I used to say yes a lot. I’d say it to my friends. I’d say it to my kids. I’d say it to everyone.

To a fault.

I’ve always been a people pleaser.

Those who know me well know that I’m very generous with my time. I’ve always liked making time for people. I always want people to be happy. Many times I wouldn’t ask for anything in return. I would just give and give and give.

There have been times when I should probably have said no though, but I’ve instead said yes. Until I learned what I was giving up because I was so busy saying yes to everyone. I realized that by saying yes to too many other people, I am saying no to myself.

If you say yes too often, it disempowers you. You’re no longer in control of your time. Other people are.

Although I do still like to help other people, my time is important. To be able to spend on the things that drive me is important. So I have pivoted from always saying yes to really putting more thought into every yes I do offer. I’d ask myself, should I say yes or should I say no? And your yes is worth less if you just always give it out to everyone, all of the time.

My shift in thinking around this can be pinpointed to one particular night, last year. Last summer before Covid dining restrictions, my husband told me some friends of ours wanted to go to another friend’s restaurant, a really nice restaurant in Chicago. They asked if we wanted to go together. I love going out with my friends and I love our friend’s restaurant. So I said yes right away, without hesitating a second. I didn’t have a calendar to look at but just said yes.

Shortly afterward, I learned that Madden had a couple of baseball games scheduled. Typically, because I had already said yes to dinner, I would have just done that. I had already committed to that and I’d just have to find somebody to take Madden to his baseball game. But it was his first baseball game of the year. He hadn’t played in a long time and it was a doubleheader. Oh yeah, and I really, really wanted to watch him play.

I told my husband, I really don’t want to miss his game but it was also hard for me to say no to dinner because my friends also didn’t want to go without me. I told them it was okay, as I’d already been to the restaurant and as much as I would’ve liked to go to dinner with them, we could still do it another time. I’ll be honest. I felt a lot of guilt. If they canceled, that’s also not good for the friend’s restaurant because they’d already stopped their reservations for that day.

It was such a dilemma.

Then I asked myself, what am I having to say no in my life in order to say yes to that dinner?

In the end, I chose to say yes to the games and no to dinner. It was my son’s first game back. As much as I love going out to eat, saying yes to my son was where my heart guided me. It was the right yes to offer that day.

They were really rough games. So I’m really glad that I was there. It was their first game back after a long break and they were really rusty. So offering my support there watching the game definitely felt like exactly where I was meant to be.

Our friends ended up going without me. I think in that situation, everybody won because they got to try that new restaurant and the other friends (owners) didn’t miss out on a reservation. Meanwhile, I got to be where I needed to be that evening.

Had that happened a year before or any other time, I would have always put other people first before whatever I needed. And sometimes that’s tricky because early on in my adult life, I feel like it was often a win for them and a loss for me. Being a people pleaser, I was just willing to sacrifice things that I wanted for other people’s happiness. As I get older, I’ve realized though that I need to put myself first. And actually, when you put yourself first, it’s win-win. Because when you are selectively giving your time, rather than always saying yes, you’re offering your best self to that person because you’re really choosing to say that yes. 

That’s sort of how I try to live my life now and how my decisions are made. In many ways, I still always want other people to be happy, but just not at the cost of my own happiness. And, to be honest, any yes I offer now is much more intentional which is also important. I feel that being more choosy with my yes is another way I’m leading an even more intentional life these days.

Think about the last time you said yes to something. How intentional was it, and did you have to give up a yes to yourself in order to offer it?