Sometimes you depend on somebody and the person doesn't come through. When you ask what happened the person might say "I forgot".
What does this mean?
I means [if the person is telling the truth] "It wasn't important enough to me to remember". Have you ever gone to a wedding and the Kallah can't be found. Finally, after hours of frantic searching, she was found at the local mall. "What happened??" The Kallah is asked. She responds "Ohhhh, I forgot! There was a sale on ceiling fans, two for the price of one, and I was soooo excited I TOTALLY forgot about my wedding."
Never happened. Why? Because a wedding is faaaar too important an event to forget. If it is your own wedding that is. Someone elses wedding is a different story. I forget simchas sometimes but only because they are not important enough to me to remember.
People won't say "Ohhhh - I am sorry I forgot about your son's bris. I have so many other things in life going on that are SO MUCH more important to me than whether you had a son that I TOTALLY forgot. It will DEFINITELY happen again."
It's not polite to say that [and I don't suggest it either] but that is the fact.
Or take tardiness [coming late] for example. "I was STUCK in a meeting." [Recently, someone promised me a ride somewhere and I waited about 45 minutes for him to come. He explained that he was stuck in a meeting and thus couldn't come at the agreed time]. REALLY? You were "stuck"? Someone stood by the door and refused to let you out? Or maybe you decided that staying in this meeting was more important to you than inconveniencing me?? You are not a victim and presenting yourself as such disempowers you and makes you a less effective doer in life.
"I got caught in traffic". Meaning, it is NOT MY FAULT. I am a victim. It is the traffics fault!! I knew a person [ע"ה] who had a job for 28 years and didn't come late ONE TIME!!! What about traffic? The answer is that when he planned his trip to work he took traffic into account and acted accordingly so that he would arrive on time even if there was traffic.
Sometimes people give no excuse and they just come late. Why? Again - because being on time isn't important enough for them. If we are having an hour long meeting and he is being paid 300 dollars a minute such that every minute late is 300 less dollars - he is not coming late.
If people would say the truth it would go like this "I came late because I don't really want to be here in the first place so I pushed it off as much as possible. And if we end on time that means that I will spend less time than I thought I would in this situation I don't want to be in."
So some people come to shul at 11am shabbos morning. A mechayeh!! They cut davening down from 2 and a half hours to a mere half hour followed by a kiddush which will take the same amount of time. Less davening with no less kugel!! Ahhhhhhhh!!
Lesson: You are not a victim. The mark of successful people is that they take responsibility for their actions. Responsibility - Response-ability. The ability to respond.
