Excuses, Excuses
It is nothing new for people to have bad personal habits like being unorganized, messy, or perpetually late. It is also not new for people to make excuses for themselves. What is new, is people hijacking actual physiological and psychological conditions to opt out of taking accountability for themselves.
Time Blindness. Have you heard of this? This is being defined as people who don’t have the ability to accurately conceptualize time and, therefore, under or overestimate how long it will take them to complete a task. This leads to them being very late, very early, missing deadlines, or missing events completely. It is not uncommon for those diagnosed with conditions like ADD and ADHD to have this as a symptom.
I get that. Someone who has trouble focusing and has a short attention span not being able to determine how long it will take to complete something makes absolute sense.
Unfortunately, this is being watered down by a number of people who just can’t keep their shit together and are self-diagnosing. This is being specifically associated with Gen-Z in the news stories and social media posts that are catching traction. As it seems to go, these kids (yeah, they are kids) are claiming to be afflicted with “Time Blindness” without any input or diagnosis from a mental health professional. Translate that: they cannot manage their time, have no concept of punctuality, and want to live on their own schedule so they claim to have “Time Blindness”.
Did I mention they want to have special allocations at jobs because of this? Yes, show up when they want. Longer or no deadlines for projects. Self-determined pace of work.
Us older folks call that a lack of discipline. Get your shit together. Learn what “Lombardi Time” is. Do your fucking job. Take responsibility for yourself. And STOP MAKING EXCUSES.
This goes hand in hand with things like being “body positive”. Listen, if you’re proud of your body, good for you. Never take anyone else’s shit. You like your hair, your body shape, your level of fitness? Good on you. But don’t ever make the mistake of thinking that because you like your body it automatically means you are healthy. Overweight is overweight. Obese is obese. Unhealthy habits that lead to heart conditions, cardiovascular conditions, diabetes, and other physical ailments are NOT healthy, no matter how much you love your body.
When a doctor tells you that you’re killing yourself because you eat like shit and get no exercise, make sure you tell that medical professional that you are “body positive” and his opinion doesn’t matter. Then pay your bill and go be happy and unhealthy. But STOP MAKING EXCUSES.
There is a significant difference between a medical/psychological diagnosis and YOUR OPINION. Unless you are a damn doctor or mental health professional, YOUR OPINION only works for YOU. No one else has ANY obligation to listen to it, abide by it, or give you special privilege because of it. STOP MAKING EXCUSES.
It isn’t fair to the people who are actually suffering or have been diagnosed with physical or mental issues for someone to just decide they have it too. You’re screwing someone else because you read somewhere about this thing and you think you have that thing too and now you want special treatment. That’s not how that works. It’s not fair to them.
Get off your ass. Get your shit together. If you love yourself, that’s great. Honestly, it is the most important thing, but that doesn’t mean you get a free pass for being lazy, or late, or unorganized, or undisciplined. STOP MAKING EXCUSES.
By the way, “Lombardi Time” means if you are 5 minutes early, you are already 10 minutes late. Do the math on that. But for the love of God, STOP MAKING EXCUSES.