It’s a running joke amongst my group of friends that I can’t say no. Sometimes it’s as if I made a Yes Man style covenant at birth to say yes to everything and anything.
The problem is that whilst my inability to say no has led me down some interesting, rewarding and down right hilarious paths, it can also be a source of stress, exhaustion and disappointment. When it comes to organizing coffee catch-ups, lunches and nights out my instinctive repetition of the word yes means that I very rarely have any time to myself. Consequently, my degree, sleeping pattern and bank balance all start to suffer. Saying yes isn’t just restricted to my social life either, it extends to doing favours for people when I don’t really have the time; lending them money when I don’t always have the means and buying or signing up for ridiculous things because of the ‘really lovely person’ in the town centre. Of course none of this is the fault of the person making requests, indeed the responsibility resides with me and my apparent phobia of “that word”. So this week I’ve decided to do something about it.
According to researchers in North Carolina, we consistently overcommit to activities because we are all predisposed to expect a future surplus of time. The researchers claim that the very nature of time tricks us, allowing us to forget just how easily small commitments fill up our day – sneaky I know! Apparently we are all programed to blissfully assume that there’s ample time to do everything we’ve planned to – but tomorrow soon becomes today, and yesterday’s naive “Yes” morphs into today’s “Oh, whoops!” Eventually we find ourselves making (comically implausible) excuses, or becoming completely overstretched and stressed out. One common sense way to get around this is to keep a diary, or at least a mental check of what you have to do in the week so your plans don’t run away with you.
Whilst that all makes perfect sense, my problem is that I often say yes even when I know I don’t have enough time to do something, and most problematically when I don’t actually want to do it. Sound familiar? According to Oprah we suffer from the suspiciously euphemistic ‘Disease to Please’ – which as tragic as it sounds, means we’re the people that always say yes to make others see us as the ‘nice person’ who they can call on or count upon at the last minute, no matter what. Every time we say yes when we don’t mean it we’re basically making ourselves into a doormat which reads: “Please like me, I’ll do anything!”
Still finding those two letters too scary to utter? Here are a few tips I’ve uncovered on how to coax them out. Firstly, most of the time we don’t have to give an answer immediately, so tell people you need time to think about it; this gives you space to consider whether you actually want to do whatever’s being asked of you, and removes the anxiety caused by having to say no to someone’s face, especially immediately after the question is asked. After all, a detached text or Facebook message is way more forgiving on the conscience. Also remember that saying no does not always have to be synonymous with being unhelpful either. If you can’t or don’t want to do something, try redirecting the person to someone that might be interested.
Oh, and as for those brilliantly crafted excuses… Don’t use them! Speaking from experience, excuses simply give people an opportunity to contest your reply and to pressure you into changing your mind, or worse still, to offer a heartfelt solution to your imagined and often far-fetched predicament:
“Sorry I can’t do lunch today, someone has been following me around all morning, so I had to take a longer route home, you know, to throw them off my trail, only now I dare not leave the house.”
“OMG, stay inside – we’ll bring the food to you – lock the doors and only answer if you hear me ring the bell three times to the tune of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.”
However, joking and ‘coping mechanisms’ aside we eventually need to learn that saying no is okay. It doesn’t give off the impression that we’re selfish or uncaring individuals, but (at the risk of challenging Oprah for her self-empowerment crown) being able to say no does tell other people that you respect yourself and that you’ve got other priorities, just like everyone else.
So, here’s to saying NO! Say it loud and say it proud !