Do you ever say yes… when you would rather say no?
I’m a pleaser. Fear of rejection is waaaaay up on the top of my fear list. Part of it is my natural personality style and part of it is …who knows? Regardless of where it comes from, or why it is here, the fact remains that I don’t like to say no……..especially to people I love.
So…..here is a little story that just happened to me and I thought I would share it in hopes that it may help you too.
By little story, I mean this thing I said no to, in the big game of life, is teensy tiny as you will see. If you’ve got the whole no thing down I commend you and if you don’t then I hope this will give you courage next time you start to agree to something you really don’t want to do. I honestly felt my wings get a little stronger from the response I got 🙂
It all started when…
I received an email…not just any email……a chain letter email. I was “selected” to participate and they picked those who they thought would make this “fun”. Now mind you it was only asking me to send a recipe. Just one recipe. One little recipe to the first name of the 2 names on the list. Now…if that’s all I had to do I would have done it in a heartbeat. But, it didn’t stop there. Next I would have had to copy and paste, change my name to the #2 position, paste the letter into a new email….(still doable for me at this point) AND THEN….. blind copy and send it to 20 people….this is where they lost me. It no longer resembled “fun” to me….and it sounded like more work than I wanted to sign up for. The letter also said that if I couldn’t do that within 5 days to let them know so it would be fair to those participating.
I did not respond right away (though if there’s a next time I will, I promise) I waited a few days and then as I was clearing out some emails ….there it was. I opened it….reread it….thought about it…..and then replied like this: I’m sorry I forgot to respond. I am going to pass on this. I hope you are not mad. I stress out over these things and I am eliminating stress so please give my spot to someone else. Love you bunches, Suzi
Whew…that was over and luckily I was within the 5 days (it had been 4) so I didn’t feel too bad. The response I got was the best ever and is what made my day and strengthened my wings. It went like this: Thanks for being honest. I am going to save this exact reply to send out next time I receive one of these emails LOL. You’re my SHERO!
Woohoo! I laughed and am still laughing as I share this with you. Teensy tiny? Maybe….but HUGE in many ways. I hope if you are ever in a place where you are asked to participate in something that you really don’t want to, no matter how big or small, ….you will “just say no” and let me know if you feel your wings get a little stronger too.
Wishing you wonderful, stress free says ahead!
Hugs,
Suzi