Saying Yes when you mean No
Do you ever find yourself overcommitting to doing for others that you live in a constant state of exhaustion and feeling overwhelmed? That was me for a long time. Throughout my whole life, I have been a yes person. If anyone were to ask me to do any type of favor for them, I said yes as if I was on autopilot, without even thinking twice. I would sacrifice my wellbeing and my goals so that other people could accomplish theirs. Every day I would wake up drained and anxious all while feeling like I wasn’t really doing anything. I am a supporter, and for a long time I loved playing that sacrificial role of depleting myself for others.
I didn’t like to use the word “no”, because, to me, that meant I wasn’t committed to the relationship, job or overall goal of what I had said no to. I said yes to going to any events my friends were throwing, any help my family needed or any new task my job wanted me to perform. I only said no if I was doing something else that I had said yes to. What I didn’t realize was how much of my power I was giving away by continuously saying the word yes. It’s easy to be okay with self-destruction if it’s in the name of helping other people.
I consciously chose my first “no” in February of 2019 while I was interviewing for a new job. The job that I had at the time was on the brink of closing its doors, and I had this desperation to find a job. I did the initial job interview and they were offering a beautiful salary, with benefits and would have cut my commute from five hours a day to one hour total. On paper, it looked like the perfect position, but in my heart, I knew it wasn’t right for me. I knew it wasn’t work I would enjoy, and for the first time ever I didn’t want to allow my circumstances to control my decision. A few days after that interview, I wrote an email to the interviewers to tell them that I had found a different role. After hitting send and pausing for a second, I realized I used those words because I actually cared what their perception of me was. In reality, I hadn’t found a new role. I just didn’t want to actually say I didn’t think the role was for me. How often do we go through life choosing the words we speak so that people perceive us a certain way? I believe this need for positive perception is one of the reasons why people say yes when they know they should say no.
After that moment, I made the decision that I needed to stay firmly planted in my “no’s” to preserve my vision for my life. In finding a new job, I knew I needed to wait until the opportunity that was right for me presented itself. I went through two other interviews where I had to say no and each time I grew more confident in speaking my truth and my desires. This led me to getting VERY clear on what I wanted and needed from a new job opportunity. Once I was able to declare what I wanted, the right opportunity presented itself. However, this was after 4 months of saying no to other things and 3 months of no full-time job at all. I had to trust that all of these “no’s” would eventually lead to the right yes.
This also can be implemented in relationships. For a long time, I felt that if I said no to a friend that they would think I didn’t care about them and then no longer want to be friends with me. There would be many days where I would leave work and go meet someone for something they were doing and get home at eleven or twelve at night exhausted an unprepared for the next day. If someone needed financial help I would give even if it meant me having to sacrifice until my next paycheck.
In June of 2019 I joined Leadership Team 175 and this has been one of the most eye-opening experiences of my life. During this process, we have spent 90 days setting and accomplishing radical goals for ourselves. Our team is large and with each person’s goals there have been many events. The majority of my team lives in NYC and I live about an hour and forty-five minutes away. The people pleaser and supporter in me started this journey wanting to say yes to every event everyone was doing. I soon realized that this wasn’t something I could sustain, and that that mentality of “doing” was something that showed up in pretty much every area of my life. Every time I couldn’t attend an event I felt a sense of shame that I had let someone down.
Acts of service have been how love has been shown to me and, thus, how I show love. I had to wrestle with the different ways that love and, ultimately, support can actually look. Sometimes you need to say “no” so that you can get adequate rest. Sometimes a “no” is self-care.
It was also easy to fall into the pattern of continuously doing something for someone else so that I wasn’t focused on my own goals and desires. It was my excuse for not accomplishing my goals. Sometimes we create busyness for ourselves to hide behind so that we are not actually seen. There have been many times in my life where I said yes when I wanted or needed to say no. I wanted to hold space for other people to be great and hit goals without wanting that for myself as well. There is room for both. You can say yes and you can say no. Relationships should not be dependent on what or how much you can do for someone. People that deserve space in your life will be there even if you there are times when you have to say “no”.
Take a moment and reflect:
Where do you say yes when you should say no?
What could your life look like if you made decisions based off of what you wanted instead of what other people think about you?
What does holding space for yourself mean?
What is one thing you can do this week that is you saying yes to yourself?