Do not Attempt to Defend an Indefensible Position

So I’m trying to sell off some of my worldly possessions. No, I’m not going from some Zen enlightenment kind of thing, I just see no need to put crap on my shelf for ten years and then decide I want to throw it away.

Well, I put some of my items up for sale on a local forum, people respond, and I didn’t do a damn thing. People got pissed that I wasn't not responding. I really had no excuse. The truth is that I just never got around to calling these people back. I would tell myself “tonight I’m going to call people back,” and then I just watch TV all night.

Today, I gave myself a hard deadline to call the people back; and I did. I left messages like “I’m sorry I took so long to call you back. I wish I had a good excuse, but I don’t. I’m bum and bad seller. If you’re still interested, call me back . . .”

This is something I learned from a George Clooney article. He said “I you try to defend and indefensible position and you look bad. Admit you’re wrong and people respect that. Clooney said "Before they could kill me on Batman & Robin, I said, 'It's a bad film, and I'm the worst thing in it.' You try to defend an indefensible position, you'll look like a schmuck. The guys I dig don't do that. Look at Winston Churchill. He said, 'These are our shortcomings. Now let's get past it,'"

Immediately, I got some callbacks. Someone even said “I love your message; I’ve been there too.” (and this was the guy who wrote “HELLO!?!? ARE YOU GOING TO CALL ME???!”) And then we set up a time to meet so they can buy my stuff.