Ryan Leak

You always got a colleague that asks if you can jump on a quick call.

The call's never quick.

I always have a friend that asks if you can meet for coffee, and then you're just thinking, are we even friends?

Like, I thought we were just text acquaintances, but now we're trying to upgrade the relationship.

Or maybe you got somebody that just wants you to review their resume, or a former coworker that wants career advice, or somebody sends you a DM and says, hey, can I...

Pick your brain.

Or if you're like me and you've got children in high school, middle school, elementary, and that school has 27 events a week, they're always asking for volunteers.

And you're like, hey, I got a job.

I got a job.

If I'm always at the school, then who's going to be teaching them?

I thought I was dropping them off for y'all to do.

The request just never comes.

And the real tension is not that the requests themselves are bad.

The tension is that it's often creating competing priorities.

And we only have so much time, so much energy, so much attention, and so much margin.

And every yes to something is a no to something else.

The challenge is that many of us just keep saying yes until our calendars are so full that

then our patience begins to run on empty.

So I think that you and I need to learn how to say no, maybe even nah, N-A-H.

Or if you want to add a P-E to it, you could say nope.