Saying No for Success: The Life-Changing Productivity Hack You Need
Saying no is the life-changing productivity hack you need.
“How can I accomplish more in a day?” “How can I spend less time on the things I need to do?”
We always wonder how to do more in less time, but we never think about how doing less can give us more time for our priorities.
The fastest way to do something is by not doing it at all, and saying no is the ultimate way to achieve that. By saying no, you are saving your time and energy to become a more productive person.
If saying no allows us to become so much more productive, why do we say yes?
Why Do We Say Yes?
It’s important to understand why we say yes in the first place.
Whether it’s because of peer pressure, obligations, or lack of self-control, we say yes to maintain relationships and help others.
Saying yes is important for functioning in society. After all, humans are social creatures, and by agreeing to their requests now, you put yourself in a better position to be helped in the future. It also helps to stay in good faith when you see them again.
But there is a line between saying yes to some things and saying yes to everything.
At the end of my first semester in college, I completely lost my ability to say no and found myself saying yes to everything. I went places I didn’t plan to go to, I slept at times I didn’t control, and I could never focus on my work because I was constantly distracted by the things I was saying yes to.
I became overwhelmed, and that’s when I realized that saying yes to everything hurt my productivity and disrupted the control I had over my life.
What Yes Does
By saying yes, we remove our ability to perform other tasks.
Say you agreed to go to lunch with a few friends. Lunch becomes the only thing you can do in that 1–2 hour time block. If, instead, you had declined to go to lunch, you would be able to finish up your work, call a friend, or even take a break for an hour.
Saying yes means making a time commitment to one thing, which means that you are saying no to everything else.
If saying yes does all of that, then what does saying no do?
What No Does
By saying no, you are declining one thing and opening up opportunities for everything else. Instead of committing yourself to one activity, you are free to do whatever you choose.
You may think that you are not in the position to say no because of your social status or ability. However, saying no shows that you value what is most important in your life: time.
If you value your time highly and use it to invest in yourself, there is absolutely no reason to believe that you can’t say no.
Say no to free up your time, say yes to take it away.
How To Say No
Now comes the real question. How do you say no? Saying no is incredibly difficult for a lot of people because they can’t resist the many reasons to say yes.
If you still value future interactions with the person you are saying no to, it is best to say no by softly rejecting them.
Say, “I would love to, but I’ve got a lot on my plate right now. Maybe next time.” or “That sounds like a lot of fun, but you guys go ahead, I’ve got something to catch up on.”
The worst way you can say no to a good friend is by lying or making up excuses when you don’t need to. This creates unnecessary tension and only sets you up for future conflicts.
You may think, “If I keep saying no, my friends will think I’m boring,” and that’s the wrong way to think about it. Instead, you should be thinking, “By saying no, I am freeing up time to work on my life goals and stay productive.
Make No Your Greatest Superpower
Now that you know how to say no, it’s time to make it your greatest superpower.
Know what your priorities are, and don’t compromise your time for the sake of pleasing others.
Do you have a project to finish by tonight? Say no to going out to dinner. Do you have to hit the gym today? Say no to playing at the beach.
When you understand that your time is the most valuable asset you own, the choice between saying yes and saying no becomes easy. Stop selling yourself short.
Moral of The Story
The moral of this post is not to tell you to start saying no to everything but rather to become more selective with your time.
There is a fine line between having fun and hanging out with your friends and obliging to their every request. As long as you don’t let it get in the way of your productivity and focus you can say yes as much as you like.
