Research indicates that children as young as 18 months begin to say the word “no” excessively to declare and assert their independence. In the mind of a toddler, the word “no” has power; the word “no” draws the attention of authority. Humans grasp the concept of saying no so early in life, so why is it so hard to say no as we grow older? A year ago, I would have never thought I would be an injured ex-college athlete writing about how lost I am. But hey, I am here now and I am proud to have said no.

When I was growing up, competitive dance was my everything. I spent my entire childhood in a dance studio, surrounded by people who loved and respected me. As I began high school, I knew that I wanted to continue my career and make all those people who made dancing special for me, proud. At the end of my senior year, I auditioned for a division 1 dance team and made the cut. For those of you who know what college athletics is like, I bet you can agree with me when I say that it is not a walk-in-the-park and it is not for every athlete. I knew that dancing at a collegiate level would be difficult, but I was confident that all of my training prepared me for this challenge. Unfortunately, I do not think anything could have prepared me for what happened over the course of my first collegiate season.

There’s no need to get into the deep details, but to sum everything up, I felt emotionally drained, uncared for, and ultimately, broken inside. I would cry myself to sleep at night from all the pressure and anxiety. I was scared to go to practice because I was afraid of being verbally attacked. Worst of all, I became extremely self-conscious of my weight and started comparing myself to other girls every chance I got. I didn’t understand how I got to this. I didn’t understand what was so different now.

At first, I blamed myself. I thought that I had changed and my feelings about dance had altered during my transition to college. Then, right after the season had ended, I realized that it wasn’t me who changed. The people who controlled my ability to dance had changed and been replaced by people who didn’t truly care about my well-being. These people didn’t share the same values of integrity and self-respect that I pride myself on upholding, so I said no. I was strong enough to say no to what should have made me happy and said yes to my word, my character. Believe me, I hated declining what I thought I was meant to do with my life. I was fearful of what was next. Despite all of the confusion, I knew that saying no would lead me towards another passion and, hopefully, inspire others to go with their gut and make their own choices.

So why do I think it’s harder for us to say no as we grow older? I think it’s more difficult for us to say no because we are cautious of the uncertainty that comes with the response.