both told a lie to the other. We are even.” Whatever had her distraught, her heart wasn’t so heavy that she couldn’t give a small chuckle. “Maybe I’m crying just a little,” she said. “It’s fine, though. Don’t worry. Get some sleep.” “I canna. My da told me a good husband doesna lay his head down for the night if his household isna in order and his wife isna content.” “He sounds like a very responsible man. Like father, like son.” No one had given him as much to feel proud over as this woman. “I do my best to be like him. Now tell me what’s fashin’ you. Is it Steafan? Your eye? Are ye in pain?” Her head rocked on his arm. “No. It’s nothing. Really. Pregnancy can make a girl a little emotional. That’s all.” “Ye miss your home,” he guessed again, ignoring her excuses. “Are ye worrit over finding your box maker?” She was quiet for a moment. “I suppose you could say that.” “Dinna fash. I will do all I can to see you home safe.” “I know,” she said, but she didn’t sound happy.

Nothing worse than a man who makes excuses, blames others, and refuses responsibility for his own actions.” No doubt there were real experiences that underlined the worthlessness of excuse makers for these men.

How to make choices that work for you: 1) You are no longer a victim; you are a choice maker! Start seeing yourself that way and take responsibility for the choices you are making from here on out. If you want to lose weight, stop eating unhealthy food. If you are unhappy, figure out what choices you are making that are contributing to your unhappiness. There are no excuses here; if you don’t like what’s happening, fix it. If you don’t want to fix it, then don’t complain about it! 2) Make

The implication that Mormons are always laboring to convey is that anything sacred must be kept secret. This would presumably excuse the death oath of secrecy imposed upon Temple Mormons as a legitimate necessity for preserving the sacredness of the ceremonies performed inside Mormon Temples. However, there is neither biblical nor logical support for this. There is not one example in the Bible (or the Book of Mormon, for that matter) of any ritual, ceremony, or act of worship that was practiced in secret-much less an example of an oath forfeiting one's life for revealing something sacred.

Language is my favorite tool, so I use it to help people build a bridge between what’s in front of them and what’s inside them. I have learned that if we want to hear the voice of imagination, we must speak to it in the language it understands. If we want to know who we were meant to be before the world told us who to be— If we want to know where we were meant to go before we were put in our place— If we want to taste freedom instead of control— Then we must relearn our soul’s native tongue. When women write to me in the language of indoctrination—when they use words like good and should and right and wrong—I try to speak back to them in the language of imagination. We are all bilingual. We speak the language of indoctrination, but our native tongue is the language of imagination. When we use the language of indoctrination—with its should and shouldn’t, right and wrong, good and bad—we are activating our minds. That’s not what we’re going for here. Because our minds are polluted by our training. In order to get beyond our training, we need to activate our imaginations. Our minds are excuse makers; our imaginations are storytellers. So instead of asking ourselves what’s right or wrong, we must ask ourselves: What is true and beautiful? Then our imagination rises inside us, thanks us for finally consulting it after all these years, and tells us a story.

Our minds are excuse-makers; our imaginations are storytellers.

Watch out. Excuses can be habit forming.

Coming from someone who’s had more pricks than a second-hand dartboard, you’ll excuse me if I don’t take that to heart.

our culture has become one of complaining, whining, and indecision. A culture of excuse makers. We overthink too much. We Google problems for hours and days. We talk about what we might do or not do with every person who will listen. We watch hundreds of videos or listen to numerous podcasts trying to “hack” our way into a better version of our lackluster life.

Before I proceed fully to open up this metaphor, let me say that though we shall use military terms this morning, and stirring speech, it should ever be remembered that we have no war against persons, and that the weapons which we use are not such as are forged for the deadly conflicts of mankind. The wars of a Christian are against principles, against sins, against the miseries of mankind, against that Evil One who has led man astray from his Maker. Our wars are against the iniquity which keeps man an enemy to himself. The weapons that we use are holy arguments and consecrated lives, devotion and prayer to God, teaching and example among the sons of men. Ours is battling for the peace, and fighting for rest. We disturb the world to make it quiet, and turn it upside down to set it right….We have no sympathy with any other war, but count it an evil of the direst sort, let it be disguised as it may. Now with that caution, whatever I shall seem to say will not sound as though I loved or excused ordinary warfare—for nothing can be more abhorrent to the Christian man than wholesale slaughter.

All of the self-justifying explanations by the supporters of the war—selfishness, cowardice, decadence, ignorance, Communist sympathies—were excuses that failed to confront the basic challenge that the protesters (and Morgenthau too) were raising about the war, namely that the very reasons the United States had become involved in Vietnam, the Domino Theory and the doctrine of a monolithic Communism, were fundamentally false and had no application to the world as it actually existed. The real question to be answered is how “the kids” could have been right about this and the country’s political leaders and opinion makers so very wrong.

Our minds are excuse makers; our imaginations are storytellers.

RULE #1 An addiction to distraction is the end of your creative production. Empire-makers and history-creators take one hour for themselves before dawn, in the serenity that lies beyond the clutches of complexity, to prepare themselves for a world-class day. RULE #2 Excuses breed no genius. Just because you haven’t installed the early-rising habit before doesn’t mean you can’t do it now. Release your rationalizations and remember that small daily improvements, when done consistently over time, lead to stunning results. RULE #3 All change is hard at first, messy in the middle and gorgeous at the end. Everything you now find easy you first found difficult. With consistent practice, getting up with the sun will become your new normal. And automatic. RULE #4 To have the results The Top 5% of producers have, you must start doing what 95% of people are unwilling to do. As you start to live like this, the majority will call you crazy. Remember that being labeled a freak is the price of greatness. RULE #5 When you feel like surrendering, continue.Triumph loves the relentless.

Mom sends me another text with pictures of cakes she found on Pinterest for a gender reveal party. “How do you feel about having a gender reveal party?” Iask. “What is that?” Archer gets up to make a pot of coffee. “Basically a party announcing if the baby is a boy or girl. You don’t tell anyone until the end, and you pop a balloon with pink or blue confetti in it or something.” “And it’s a thing people donow?” “Yeah. If you have a halfway decent Instagram following and you don’t do one, people will wonder what’s wrong withyou.” Archer chuckles. “I don’t really care either way. Any excuse to have a party is good in my book. Do you want to haveone?” “I know they’re a little lame, but yeah.” I bite my lip, looking at the photos my mom sent. I haven’t told anyone besides my family and Marissa about the baby. I’m a modern woman with a successful job, and shouldn’t worry about people judging me over having a baby when I’m not married. But I do, just abit. “Then let’s doit.” Archer’s words make me smile. “My mom is going to go crazy over this. She wants to know where to have the party?” It’s a simple question, but I know it raises the same concerns to Archer too. He turns on the coffee maker and comes back to the table. “If you’re going to take impressive Instagram pictures, your parents’ farm has the perfect setting.” “I’m glad you have your priorities in check.” He nods. “I gotcha, babe. We’ll make sure to have everything posed perfectly. I’ll even take pictures of all my food before I eat it. Actually, we could invest in some of that realistic-looking fake food. I hear it photographs better.” I look at Archer, a big smile on my face. He makes it so easy tofall. “Good idea. Anything for the likes.” “Exactly. The number of likes is a direct correlation to how loved this baby is. We really have to step itup.

What separates the action taker from the excuse maker is the habit of acting.

It does not mean someone with impaired decision-making should be excused - it means that the 'normal' individual in relation to them should be mindful that there are indeed real reasons why impaired decision-makers make their 'as is' decisions without rational conscience, responsibility and or perpetual lack of gratitude / remorse. You may find these individuals make (important) decisions out of anger, anxiety, fear, lack of confidence, sarcasm and / or identity deficiency - as projection for shielding a weak sense of self.