'I Don't Know How' Is Not a Valid Excuse.

CA Anoop Dangwal (CA, M.com, B.com,) (899 Points)

25 December 2013  

By Steve Pavlina

 

When you say something like this:

I wish I could write better, but my writing skills aren’t very good.

I wish I could write better, but I’m too lazy and undisciplined to do anything about it. I also have low self-esteem, which prevents me from believing I can correct this deficiency. You should probably avoid me and spend your time with someone more worthy.

As an adult you’re responsible for your own education. If you find it deficient in some area, educate yourself into proficiency.

Many people find their early education lacking when they reach adulthood. No one really knows what knowledge and skills will be important to you later in life. So they guess and they often guess wrong.

In order to achieve goals in life, we had to fill in many gaps in our formal education. This required a disciplined approach to self education. Regularly identify gaps in our knowledge and skills that could hold os back from achieving our goals. Then set educational goals to fill in those gaps, and work step by step to achieve those goals. Usually this involves a combination of reading, connecting with experts and learning from them, and our own experimentation.

Never whine about your lack of skills or your weak education. Never use a lack of know-how as an excuse for not being able to achieve a goal. That’s low class behavior, and it surely won’t help. 

You may feel deficient in some areas. That’s normal. If you feel your schooling didn’t do a very good job, that’s a shame, but it is what it is.

If you don’t know how, learn how. Use that fancy brain that learned how to walk, talk, and read. It’s still capable of further learning, is it not? Of course it is!

If you’re going to get anywhere in life, you must assume 100% responsibility for your ongoing education. Maybe your parents and the school system got you off to a good start. Maybe they didn’t. Whatever happened in that regard, the past is the past. You must now look to the future. Whatever you didn’t learn back then, you can start learning today. A few years from now, you can have the equivalent of a Ph.D in a subject you never studied before. You can master a new language. You can become an expert on a subject in which you’re merely a novice today.

Using “I don’t know how” as an excuse is truly pathetic today. In the information age where you can begin searching for such answers in seconds, this tired excuse only makes you look foolish, lazy, and unworthy of success. Even young children wouldn’t be stopped by such a phony obstacle.

The next time you feel inclined to say “I don’t know how,” say instead, “I’m learning how.” At least have the sense to Google “how to ___.” The information you need to get started is already at your fingertips.

Think about an educational deficiency you’d like to correct, and set a new educational goal right now. What exactly do you wish to learn, and how soon? Then plan out some of the steps you’ll need to take. Identify books to read, courses to take, and experts to talk to. Now get to work and start learning. Start by picking one book, buying it, and reading the first chapter. No more feeble excuses!