The year of “No”

Many people have heard of “The year of ‘Yes’” … It’s when you consciously decide that whenever you are presented with a challenge or a new idea or new concept instead of thinking that you aren’t capable of doing it, you say ‘Yes” to it and push yourself to step outside of your comfort zone for an entire year or however long you choose to do it.  The practice of this can be fulfilling and very rewarding; case and point Shonda Rhimes did a year of yes’s which pushed her to create Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal and How to Get Away with Murder and look where that got her.  But for people pleasers and over achievers, a year or years of nothing but saying yes to any and every thing can be detrimental.  Unlike those needing that push, over achievers and people pleasers step outside of their comfort zones quite often.  I, myself, fall into both categories where I say yes to certain situations and scenarios for fear of letting people down or putting them in a bad situation to be short-handed or under staffed (the people pleaser) but then when I am in the thick of it I feel the need to be the best at whatever the task is and go above and beyond to accommodate (the over achiever); often times leaving little to no time or resources for myself.  When this continues for months or even years for multiple people or scenarios it can be overwhelming.  And honestly, IT… IS… EXHAUSTING…

Don’t get me wrong, during the time that I was “saying yes” I had some wonderful experiences, saw some amazing things and made some interesting memories with people that I held dear.  But if I was being honest with myself, I was miserable.  I was struggling to “keep up with the Joneses” and all that my friends were doing, going to events, weddings, birthday trips and such drowning in debt, maxed out on time and all around drained all because I was afraid to let them down and appear to be “a bad friend”.  However, I couldn’t help but notice that when major events happened in my life those same people that I crossed oceans for… wouldn’t even jump a puddle for me.

It took a while but I had to really assess my situation and figure out what I needed in order to be happy.  So I withdrew, and took some time for myself and really began to re-evaluate my life essentially; which was eye-opening.  What I found that what I needed in order to be happy was that I needed to start saying “No”.  BRILLIANT!!! How simple is that right?! We all know that it’s not that simple but I was determined to put this concept into practice.  So I did just that.  Similar to the Marie Kondo concept to re-organizing your closet, I had to re-organize my life and start making myself and what “sparked joy” for me a priority.  I started saying no to things that I really didn’t want to do or halfway didn’t want to do or the things that I wasn’t thrilled about.  You know, the activities that didn’t seem all that interesting, the objects or gifts that I kind of liked but not really, the events that were impressed upon me to attend, etc… I said “No” to them all.  And it wasn’t a “no” with a lengthy explanation; it was simply “No” (I may add in a “thank you” to make it “No, thank you” for flavor).  Because whether people want to admit it or accept it or not, “No” is a complete sentence. 

In doing this, I felt so liberated!  I put myself first.  I began to focus on what my personal goals truly were… I got out of debt, I traveled to places that I wanted to go to for as long I wanted to go, I purchased items that really reflected who I was as a person and that made me smile… and I still smile to this day when I see them, I became friends some really amazing, strong and sophisticated women in the process, and just truly stepped out of my box and began to LIVE.

Now I will say that saying “no” did upset a few people… I lost some “friends” because saying “No” caused me to re-evaluate their roles in my life; therefore, I missed events that were important to them (not so much to me), some other folks were in their feelings because I didn’t follow the masses when they thought I should have, so on and so forth.  But I had to press through, to find and do what was best for ME.   No one else; just me.  And it was in that space that I found my happy place. 

Within that journey I realized that being a people pleaser wasn’t helping anyone but instead it was enabling those people that are, either knowingly or unknowingly, self-absorbed and manipulative to drain me dry… it was killing me.   I had to set myself free if I wanted to survive and I’m so glad I did.  That people pleasing burden was lifted off of my shoulders never to return.  Now I’m still an over achiever but I’ve learned to focus that energy on my craft and career goals while stilling being able to live life to the fullest.  I found my happy, I found my spark of joy, I found my freedom, I found my yes… in my no.