A Better Way of Saying No
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Why is saying no so difficult for many people?
What's going on, my friends? Welcome to the Ryan Leak Podcast, where we love to keep things short and sweet for you each and every week. We always wanna give you something that we believe is going to add tremendous value to your life. And I absolutely believe that today's episode is going to do just that. Today, we're gonna be talking about a better way to say no. a better way to say no. And I have the sinking suspicion that someone listening to today's episode literally just put their head down because they have about eight to 10 things that they have said yes to, that they wish that they had said no to. No, it's spelled N-O in case you haven't used it in a while. And I get it. For you and for me, I think saying no feels harder than it should.
And it's not because we're weak. I think it's because we care. We care about people. We care about opportunities. We care about being seen as helpful, generous, available. But the requests, well, they just never stop coming. 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?
What competing priorities make saying no challenging?
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. That's helpful too. And regardless of how we're saying no, we inevitably... giving people an answer that they do not want to hear.
I know when I ask for stuff, I want people to say yes, but I've learned to respect no over time. And so I'm going to give you a couple of ways that I've been learning to do this over the last couple of years as requests and demands have been at an all-time high. And I'm also having to navigate ways work-life balance, if you will. I was a growing family that played multiple sports and navigating travel. And inevitably, I'm having to say no more than I ever have. And it can feel like I'm disappointing more people than I ever have. But I'm actually protecting margin in a way that I think sets me up for long-term success personally and professionally. So sometimes if I need to say no, I will simply share where my margin is currently going.
So sometimes I'll say something like this. Hey, I would love to connect, but right now all of the margin I have is being directed toward a few different priorities that I've already committed to.
Now, that could be a book project. That could be my own podcast. Sometimes I can't be on somebody else's podcast because I need to be recording my own. Or sometimes I can't write a book review for somebody else because I'm not finished writing my own book.
And sometimes I say, man, my kids, man, they've got... They've got sports this week, and I would really love to grab dinner with you, but I told my son I'd take him to practice or that I would be at his game. And so while I do have the margin, right now it's being directed towards some other priorities. This communicates a couple of things. One, it communicates appreciation.
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