Do you ever have one of those weeks where you just feel like you are being pulled in every direction and you just might break? I think it's safe to say everyone has felt like that at least once in their lifetime.
This is one of those weeks for me and I just got to thinking. Is it really healthy for you to try and please everyone while doing some harm to yourself?
I think you owe it to yourself to take a step back and evaluate what you're doing. If it's not advancing yourself in any way or making you happy, why are you doing it? If your answer is to make others happy or satisfy someone else, that might not be the best thing to do for yourself.
Don't get me wrong, I love doing nice things for others and making people happy with my actions. But if it comes to a point where they just come to expect it, you may start to feel like you are being used in a way.
No one likes to feel like they are being used. So that's why I say it's okay to say no sometimes. I recently watched a recording of a speech Lady Gaga gave at Yale a couple years ago, and it made so much sense to me. In her speech, she spoke about how the word "no" gave her back so much happiness.
That may sound so strange, because "no" normally has a negative connotation. But she said that she finally started to remember who she really was and that she had integrity and her own opinion. I loved her openness and honesty about it, and I thought it might be a concept that others need to hear about.
I have so many people in my life that also have extreme difficulty with saying no. I believe there should be more advocates for saying no. There is nothing wrong with doing yourself and your sanity justice. Everyone has things on their plate that they have to deal with, and it doesn't make sense to pile it up with things you don't have to do.
It is never easy to try to train yourself to have a certain mindset, but it can't hurt to try if it will make your life easier.
