You may have heard the saying: “When you say ‘yes’ to something, you’re saying ‘no’ to something else.” We can also turn that around to: “When you say ‘no’ to something, you’re saying ‘yes’ to something else.” Sometimes that ‘yes’ is in your present reality like your family or your health. And sometimes that ‘yes’ is for a future opportunity.
Today on the show Kristen is walking you through the reasons we tend to say ‘no’ when we should be saying ‘yes’ and vice versa and how you can learn to find the right answer for you with a few simple steps.
Here are a few highlights:
- Why we overbook and overextend ourselves
- The exact questions to ask yourself to know if you are truly a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’
- When a ‘no’ might actually be a ‘yes’
- How to use emotions as your guide to making a decision
- How we train ourselves to think everyone else’s wants and needs are more important than ours
- The exact emotions to consider before making a decision
Deciding to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to an opportunity, obligation, or ‘want’ doesn’t have to be hard. It all boils down to the reasons/emotions behind your decision. Listen in to hear the process of learning how to recognize your underlying emotion/motivation and how to quickly make decisions in your life and business.
Connect with Kristen:
If you’re ready to learn the simple process of running your social selling business online, you have to check out Kristen’s live group coaching program! The Social Selling Academy: www.thesocialsellingacademy.com
Interested in Kristen’s exclusive mastermind for six-figure earners in the network marketing industry? Get all the details and join the waitlist here.
Do you have a business full of customers and almost no builders? You’re in need of a reboot! Learn the three skills you can learn that will completely change your recruitment game. Check it out here.
Transcript for Episode #116 Saying No:
Kristen Boss (00:05):
Welcome to purposeful social selling with Kristen boss. I’m your host, Kristen boss. I’m a mindset and business coach with more than 15 years experience in both the product and service based industry. I believe that social selling is the best business model for people wanting to make an impact while they make serious income. This is the podcast for the social seller, who is tired of feeling and authentic in their business and desires to find a more purposeful and profitable way of growing their business in today’s social media landscape. In this podcast, you will learn what it takes to grow a sustainable business through impactful and social marketing. It’s time to ditch the hustle and lead from the heart. Let me show you the new way.
Kristen Boss (00:48):
Hey bosses. Welcome to another episode of the podcast this week. I wanna talk to you about the power of your words and specifically the power of the word. No, and if you are like me, you might often suffer from FOMO or missing something fun and you might find it hard to say no to people, no to things maybe no to yourself in certain areas. And I really believe that a lot of the things that have happened in my life, the things that I have created, the results I’ve created, you know, um, where I’m able to have my business today is because of my ability to say no. And you may have heard the saying before, because I had heard it many, many times, and it never became more true than when I was really focusing on growing and scaling my business and growing my company.
Kristen Boss (01:42):
And it’s this concept of, you know, when you are saying, when you say yes to one thing you’re saying no to something else, or when you’re saying no to something you are saying yes to something else. And it’s very easy. I think, especially as an entrepreneur and as a parent and a spouse and a friend, it’s so easy to feel like everything is important and everything is urgent. And when everything is urgent and everything is important, what happens is we find ourselves saying yes to everything we say yes to too many things. And then when it, when push comes to shove, what ends up happening is we overbook ourselves. We overstretch ourselves. Then we become exhausted. We become overwhelmed. We regret our yes. Or because we have given so many yeses, the quality of our yes. Diminishes because we’re tired, we’re stretched too thin. Even the thing we show up and say yes to, we can’t show up powerfully because we’re tired because we said yes to too many things.
Kristen Boss (02:38):
And I think a lot of times there are several reasons why we are, why we want to say yes when we should be a no. So the things that we say yes to that really should be a no. And that is when you, you’re talking yourself into it for the sake of someone’s feelings or opinions, when you’re doing it to people, please, somebody when you’re doing it, because you’re afraid that their no, or you saying not today is going to hurt their feelings, that you’re gonna cause them pain or that they’re going to think poorly of you. That they’re gonna be disappointed. So a lot of times we, in that moment, we make pleasing that other person more important than getting centered on. Okay, well what’s important. And how am I showing up? And even if I say yes to this person, isn’t my best.
Kristen Boss (03:23):
Yes. Are they getting my best? Yes. Or are they getting a yes from like obligation and guilt and fear and people pleasing tendencies? Because I don’t want somebody to say yes to me because they feel obligated to do so. I want them to do it because they desire to do so. So again, one of the reasons we say yes to something, when in fact we should say no, is when we’re doing it to people, please. Another example of saying yes to something when it should be a no is when it feels like a no to us. <laugh> and I know that sounds really obvious, but there are times like, I think so often we, we ignore our bodies and your body is always talking to you. It’s always telling you if it’s a yes or it’s a no. And you know what a no feels like in your body, it’s a hard, no, it’s a hard pass.
Kristen Boss (04:11):
Like it feels resistant. It’ll shut down. Like, you know the feeling I want you to just ask yourself today. What does a no feel like in my body? And how often am I pushing myself to ignore that feeling and force myself into a yes or tell myself that, that feeling isn’t valid. That it’s not a good reason. And I talk myself into being a yes. When I’m not a yes, like it’s again, it’s ignoring your inner, knowing your inner voice. It’s ignoring your discernment. And any time we say yes to something, when we want to say no, what we’re communicating to ourselves is I don’t matter. My needs don’t matter. My health doesn’t matter. What matters is what matters more is what this person thinks of me or what this person will do. And so we, and I know there might be some of you who really feel like you are constantly trying to keep the peace and you’re constantly dying to, you know, anything you want.
Kristen Boss (05:11):
And you’re just like, okay, well, everyone first. And I think, I think we tend to, it depends on your stories and your upbringing, but some people were taught like, no you can to think of yourself is, is totally selfish. You must put the needs of others before yourself to do any, any other way is selfish and wrong. And I think it comes even more. So I think that’s magnified. If you are a woman or if you are a mom, I think it gets magnified in motherhood because we’re, we literally, from the moment, you know, a tiny little person is born. All of our needs come last. It’s very easy. I remember for me, like that was when I was like, well, if I get to a shower, I don’t know if I ate today. I don’t know when I last slept because my time is consumed by keeping this tiny little, fully dependent person alive.
Kristen Boss (05:59):
And so even then it was like, I was training myself to think everyone else’s needs are far more important than mine. But what happens is when we end up neglecting ourselves so much, we be, we create room for resentment. We create room for exhaustion. And I, I coach people on this a lot. I say, Hey, when you’re feeling guilty for taking time for yourself, because you think it’s selfish, what happens with the time you do give to your kids? The time you do give to your friends, your spouse, your family, your coworkers, your students, people, you serve your customers. What happens? They don’t get the best you, when you’re saying yes to them, they, they’re not getting the best. Yes. Because you didn’t allow yourself to have permission to say no to something. Like, I can’t say no, because that’s wrong and that’s selfish. So a lot of times when our yes, should be a no is when we’re saying yes, out of obligation or guilt or shame thinking we are wrong for it.
Kristen Boss (06:57):
Those are, you know, some, these are some of the common reasons why we say yes when it really should be a no. I also think sometimes scarcity comes into a yes. And this is when I see business owners really get burnt out is they’re afraid to say no, because they’re afraid of losing a, losing a sale, losing an opportunity, losing a customer. So, because every sale feels precious. Every conversation feels like a sale. They’re absolutely terrified to take time away. They’re terrified to put down the phone. They’re terrified to have business hours, because what happens if somebody contacts me outside of my business hours, what happens then it’s like, listen, somebody who wants to buy from you, they’re gonna buy from you when your door’s open. Again, they’re gonna buy from you. When you sit back, you know, at your desktop, or get back to your phone during your working hours, they’re still gonna be a yes.
Kristen Boss (07:46):
If they’re truly a yes, their mind is not gonna change in the time that you decided to, you know, not show up during your off time. Right? But I think a lot of times business owners say yes to so many things, cuz they’re afraid of lost opportunities. And you’re only afraid of lost opportunities. If you don’t believe more are coming to you. If you don’t believe opportunities are always coming. If you don’t believe customers are always coming. If you don’t believe, you know, a there’s gonna be another sale another time. And I’m not saying, I’m not saying don’t care and don’t work. I’m not saying that I’m saying I’m talking to the person who feels like they have to say yes to every single thing because scarcity is driving the bus scarcity is saying, if you say no, now it may never happen again.
Kristen Boss (08:34):
If you say no, now you’re probably gonna lose it. And that only creates scarcity in anxiety thinking, this is it. This is my one time nobody else is gonna contact me. No one else is gonna come to me and show interest. Right? I, I may not be able to, you know, speak at that event or go to that event. And what’s fascinating is I have had to learn to say no more than I ever have in my entire life, in this season of my business. And there are times where you do need to say yes where it feels like an act of courage to say yes, that is when your no should be a yes. When you, when it feels like a call to courage, when it feels like something that is just outside of your comfort zone, when you find yourself talking yourself out of, it might be an indication that it might be something for you to say yes to, it might be something where it’s like, Hey, it’s time to lean into this, this space that you might be afraid of when courage is calling.
Kristen Boss (09:33):
That is a time to say yes. Another time to say yes is saying yes to yourself. Does it, does it care for your mental health? Does it add to your wellbeing and when you are better cared for, does it add to the wellbeing of others? Yes. Yes. And yes. Just notice oftentimes if you are talking yourself into a yes, for, for somebody else or for out of guilt or shame or obligation, or if you’re talking yourself out of a yes, because you’re afraid of doing the scary thing, because it might take courage because you might have to lean into discomfort. Just kind of checking in with yourself and saying, okay, wait, hold on. What is the primary emotion driving? My decision between yes or no right now is scarcity here or is courage. Here is shame. Here is fear. Here is kindness. Here is love here.
Kristen Boss (10:21):
What’s here. But a lot of times we just, we crumble when it comes to our decision, making another part is, you know, feeling empowered to say no and realizing there’s going to be another time for me to say yes to this. And so just lately, I’ve had a lot of opportunities come in my lap, like opportunities to be around. Amazing, amazing people like bucket list people. And it has been so painful for me to say, you know what? It’s a no for me right now, come back to me in six months. But I’m looking at my calendar. I’m looking at my bandwidth. I’m looking at my capacity and I need to say no right now so that I can say yes to my family so that I can say yes to rest so that I can say yes to my mental health so that I can say yes to working on some things for my students.
Kristen Boss (11:11):
And so a lot of times it, it does feel, it can feel painful to say no. And sometimes it does feel like saying no to really fun things. Things that feel like, oh my gosh, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. But when you are no longer operating in scarcity, nothing ever feels like a once in a lifetime opportunity. You believe that there is an abundance of opportunity, always coming, always coming. So right now I’m, I’m in a season where I feel like I’m saying no, eight times outta 10, like my yeses are so few and so far between, and I walk my yes through a decision filter. Like, is it my best? Yes. If I say yes to this, what will I have to say no to who am I saying no to what might be the cost of this? Yes. If I say yes to this, what are other things I might not be able to say yes to, right.
Kristen Boss (12:05):
If I say no to this, what am I saying yes to instead. And that for me has been a huge indicator for me. When I say no to this, what else am I saying yes to what am I saying is the bigger priority? What am I okay with? Right. Asking yourself the better questions when it comes to your decision, who am I saying yes for, for me, or for them, for my future or for my present. Because some sometimes, and I think this is important to know too. Sometimes we have to say no to things at present in our present life things happening currently so that we can say yes to things in our future. Think a great example of that is with money is with savings. Sometimes it’s saying no to that Starbucks run. So you can say yes to a vacation fund to adding money into, you know, to savings or to add money into something else that you want, that you said is more important.
Kristen Boss (13:03):
Right. But if we’re always framing, no, as like a, oh my party’s gonna end and that’s not fun. Right. Then, then we’re always gonna resist saying, no, we’re gonna be like, I don’t wanna say no, I don’t wanna deny myself anything. But when we, when we think of no, as a form of like, I’m denying myself or I’m denying somebody or I’m rejecting somebody, we experience resistance to no. Instead of thinking, reframing our no. And saying how does saying no, become an opportunity to say yes to something better and elsewhere. And I will tell you guys, as I was building my business, writing my book, there were just so many things I had to say no to at the time, that felt really important, really urgent, really fun. And I was like, I know that these things I’m gonna I’m, I’m gonna have an opportunity to do them again.
Kristen Boss (13:53):
But right now I have to say yes to this best thing for the future, for the future benefits of where I know I’m going, it feels like a bummer sometimes. But Hey, I, I know that down the road, I can revisit this. In fact, you know, with my keynote speaking, something I’ve talked about with my families, it’s really important that mommy’s not gone all the time. It’s really important to me that I’m with my family a lot. So, you know, something we decided to do my husband and I, we talked about how many keynotes I’m gonna take on a year, because if it could very easily turn into 20, 30 keynotes a year and that’s, you know, that’s being gone more than half the weekends out of the year. So for me, I had to make some decisions of like, okay, what are the qualifications that I will say yes to for certain keynotes?
Kristen Boss (14:41):
Like I have to say no to a lot of companies that come to me that might ask me for, you know, a quick 30 minute corporate training. It’s just because I view my time as so precious. I’m like, okay, well, if I say yes to this, then what am I saying no to? And a lot of times the no is more important than the, yes. Who I’m saying like, who am I saying no for I’m sometimes I’m saying no for my kids. Sometimes I’m saying no for my husband. And sometimes I’m saying no for me, like, no, I’m not going to take this on because I want to be with my children because I want to be with my spouse or because I need to take care of me or because of my bandwidth. So what I wanna offer you is I want you to kind of sit down and ask yourself, what does a, what does a no feel like to me?
Kristen Boss (15:23):
When do I know it’s a no, that I’ve trained myself to ignore it or tell myself that, you know, my feelings about this don’t matter that I’m not allowed to have feelings. I’m not allowed to be a priority here. And what is something that feels like a yes, to me that I ignore what is a yes. That I talk myself out of because I’m afraid or because I’m worried or because I’m concerned, right? Sometimes learning to tune back in, listen to ourselves, listen to our body, listen to your body. There’s a reason why we, you know, we talk about our gut, like making decisions from our gut and your gut is considered your second brain. So like, you can trust your decisions. And for me, it was interesting. I was talking to a client recently and I said, Hey, you know, when you’re making a decision that you know is a good decision, like, you know, it, you feel extremely grounded, extremely certain.
Kristen Boss (16:11):
Even if the decision is scary, where do you feel that in your body and for her, she felt it heart center. She’s like, well, I feel it in, in my, in my, kind of like in my solar plexus, I feel it on my heart center, it feels very grounded. I feel very calm. I feel very taken care of. Even if I’m doing something scary and I was like, Nate, can you name other times in your life where you made decisions and you felt it from that place and she’s able, able to name several. I was like, has that feeling ever been wrong for you? And she said, no. I said, and how often are you trying to tell yourself that that feeling might be wrong? She’s like, wow, you’re right. I think oftentimes I’m trying to talk myself out of that feeling. I said, okay, and what feels and what feels like a no to you, when do you know?
Kristen Boss (16:57):
It’s not a good decision. And for her, she she’s like, oh, and my gut, it feels terrible. It feels awful. And so we were talking about that and I said, okay, so that’s your no, that’s how you know, it’s a, no, you feel it there in your gut. And what was so interesting is it’s the opposite for me. Like when it’s a yes for me, I feel it in my, I feel it in my center. I feel it in my, in my gut area, I feel it in my stomach, it feels like iron in the best way. Like, it feels like rock solid, super grounded, super centered. Like my center of gravity is pulling to the earth. I don’t know how else to describe it. But for me, it literally is in my gut a no to me, I actually feel it in my chest.
Kristen Boss (17:36):
It feels very constricting. I feel very shallow breath. I feel everything’s starting to tighten. I feel like my heartbeat’s starting to get rapid, or I feel like this sinking sensation in my chest for me. That’s I know it’s a no, so it’s different for everybody, but it’s important to know what your no feels like in your body so that you can honor it so that you can be like, Hey, I, I can trust this. I can trust this. And it’s so interesting. I’m a, I’m a true crime junkie. I love it. Um, I love listening to true crime podcasts. And I can’t tell you how many episodes that we’re like people were saying. I had that feeling. I had that feeling and I ignored it almost every time. I’m like, why, why do we ignore this feeling? Why do we tell ourselves, like, we’re being silly, we’re being illogical.
Kristen Boss (18:24):
We can’t, you know, we can’t trust that feeling. It’s like, we’re always talking ourselves out of, you know, trusting ourselves. And so what I wanna offer you today is when it comes to your decision making, do some evaluations. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, if you’re feeling stressed, if you’re feeling like you don’t have enough time, you might be saying yes to too many things. And you might be saying yes, for all the wrong reasons saying out of guilt, obligation, shame, fear of being perceived as selfish, those reasons, right? Ask yourself, what might I need to say no to in this season to protect my bandwidth, to protect my family, to protect my health, to protect my business, to show up better and give yourself permission. Because when you say, no, you are giving something else a better. Yes. You’re saying you’re giving yourself what is my best? Yes. I can’t even begin to tell you how powerful that question can be in your life. If you just ask yourself what is my best yes. In this moment. And what might I need to say no to in order for me to have the best. Yes. Here. Okay. Friends, hope you enjoy this episode. We’ll catch you in the next week.
Kristen Boss (19:42):
That wraps up today’s episode. Hey, if you love today’s show, I would love for you to take a minute and give a rating with the review. If you desire to elevate the social selling industry, that means we need more people listening to this message so that they can know it can be done a different way. And if you are ready to join me, it’s time for you to step into the social selling academy, where I give you all the tools, training, and support to help you realize your goals in the academy. You get weekly live coaching so that you are never lost or stuck in confusion. Whether you are new in the business or have been in the industry for a while. This is the premier coaching program for the modern network marketer go to www.thesocialsellingacademy.com to learn more.
