Word-Of-the-Week #962: NO
January 12, 2023 by Susan Clarke
NO – used to express refusal, denial, disbelief, emphasis, or disagreement.
How did you hold up this Holiday Season? Did you feel like there were too many obligations? Do you feel guilty just thinking about saying NO to someone?
This week Bill Marvin, The Restaurant Doctor, sent “A To-Do List for 2023? Not So Fast” and it seemed like a great follow up to last week.
“This is the time of year when most people make New Year’s resolutions with all good intent … promises to themselves they seldom end up keeping because they’re too busy and just don’t have the time to add more balls to the juggle.
Jim Collins, author of the mega-bestseller “Good to Great”, had a suggestion: instead of to-do lists, make a “stop-doing” list. Because in obsessing over to-do lists full of things that don’t really matter, we spend less time saying yes to the truly important things.
Here are seven things the most successful people say no to on a regular basis. Perhaps you should, too.
- Say No to opportunities and things that don’t excite you, speak to your values, or further your mission in life.
- Say No to superficial networking events in which people swap business cards and never hear from one another. Why? Because successful people don’t network. They build relationships.
- Say No to spending time with uninspiring, critical, or negative people who drag you down. Time is precious — choose a small circle of people who will energize you and challenge you to be better.
- Say No to overworking. While it’s true some successful people and many restaurant owners put in 60 to 80 hours per week, very successful people aren’t workaholics who neglect self-care and family. They recognize if they can’t take care of themselves, everything else suffers.
- Say No to doing all the work. This comes down to one word: D-E-L-E-G-A-T-I-O-N.
- Say No to giving the steering wheel of your life to anyone else. Warren Buffett says: “You’ve gotta keep control of your time and you can’t do that unless you say no. You can’t let people set your agenda in life.”
- Say No to people-pleasing. Successful people don’t neglect their deepest wishes and desires to accommodate and yield to others’ wishes and desires.
Before you make yet another list of futile New Year’s resolutions, perhaps you’d be better served by taking a day off to reflect on what’s really important to you. Then make a list of everything you need to STOP doing in order to free up the time you need to make progress on the critical stuff.”
This week’s focus is on saying NO to things that are not important to you! What excites you and can further your mission in life? Do you have a small circle of people who will energize you and challenge you to be better? Are you the person in charge of setting your agenda?
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