Saying Yes When Saying No Would be Easier
This one won't fit neatly on a cute cat meme . . .
When it comes to building a business or a brand, there’s a lot of advice out there about saying yes and saying no. Things like: Say yes to everything when you’re just starting out and No is a complete sentence. Like most advice dolled out in pithy memes, both of these statements oversimplify decisions that are much more nuanced.
I recently said yes to a thing that my very first gut reaction was to say no to. (Oh wait . . . there’s another pithy piece of advice: listen to your gut.) I’m very glad I said yes AND I’m also really tired AND I got so much out of the experience AND it pushed me mentally and physically.
A couple weeks ago, I got an email from the organizer of a conference I had applied to present at in April. I just assumed I hadn’t been selected, since I never heard anything. However, the email I got indicated that they were checking in because I was scheduled to present and had not registered for the event. The conference was exactly a week away. Turns out my proposal had been accepted and there had just been an email snafu with the notification.
Immediately I thought “nope, there is no way.” I would need to pull together my thoughts for the presentation into slides, as well as work out all the logistics of getting to the conference in one week’s time. Further complicating things, just before the conference I was scheduled to help my in-laws out with some pretty big medical stuff (everyone is just fine now!).
It was too much. I’d simply have to bow out gracefully and apply again next year.
But I peeked at my calendar anyway. The Thursday and Friday of the conference were miraculously open. Just out of curiosity, I navigated to the conference schedule online. It didn’t start until noon on Thursday. I had the family stuff Wednesday morning and an important meeting that afternoon until 3:00pm. It would be a 5 hour drive to the conference but, I wouldn’t have to be up super early the next morning. Another quick click to check out what I’d sent in as my session description and I realized that I had materials done for the first third of it. Plus, I would have the weekend to pull my thoughts together for the rest . . .
Now you’re probably thinking okay Ms. Healthy Hustle- stop right there- you DON’T have time for this. It’s too much. Just say no.
And you wouldn’t be wrong. The timing was tight. I had other things pulling my time and energy. I would need to put in some hours on a presentation I’d feel good about. It certainly would have been easy to offer up the complete sentence of no. But here’s the piece of information I haven’t shared. The conference I’d been invited to present at was The Graduate Student Success & Wellness Conference. Student success and wellness. Those are my things. That’s my jam. (Are we still saying that? No?)
There seriously could not be a more professionally aligned conference for me.
And that was what made me peek at my calendar, take a look at the conference schedule just out of curiosity, and ultimately reply “yes, count me in!”
It was a push. It was an intense week with the family things and the already scheduled work things, along with the added tasks of planning the trip and travelling to Boone, North Carolina and finalizing my presentation (which I did in the car on Wednesday, while my husband drove). But saying “yes” was absolutely the right decision. I loved the keynotes and sessions I attended and learned some awesome things. I met like-minded people, and I got to share about my experience using design-thinking in helping graduate students plan their future.
After the conference my husband and I stayed in Boone for the weekend. We slept in, went on a beautiful hike, sipped cabernet on the porch of the cutest little wine shop (where we met a sweet dog named Guinness).
I pushed hard to make something I cared a lot about happen, and then I rested.
And that’s what gets missed in the quick snippets of advice. Sometimes the right decision is to pause, take a breath, and check that gut reaction. No was the easier answer, but in this case yes was the absolute best answer for me. This was a positive growth opportunity for the parts of my career that I care the most about. It was a stretch to make this happen, and sure, I’m tired. But I’m taking space to rest now, it was worth pushing hard for something I care so much about.
Now if I could just fit all that into a meme with a cute cat . . .
Things of Beauty
Just a few things that felt particularly soul-nourishing recently (or maybe just made me smile).
🦩 Loved this from Ellie Burke this week. It feels really aligned with my thoughts about saying yes to the conference:
Tending to one’s well-being and growth is less about doing the things that feel easy and more about the ability to be unendingly curious about what’s right, right now—about what’s needed today; and the willingness to hold one’s own feet to the fire.
Read the whole post here (also longer than a meme, but hey— there are flamingos!):
🎵 Oldie but a goodie from Kenny Loggins that also feels super resonant: Conviction of the Heart.
⛰️ Dear Boone, North Carolina - you’re beautiful. Highly recommend the Boone Fork Trail. It’s got waterfalls, and ladders, and rocks to climb up, and creeks to cross, and mossy bridges. So. Much. Fun. (Definitely earns it’s moderate rating!)
I’ll be sharing more of beautiful Boone in next week’s Things of Beauty post (including some intel on local Boone chocolate)!
Have you said yes to something that felt right but not easy lately? Do you have popular advice you disagree with? Tell me about it!
I appreciate this post! I think often times we have to self-evaluate WHY we want to say 'no' to something (sometimes it's fear-based, sometimes it's valid exhaustion, and sometimes, like your title suggests, it's because saying no is easy). Once we understand the 'why,' it's easier to tell when to push ourselves and when to let things pass by.
I have a theory about gut wisdom choices. Our gut wisdom is like an executive under-study. We let it make decisions and then we discuss what went into it and how’d it work out. And as we get more comfortable with its decision-making, we’re more trusting, knowing that we can always call a meeting to review the choice.
I also believe this is where spirituality comes in. Relying on your belief that the gut wisdom has its own connection with the divine and they confer in a language other than verbal. And it brings the essence of that dialogue back to us, again bypassing language.