When Is It Okay to Say No?
Nobody but you can answer this question.
All around us, there are messages recommending that we say yes. Say yes to new experiences, new people, new opportunities, and on and on. What’s more, “yes” has become associated with positivity and “no” with negativity at the most basic levels.
The result we tend to experience from this is that, often, saying “no” is seen as selfish, undesirable, and utterly negative. When you say “no” you close doors rather than open them. You set yourself and others up for failure and worse. Saying “no” keeps you small, impedes growth, and active change.
Of course, sometimes this is true. However, that’s situational. Depending on where you are, who you’re with, what you’re doing, and other factors, saying “no” does get in your way.
Yet there are also times when saying no is to your benefit. This is particularly pertinent to your health, wellness, and wellbeing,
When “no” is good for you
If there is a toxic person in your life, saying no to them can mean the difference between the suffering of the slow removal of a bandage versus the swiftness of ripping it off.
Often, saying no to someone toxic comes with pain. That pain, however, is a product of that toxic person or someone who believes in that toxic person making you out to be the villain. Saying “no” to them gets you vilified and doesn’t feel good.
Saying “yes” to them, however, is like a slow poison. First, there’s the anticipation of the toxic time you’ll be spending with them because you said yes. The anticipation alone can be mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and even physically painful. Before there is even time spent with that toxic person, you suffer.
Then the time with that person is suffering. Say, for example, the toxic person is a narcissist or a bully. While you’re with them you will be subjected to their narcissism and bullying in full force.
Finally, after you’ve spent that time with that toxic person, you’ll likely need to recover from their toxicity. That time you spent with them might have made you feel angry, frustrated, sad, displeased, and any number of negative emotions. Toxic people can massively impact us.
All that prolonged suffering resulted from not saying “no”. While the pain of saying “no” would suck, it would be one-time, and relatively quick – like ripping off a bandage. Instead, by saying yes, you prolonged the suffering, akin to slowly removing a bandage and painfully pulling at each individual hair below the adhesive.
I think it’s clear that saying “no” to that toxic person would have been good for you.
Who can be the judge of that?
Only you know what’s best for you
There is only one person in your head, heart, and soul. One person alone can think your thoughts, feel your feelings, intend your intentions, and do for you. That would be you, yourself.
Hence, you alone can recognize when saying “no” to a person, place, or thing – tangible or intangible – is to your benefit.
We are encouraged to be mediocre. A great deal of the near-worship of celebrities, athletes, business moguls, politicians, and the like, is focused on making the rest of us accept our mediocrity. Unless you can overcome the odds or work ludicrously hard (or come from faux royalty and/or money), you should just accept that you are, have always been, and will always be mediocre.
Hence, believing in yourself and your empowerment is constantly, frequently discouraged. What is encouraged, meanwhile, is toeing the line, working to fit in to the “norms”, and living subconsciously by rote, routine, and habit.
You can accept this, and it might be perfectly fine for you. I’ve yet to meet anyone from whom that’s the truth, however.
You have the power to make choices and decisions to live the best life you can, for yourself. Hence, you can choose to say “no” when that’s what’s best for you and your health, wellness, and wellbeing.
How can you know? By being consciously aware and practicing mindfulness.
Mindfulness and saying no
Active conscious awareness is mindfulness. Becoming actively consciously aware is easy. Rather than just going with the flow and living by rote, routine, and habit, you place yourself intentionally in the here and now.
Once you are present, you can become aware of what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, what you intend, the attitude of your life approach, and what you are and/or aren’t doing. That awareness tells you, right now, who, what, where, how, and why you are.
With that knowledge and conscious awareness, you can look at a given situation. Is this something saying “yes” to will bring me more pain and suffering than saying “no” will bring me? The question truly is that simple in the asking. However, the answer might take more analysis.
Most importantly of all, there is no right or wrong answer. At least, in the grand scheme of things. For you yourself, however, the answer will potentially be the difference between quick pain and suffering and long pain and suffering. See my prior example.
Also, there might be no pain or suffering at all. Saying “no” might actually be blissful, relieving, and freeing. Detaching from toxicity, unwanted and undesired people, places, and things can be freeing and empowering.
The power is in your hands. You can choose to say “no” to people, places, and things – both tangible and intangible – when you mindfully think and feel it’s the right choice for you.
And this brings me to a final, very important point.
This is about only you
You can see that someone is in a bad situation. You can tell them to say “no” and walk away.
It doesn’t matter what your insight is or how much you recognize something that they don’t. You can do nothing for anyone else. You can’t force others to say “no” to what you think they should say no to. Even if you’re right, you can’t control the thoughts, feelings, actions, or intentions of anyone other than you.
There are whole industries intent on forcing “yes” and “no”. All advertising falls into this category. Most political campaigns and religious organizations do, too. The only way to be part of their solution is to not only say yes or no as they demand, but to make everyone else do it too.
I am in no way disregarding the need for law and order in our society. That’s also way beyond the scope of this essay. What I am saying here is that you can make choices and decisions, say yes and no, for only yourself. Turning that inwards and being mindful of it can help you reduce pain, suffering, confusion, and discontent that comes from fretting about other people and what they say yes or no to.
This is part of self-care and is not selfish. The truth is that it’s okay to say no when you know it’s better for you and your health, wellness, wellbeing, and chosen life path. When saying no is better than saying yes to spare another’s feelings or avoid conflict. You are ultimately worthy and deserving of choosing to say no when you know it’s best for you to do so.
When you know it’s in your best interest, do you know that it’s okay to say no?
This is the six-hundred and thirty-second (632) exploration of my Pathwalking philosophy. These weekly essays are my ideas for – and experiences with – applying mindfulness and positivity to walk along a chosen path of life to consciously create reality.
I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world and empower as many people as I can with conscious reality creation.
Thank you for joining me. Feel free to re-post and share this.
The first year of Pathwalking, including expanded ideas, is available here. Check out Amazon for my published fiction and nonfiction works.
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