When we’re asked to do something it’s nice to be able to say yes. If you take any sort of sales training you want the customer to say yes. Our world is a plethora of ads which all implore us to say yes. Say yes to toothpaste, say yes to this restaurant, say yes to this theme park, say yes to this car, say yes to this house, just to name a few. In short, people love when you say yes. Your friends love when you say yes to going out with them, your fiancé hopes you’ll say yes when he asks you to marry him, and your boss hopes you’ll say yes to staying when you have an offer somewhere else.
I say all of that to make the point that saying no is needed at times more than yes. I love to say yes but I also have been learning the power of no. When my friends want me to go out with them I always want to say yes because I’m a social person and I love being with people, but I’ve been learning to exercise the power of no. Should we say yes to our friends when we’ve been up for sixteen hours and have to work the next day? Or when we have work to do and we want to procrastinate on it, but we know we shouldn’t.
If you’re feeling overwhelmed, learn to say no. There have been times in my life where the realization of saying no has been greater. When you are faced with time restraints, chances are there are several things that you should say no to. When you are faced with the choice of whether to continue in a bad or time consuming habit you should say no. When you are faced with the reoccurring temptation to do something detrimental to you and those closest to you, the answer should be no.
No is a powerful word. Using the word No can declutter your entire life. We live in a world which has a constant pressure on us to say yes, those that know when to use the word No appropriately will be much farther down the road than those which continually say yes. Evaluate your life, what are some things you could say no to? They may not be bad or evil, but they also aren’t helping you achieve your goals, so say no to them, declutter your life.