Simple Thoughts on Saying No: Honor Your Values, Encourage Others to Respect Your Time

There are times when your mouth says “yes”, but your heart doesn’t do the same. You can feel / hear / sense those two opposite voices, but you ignore the one in your heart. Denying them, you give your time and energy to others and leave all the stresses to yourself.

Can we just say “no” to whatever against our capability? Saying no to overcommitment, for example. Means we keep saying no even if they say “as a good friend of theirs, you are always obliged to be there for them no matter what”.

Can we say no without any worries to whatever destroys our emotional / mental health? Just saying those two letters without thinking: they’re important to me so I must help them whenever they call. Can we put a little bit of limit to our yeses?

Well, let me congratulate those who can. But for those who are saying you can’t, nothing holds you back but your fear to upset others. It’s all fears about others.

Then, now you wonder how to get rid of the fears, and how to simply say no to others, right? Here in this blog post, I'll share my little strategy that has something to do with your thought process. But, before you continue reading, let me tell you that now, you can support me by clicking buy me french fries.

Thanks in advance!

To me, you can’t say know just because you’re afraid to make your love ones unhappy, you’re so scared to create a negative persona, and you’re worried about a lot of things that others will say. When you think of those fears, I bet there’s a lot of “what if” to avoid and stop them hurting your head. Now, in order to confront and fight them with me, let me add some other “what if”. If you really want to change your constant yes, ask yourself all these questions below.

• What if you cannot make your own enjoyment because you always say yes to fulfil others needs?
• What if your constant yes leads you to overpreoritize others and not yourself?
• What if others think you’re so easy to take advantage of, and they make you neglect your own needs and wants?

• What if you cannot design your own path of life / achieve your personal goals because of that constant yes?

Simple Thoughts on Saying No: Thoughts Reversal

As an Asian (Indonesian), I have been taught with all the values about being nice, kind, and friendly to everyone, don’t care if they’re the ones we know or strangers. I have been familiarized with what’s called humanity, which make me who I am now. And yes, with the values I’ve received, saying no can be so difficult. However, difficulties are completely different with impossibilities.

Something difficult is still possible to happen, that’s my first principal. From there, I reverse my way of thinking. Still coming from my understanding of being nice, friendly and kind, I learn to honor my values and encourage others to do the same. Here’s how I do it.

Being nice = Not Comforting Others above Oneself

From what I’ve heard, being nice is often defined as welcoming, accepting and comforting people. I have never been told oneself is mentioned on the old / traditional moral and cultural value. It might be because the previous generations of my people were mostly not self-center oriented ones. But, I believe cultures evolve in their origin.

So, I add the word not always and give a little bit of change in viewing the definition of being nice. Being nice = welcoming, accepting and comforting oneself and others, but not saying always yes to whatever people want us to do. So, I consider myself still not being nice when I always say yes to others without being honest to myself. That way of thinking helps me, so let’s hope it helps you, too!

Being Friendly = Not Forgetting Your Privacy

Being friendly means treating people as friends, right? It means an act of showing friendliness, right? So, I don’t reverse anything here. I only add one thing to not forget about.

Viewing friendliness, I treat others as friendly as possible without being too much tolerant. Means I need to say no if they cross my boundaries. I need to stop them if they start disrespecting me or my privacy. And speaking of privacy, I feel like writing a separate post about it.

Being Kind = Not Letting Others Use Your Kindness

The definition of being kind might be different out there. But I know some people thinking that being kind means letting others to rely on us, and that they ask for our help over and over. That’s a thing to reverse on my end, then. To me, being kind is not letting others using my kindness.

To me, being kind means knowing the most and the least I can do, and making people aware of it. Being kind is showing kindness without opening any door to be used. That means I say know when my acquaintance or even friends want to use that much of my time.

I don’t push myself to join people when I’m not physically mentally emotionally available. I stay true and honest to myself by declining some requests. I hold my firs principal, honor my values as well as encouraging others to respect my time.

To me, saying know doesn’t mean rude. I say no because I don’t want to bring too much stresses. I say no to allow myself standing my ground. Saying no = saying yes to the better.