Perfectly Imperfect and loving it. - Saying no
And today, I want to continue the series Perfectly Imperfect and loving it. - Saying no
Today is a hard one for a lot of people. It's about saying no. Often times we have this perception that saying yes makes us perfect because people expect us to be able to drop everything that we are working on and help them. Or people expect that we have more capacity to offer than what we really have. Because we get in this trap of thinking, we have to be perfect and we have to say yes. We devalue ourselves and we do things that we really don't want to do or we commit to so many things we could not possibly complete all of those commitments even if we tried really hard. The problem is most of us try really, really hard and end up being burnt out and miserable. So today we're going to talk about how do you say no. For starters, let's talk about just say no in general. You have to be to say no thanks, no, I'm not interested, no, I don't want to do that, thanks for asking. You can be nice about it but just say no. Don't say let me think about it because then they're going to follow up with you. And you still have that idea that you have to say yes and you struggle with just say no.
I know somebody may say I can't say no to my boss and I don't think you should say no to your boss as long as it is not an inappropriate request. We all know that if your boss makes an inappropriate request, the answer is no. When I worked for all the different bosses in my past, I just always kept a list of all the things that I was working on. And I would say hey here's the list of priorities where do you want me to prioritize this in the things that I have to get done today. I'll be happy to do it but how do you want me to get it done for you? Ad most of all the priorities and things that I was working on they would decide for themselves and ask somebody else to handle it. How do you say no when it's somebody you love and you really care about them? You want to help them but you just don't have the capacity.
The first thing I think you need to separate the idea that being perfect requires a yes. It doesn't. We don’t need to be perfect. We need to live lives that we were excited to get up in the morning and look at the next opportunity that we have. So I want you to just ask yourself a couple questions when people make requests of you.
The first question is, do I want to do this?
Does it energize me?
Do I need to do this? There's going to be some times when we have a request that comes that we don't want to do it, but we need to. Then I want you to ask yourself
If I say yes to this will I regret it?
I think those three simple questions can help you really understand at your gut level. Do I want to do this or not?
I think those three simple questions can help you really understand at your gut level.
Do I want to do this or not?
Then I want you to practice this if it doesn't energize you if it's not something that you have to do because you have to take your kids to school or you have to go grocery shopping if you want to eat. I want you to say no, no thank you, thank you for asking but I can't do that, I appreciate you considering me but I'm not available, thank you for asking. Whatever it is that you decide is your phrase for saying no I want you to practice saying it all the time. You have to reprogram your mind to be very comfortable with the idea of saying no.
practice saying yes to things that energize you.
I want you to practice saying yes to things that energize you. Things that make you excited that can help you get to your next level. I want you to think about it ahead of time. What are the things that make me feel energized and I want to say yes to and what are the things that make me feel lost and I don't want to do those. The more you practice being more decisive and making up your mind about those kinds of things, the easier it's going to be to say no when somebody makes a request for you to volunteer to serve on the committee that has to hand out donuts at 7:30 in the morning. You'll be more comfortable saying No thank I appreciate your consideration. So practice that this week.