Action Step:
Which of the tips will you try first?
Chapter 24: Say “NO” to them and “YES” to yourself
“I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please
everybody.”
Bill Cosby
Here is another one of these small exercises that improved my life a lot: When I
stopped wanting to please others and started being myself, a lot of it came with
the word “No”. Every time you say “No” when you mean “No”, you are actually
saying “Yes” to yourself! Before learning to say “No”, I often went out with my
friends although I didn’t want to or went to events I didn’t enjoy. The result was
I was there physically but mentally I was in another place and honestly I was not
the best company. When I decided that a “Yes” is a “Yes” and a “No” is a “No”,
I felt much better. I went out less with my friends and telling them “NO” was
hard at the beginning, but the result was that when I was with my friends I was
fully there.
In my work life, the impact was even bigger. When I started working in Spain I
wanted to be a good colleague and said yes to every favor I was asked for. Guess
what happened? I ended up being totally overwhelmed at work, because I was
asked for a lot of favors – usually work nobody else wanted to do. It took me a
while to put my foot down, but finally I said “Enough!”. From then on my first
answer to all questions for favors was “NO! Sorry. Can’t do it. Very busy at the
moment!” By starting to say “No” often, I improved my work life a lot and
actually freed up a lot of time. But make sure you say “NO” without feeling
guilty! You can explain to the person in question that it’s not anything personal
against them, but for your own wellbeing. I could still do my colleagues a favor,
but only if I had enough time and decided to. Suddenly I was in the driver’s seat.
If I was up for it I would mention to the colleague in question that I’m only
doing a favor and in no case do I want to end up doing the job. Selfish? Yes! But
keep in mind who the most important person in your life is. That’s right! YOU
are the most important person in your life! You have to be well! Only if you are
well yourself, can you be well towards others and from this level you can
contribute to others, but first be well yourself. You can always buy some time
and say “maybe” at first, until you come to a definite decision. Life gets a lot
easier if you start saying “No”!
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