“What’s Your Excuse?” Yet another meme that I deeply hate.

By saying that people need an “excuse” in order to have a larger body or not exercise regularly, you are diminishing their own personal goals and motivations in life. You’re saying that all other aspects of their life are completely unimportant. Any valid reasons for focusing their attention on other goals are nothing more than “excuses” that should be brushed aside.

This is a huge problem. Your body should only be one section of what makes you you. Your hopes, your dreams, your passions and your loves are also important parts of your life. If those involve fitness? Hey, then I’m sure you’ll have a lot of fun weight lifting and running and attaining that dream body of your’s. But if they don’t? Then I’m sure you’ll lead an incredibly happy and fulfilling life while doing whatever it is that you enjoy most. If that means that you don’t have the time, energy, or the desire to have 6-pack abs, then that’s a perfectly valid decision that you have the right to make. It is never an “excuse.”

What’s more, the majority of these “What’s your excuse?” memes tend to exploit people with physical disabilities. 9/10 will contain a person with prosthetic limbs or birth defects that have caused them to have no arms/legs. This is then put forward as something that could have been an “excuse,” yet the person instead rose above it and pursued a fitness lifestyle. Holding them up as this prime example of fitness is just a way of ignoring all the other aspects of their lives. It’s saying that their physical accomplishments are the only ones that matter. It’s saying that they solely exist as a way of inspiring other people towards a life of thinness. That’s….twisted.

Trying to compare our lives to the lives of these strangers is a false correlation. You can’t simply say “Look! They’re exactly like you! Except their life is harder and they still managed to look better than you!” That will never, ever be the case. These memes ignore the other privileges and hardships that people have in life. Wealth, access to a variety of food, “good” genetics, medical care, an emotional support network - Not everyone has access to these, yet these are some of the most important parts of attaining that stereotypically fit body type.

Don’t do this - Don’t compare your situation to that of anyone else. I don’t care if you’re the love child of Jillian Michaels and Arnold Schwarzenegger - You are under no obligation to exercise daily or have a muscular body. You are perfectly justified in sitting on the couch all day long, if that is what you want to do. Your personal desires and goals in life are not an “excuse” for not exercising.

So if someone asks “What’s your excuse?” just reply “I don’t want to.” That’s all that they ever need to know.