Welcome back to the Remodel Your Reality Challenge! A key part of time and schedule management is the clear-minded evaluation of the opportunities that come your way. Ideally, your priorities will help you make decisions about what to commit your time to. When considering a new opportunity, evaluate whether or not the invitation sounds interesting to you. If it doesn’t, reserve the right to say no!
One Thing To Think About
There are two keys to keeping your opportunity load on track and reflecting your priorities:
Reserve the Right to Think About It – Instead of immediately agreeing or saying no to any type of invitation you receive, decide that you will not commit to anything on the spot. Instead, when you receive a request or invitation, let the requestor know that you’ll need to check your schedule and get back to him or her. This allows you to thoughtfully evaluate the situation and provides you with a buffer in the event that you decide to decline.
Do Away with Elaborate Excuses – Remember this maxim from the Oprah Winfrey show: “No is a complete sentence.” The next time someone asks you to take on a project or attend an event that doesn’t support your priorities, simply respond with “No, I can’t do that, but thank you for thinking of me.” Breathe deeply to quiet your thundering heart and move on to another topic of conversation.
One Question To Answer
When considering a commitment or opportunity, ask yourself these questions: Does this opportunity fit in with my priorities? If not, does it detract from them? If you feel that the opportunity fits within your priorities, and it’s interesting, consider committing yourself. Make sure to understand why you find the opportunity exciting, and clarify any expectations the inviting party will have of you once you throw your hat into the ring.
One Challenge To Take
Pledge yourself from a clear and positive place. If you feel any misgivings about saying yes, stop! From this point on, decide that you will only make commitments that compliment your priorities and feel good to you.
- Identify at least five commitments or scheduled activities that are wasting your valuable time. Examples could include volunteering for an organization you no longer enjoy, running errands for others, attending social events with people you don’t care for, participating in water cooler gossip, or failing to commit your day to activities that are important to you.
- Name your alternative. Could one of your priority areas move into the timeslot that one of your time wasters currently occupies? List the five commitments you would prefer to make in place of your current time wasters.
- Conclude your commitment to non-priority activities. If the item is a one-time engagement, contact the host or requestor and let him or her know you have a conflict. If your commitment is ongoing in nature, let your contact person know you cannot participate any longer.
- Schedule something from your priority list into the open time that appears as a result of allowing yourself to say no.
Every time you make a decision to say yes to one thing, you are saying no to multiple others simultaneously. You may not be aware of this, but it is fact. Until you are able to say no to the demands and requests of others, you will never be able to say yes to you.
Ultimately, it is better to disappoint the requestor whom you will not remember forty years from now, than to look back at your life and realize that the person you disappointed was yourself.
Until next time, take care!
Kim
