View Content #27194

By Mandy Gettler, CASLS Associate Director

This Topic of the Week is part of our July series on self-care. It expands upon Disposition 5: Prioritizing Mental and Physical Health.

I thought I was meeting a friend for coffee, but it turned into one of those moments where I felt horribly unprepared.

“Do you want to meet for dinner tonight?” he asked.

I wanted to say no, because I desperately wanted some alone time. But I also want to have friends, so I said yes instead. Saying no to a reasonable request, quite frankly, didn’t seem nice.

It turned out saying yes was actually the opposite of kind; I had accidentally, unwittingly done a cruel thing.

My friend and I had an awful time together.

I didn’t pay attention to anything he said nor did I hold up my part of the conversation. Saying no to dinner and yes to getting together next week when I felt more recharged would have been the truly kind response.

Instead, I had said yes and been a total jerk.

(Later, I apologized for being a total jerk, and no one likes admitting and apologizing for their bad behavior. So really, I was unkind to both of us just because I couldn’t say no.)

We each say yes, implicitly and explicitly, hundreds of times each day. Lest you think I am prone to hyperbole, here is a list of things I say yes to every day before 8:00 AM:

• Hitting the snooze button on my alarm so I can lie in bed for ten minutes
• Making and drinking tea
• Reading
• Writing
• Showering
• Getting dressed
• Eating breakfast
• Brushing my teeth
• Waking up my two children
• Getting cereal for them
• Asking them to get dressed and brush their teeth
• Feeding the cat
• Cleaning up cat vomit
• Putting lunch boxes in backpacks

Could I have answered emails, written a section of a grant, washed dishes from the night before, or made my kids scrambled eggs and pancakes for breakfast* instead? Of course. I could have said yes to those activities, too. But I said no to doing those things, because I wanted to say yes to something bigger.

I say yes to getting up at 5:30 AM every day so that I have time to myself in a quiet house to read and write. This morning routine keeps me centered. I’m more patient. I’m a better problem solver. I’m more compassionate. And I go to bed at the end of each day liking myself a little more and feeling fulfilled – which in turn makes me a better parent, friend, partner, and employee.

There are things in life we must do to be capable human beings, like brushing our teeth and cleaning up cat vomit. Then there are things we choose to do, like getting up at 5:30 AM every day. Sometimes, the things we choose to say yes to don’t even seem valuable to the outside world, like lying in bed for ten minutes after the alarm goes off so I can feel the summer sun on my face. I say yes to that anyway, because waking up early and yet slowly feels good to me.

This week’s Activity of the Week challenges you to think of all the things to which you say yes. What would happen if you said a kind no and a bigger yes to something else instead? Are there types of requests you are more likely to say yes to without thinking? If so, how can you learn to pause so you have the option of making a kind no in exchange for a bigger yes?

* I do sometimes make eggs and pancakes for breakfast, so don’t feel too bad for my children. They are well fed, and they also really like cereal.