Saying Yes and No Appropriately
SUMMARY
Do you find yourself saying yes to things all the time, and then you go away from that situation going, "why did I do that? Now, I'm in a more stressful situation than I was before. And I haven't got enough time to get stuff done that I'm already doing." Or have you learnt to be on top of this and to treat yourself as your number one priority.
Hi, this is Grant Herbert, Emotional Intelligence Speaker and Trainer of the Year and Master Coach Trainer and today, I want to continue our conversation around developing our Personal Power, that underpinning competency of emotional intelligence, by learning to say yes and no appropriately.
The first thing you need to do is to make sure that you are totally clear on your priorities.
The second thing that you can do is to go through a simple exercise that says, "when I say yes to this, I'm saying no to that."
The third thing is to slow down the decision making process.
TRANSCRIPT
Do you find yourself saying yes to things all the time, and then you go away from that situation going, "why did I do that? Now, I'm in a more stressful situation than I was before. And I haven't got enough time to get stuff done that I'm already doing." Or have you learnt to be on top of this and to treat yourself as your number one priority.
Hi, this is Grant Herbert, Emotional Intelligence Speaker and Trainer of the Year and Master Coach Trainer and today, I want to continue our conversation around developing our Personal Power, that underpinning competency of emotional intelligence, by learning to say yes and no appropriately.
People tell me all the time, "Grant, I have a problem saying no." And I'm quick to point out that that's not actually correct because every time that you say yes to someone or to something out of obligation, then you're actually saying no to yourself — to something else that is a true priority of yours.
When we are working to please others to get their approval, when we're operating in that performance trap, we will say yes subconsciously without even thinking; because we think that's what we need to do to get them to like us, to get them to accept us.
The first thing we need to do is know your true priorities.
As I said before, you don't have a problem saying no, you have a priority problem. What I mean by that is that you are putting everything else before your priorities, or you're putting priorities in a list and then you're not sticking to that. So, the first thing you need to do is to make sure that you are totally clear on your priorities.
The second thing that you can do is to go through a simple exercise that says, "when I say yes to this, I'm saying no to that."
And being able to recognize by the things that you constantly are saying yes or no to right now, whether or not any of those things are outside your priorities. For example, when I say yes to working many hours in my practice, outside what I've got in my calendar, I'm saying no to my family time; to the things that are most important to me.
By going through that and by writing down a list of all the things that you say yes to, you will find out exactly what is the consequence of saying yes to that.
And number three is exactly that. It's to slow down the decision making process.
A lot of times we'll just go yes or no to something, and then think that's not really what I want, and then we deal with the consequences. So, what we need to do is make sure that we are in control of our emotional responses; that we're making sure that we are in a position to make a decision as to whether or not that is something that we should be saying yes to right now.
What I love to do when people are asking me to do things, is I like to come back with a question. I might say, "that's interesting. It sounds like something that I could consider doing. Can you give me some more information as to what that actually would entail." By doing that I've done two things: Firstly, I've interrupted the pattern of just saying yes. It has also asked a "what" question — I'm seeking more information before I say yes.
So, there you have it — three simple but powerful steps that you can take yourself through this week to help you to recognize, whether or not, something is within your priorities when you're saying yes or no to it.
Well, that's it from me for another week. Join me again next week, when we continue this conversation around Social and Emotional Intelligence so that we can navigate our emotions in a healthy way and enjoy life way more. I'll see you then.
