No Is A Complete Sentence

Years ago, I had a pastor tell me that my new word was “No.” At the time, I remember thinking, What does that even mean? Am I supposed to walk around saying no every time somebody asks me something?

But here we are years later, and now I get it.

My answer to everything is not automatically no. But when I do say no, that’s what it is. No backtracking. No overexplaining. No changing my answer just because I feel bad.

There was a time when I would say no, then rethink it and eventually say yes just to appease someone else, even when I knew saying yes was doing me a disservice.

Understand this: your no is your no. And no is a complete statement.

You do not have to explain it. You do not have to backtrack. You do not have to feel guilty for protecting yourself.

In fact, sometimes no is a boundary.

We struggle with saying no because we do not want to disappoint people. We do not want to be deemed selfish, rude, or known as “acting funny.” We do not want people mad or upset with us. So, we put ourselves on the back burner and say yes.

Not to mention, when you do say no, folks seem to forget about every yes you ever said.

But sometimes, yes can be draining, energy depleting, and time consuming, especially when you are always saying yes and it is not being reciprocated.

At some point, we have to decide that we are going to put ourselves first. We have to learn when to healthily say yes and when to jsut flat out say no.

Now, saying no does not have to be mean or rude. It could be as simple as, “I’m unable to do that at this time,” “I’m not available that day,” or “That won’t work for me.”

So, think about it. Where in your life are you saying yes? Is it a healthy yes, or should you really be saying no?

Sometimes no is protecting your peace.

So let your no be your no, and don’t you dare feel bad about it.