excuse me?

Excuses come in the form of out and out rationalization or denial of responsibility. Those special projects we were going to work on would be done, if only we weren't so tired after a day's work at the factory. This same tiredness doesn't seem to affect other areas of our life such as Sunday night bowling.
Let's take bowling for another example. Why is it that we have a bad shoulder or knee which only bothers us on nights when we haven't bowled so well?
Research into the world of excuse making, can be very enlightning. It seems there are many different strategies involved in this explanation of, or preparation for, failure.
According to Dr. C.R. Snyder, clinical psychologist at the University of Kansas, men and women make an equal number of excuses, but women use a verbally more sophisticated strategy, as opposed to men's macho bold-faced denial, or self-handicapping alibis for poor performance.
Starting back in early childhood, parents who love their children very much, can still expect a great deal from them, and set standards accordingly. Years later, these same children often catch themselves making "excuses" for not living up to those standards. Dr. Snyder points out that self-concept develops in the early school years when children begin learning to compare their idealized version of themselves with reality. Seven-year-olds start worrying about what others think of them and by the age of nine kids start dealing with the concept of self-criticism.
Excuse making becomes a way of protecting young egos. Children sometimes feel that criticism is tantamount to epic rejection. After reading Dr. Snyder's theories, many of us can probably identify with techniques we use in our own excuse making process.
Plain and simple "denial of responsibility" is one of the most common. For example, that scratch on the car was probably made when the wife had the car last, not when I "barely brushed" that car in the parking lot at work.
Or how about the "it really wasn't that bad" ploy. The diet wasn't really broken, as the peice of cake was small and there wasn't much ice cream in the bowl.
Research shows that the most popular excuse making technique is the "extenuating circumstances" one. If some fan hadn't hollered too loud, that flyball wouldn't have been dropped out in center field. Of course, there is some half-truth to this technique, which makes the biased account more favourable to the excuse maker.
Dr. Snyder's points out that there are ways to end or at least reduce excuse making. First of all, we can lower any unrealistically high standards we may have set for ourselves. We probably have spent an awful lot of time trying to explain (make excuses for) why we are not perfect at various things. We can try writing a few small articles before jumping head-on into an epic novel. Or we can learn to be happy with a few good bowling scores, instead of always shooting for that "perfect game."
By taking things slowly and systematically anyone can get their excuse making under control. Dr. Snyder assures us of this.
The great William Shakespeare gave us the real reason to try and put a halt to excuses when he said "And ofentimes excusing of a fault/Doth make the fault worse by the excuse."