E65 Every Yes Is a No to Something Else

Speaker A: I recently coached a client on boundaries. And about 10 minutes in, I stopped and thought, I need to say this out loud to more than one person. So here we are today on Lead with Spark. Here's what she said to me. She said, I have such a hard time saying no. I give everything away, and then I feel hurt when someone doesn't choose me. I want you to sit with that for just one second, because I think a lot of us live there and we never say it out loud. Then a few minutes later, she, uh, said something that was even more honest. She said, I don't want to say no. I'm always looking for, how can I say yes? What can I change? What can I move around on my schedule? What can I rework so that the answer ends up being yes? And here's the part that got me. Every time she found a way to make it a, uh, yes, it cost her about 20 extra minutes of her own work. 20 minutes that she was quietly donating so that nobody would have to hear the word no. That simple little word, no. Today, we are not talking about time management or productivity or a better calendar system. We are talking about the thing underneath all of that. Welcome to the Lead With Spark podcast, the show where real women lead with authenticity, show up with presence, and live out their purpose. I'm Lindsey Moulder, speaker, C suite executive, family gal, um, travel junkie, and a firm believer that your leadership starts from within. Around here, we go beyond the fluff. We talk about the real stuff. No one teaches you in leadership training. Your values, your superpower, strengths, boundaries to stop burnout, and how to quit being the chaos coordinator of your own life. Whether you're building a business, leading a team, or just trying to stop feeling stuck in the daily grind, this is your space to get clear, get aligned, and finally lead with confidence. So let's cut the noise and reconnect with the spark that makes you you. Let's go get our spark on. When I work with one of my clients on boundaries, the first thing that I do is flip the whole frame. Because when most of us hear the word boundary, we hear the word no. We hear conflict. We hear disappointing someone who has counted on us. But a boundary is not what you're saying no to. A boundary is what you're saying yes to. Let me make this real for you. If I called you tonight up on the telephone and said, hey, girl, I'm asking you to stay late at work and work on this project, what are you actually saying no to? You're saying no to dinner with your family. No to working out and making sure that your health is a top priority. No to eight hours of sleep, which Lord knows that we all need. Or maybe it's no to 20 minutes of just quiet time that is honestly the only reason you're still standing. You are always saying no to something. The only question is whether you're choosing it on purpose. I know exactly what this feels like. I lived it for years. I had a, um, little guy at home who needed my attention, wanted my attention. And yet every time someone at work asked me, can you stay late? Could you take on this extra project? Could you just work on this a few more minutes? I would say yes. I cannot tell you how many times I took my son into the office night after night. I would work late, and he would sit beside me, coloring or playing with his cars or doing, you know, some little project that I took in. He was with me, but I wasn't with him. I wasn't present. And I realized that I was starting to miss out on the years of him growing up. I was missing his little thinking process as he was learning, as he was playing with things, getting creative. And I didn't realize that every time that I said yes to someone at work, I was saying no to my son because I wasn't really there with him. And then I realized I can't ever get that time back, because I can't. He was only that age for that particular moment. And I said no to him and yes to work. Now, here's why the default answer for all of us is yes. It's not because we're weak or because we're a, uh, people pleaser. It's because our own priorities are not top of mind for us. And in that very moment, when we're asked, somebody asks you for something, and their request is right there in front of you. It seems urgent. It's very specific. It's got a face attached to it. Your friend, your boss, whomever that might be. And your priorities are, uh, someplace in the back of your head. They're vague, and they're probably not written down. And so, of course, the request that's right in front of us, it wins every single time. It's the only thing that's right there in the room. But if you had already decided out loud and in writing that your health is a priority this quarter, or that, uh, Thursday night belongs to your family and nobody else, then those requests, they're not a fight anymore. It's just a fact. I already said yes to that. So I have to say no to you. Think about it. If I would have already been thinking about my son when all of those requests came in, it would have been easy and guilt free. No spiraling, no rehearsing my explanation in the shower at 11 o' clock at night, I would have just been able to say no because I already said yes to my son. And it's honestly kind of funny because no is such a short word, one of the shortest ones in the dictionary. It's actually one of the first words that we learn as toddlers. My little grandson says it all the time. No, no, no, no, no. And then we grow up into women who are running teams and companies and households and we are terrible at saying the word no. Okay, I want to pause right here because if any of this is hitting home, this is for you. October 15th through the 18th, my co facilitator Paula Shannon and I are hosting the audaciously unapologetic retreat at at Savannah Wellness Resort and Spa in Carefree, Arizona. We're taking a select small group of women and that's it. It's by application only. It is built around clarity, confidence and connection. We are going to do real inner work on who you actually are. A, uh, roadmap past the fears that you have not said out loud and an action plan that you can leave with. Plus, yes, a world class spa. And this episode is exactly day one deciding what matters to you before the world decides for you. I want you to go to audaciously unapologetic.com and apply. And if you're on the fence, then you can schedule a chat with me right there in the site and we'll talk it through. Okay, let's get back to the show. So here are three things that I gave my client and I want to give them to you. 1. 1. Decide your priorities before anybody asks and move one number. This is where most of us blow up. We decide to fix everything all at once. We get new boundaries in every single area of our life and restrict them on Monday. And we're going to go from a number 2 on the scale to a number 10. It doesn't work that way. One of my clients works in weight loss. So I put it in her language. I said, if someone walks in and they tell you that you need to go from weighing, um, 300 pounds to 100 pounds, then you quit before you even start because it's not real. But £300 to 275, yeah, that's probably doable. You can picture it. You Start to believe in yourself. You know that it's possible. Boundaries work exactly the same way. We did not say that you're home at 6 o' clock every night. We say, all right, how about we start to get home one night this week at 6 o', clock, just one night. You stop, you set a time, you move. One number, one day, one digit. The second thing I want you to do is write them as present tense affirmations and read them out loud. I mean actually stop. Read them every morning and every night. Not someday, not. I'm going to work on it. Present tense. I am leaving the office at 6pm I am the woman who protects her Thursday nights. I do move my body four times a week. I am healthy so I can chase my grandkids. You're hearing some of my affirmations, by the way. I want you to say it specifically, exactly the way that it would come out of your mouth in present tense and your brain starts to believe it. That's not, uh, some woo woo thing. This is just repetition doing what repetition does. I keep at least 10 of these and I read them every morning and I read them again before bed because reading makes it real. But if reading isn't your thing, then record yourself and say all 10 of them into your phone. Play it to yourself on the drive to work and on the drive home. I also ask my clients to update their affirmation statements every quarter. I do this myself also because I change my priorities, I change my goals, and so my affirmation statements need to change with me. And again, I'm telling you, please don't try to boil the ocean here. 5 to 10 really good affirmation statements. That's the whole assignment. Some of the most successful people in the world have affirmation statements that they read every day. You should be one of those people. The third thing that I want you to do is just keep score of your nose. This one of my, this one my client invented herself and I loved it so much that I'm going to give it straight to you. Something came up that was going to eat her entire afternoon for almost no return whatsoever. And she said no out loud to a real person. And then she walked back to her desk and gave herself a tally mark. She high fived herself in the mirror and it was awesome. A, uh, tally mark. That is it. That's the entire system. Because here's what happens. You have a story running in the back of your mind that says you can't say no. You've never been able to say no, they're not going to like you. They're not going to ask you again. You're not a team player. And then you look down and you realize, hey, I got four tally marks on a sticky note, and the evidence flatly disagrees with you. You said no four times. People still liked you. The world's still moving around. You already know how to do this. You just haven't been counting. Counting makes it real and makes it facts that you can live on. I want to tell you the moment this actually landed for my client, because it was not any of the three tips. Specifically, we were talking about how every single one of her yeses was. Was really about taking care of her clients herself. Every override, every workaround, every extra 20 minutes, all of it in service of somebody else. And then she got quiet. And then she said, but it would be better for my clients if I got more than six hours of sleep. Yeah, it would. You see, there is a moment when you realize that your team doesn't need more of you. Your boss doesn't need more of you. Your clients don't need more of you. They need you with clarity. Being the expert that you are, being the leader that you are, being the mom that you are, whatever that might be, that's the whole thing. The story you've been telling yourself is that the boundary you created is selfish. That when you protect your time, you're taking something away from people who need you. But here's the real deal. It does not. Nobody has ever been well served by the exhausted version of you. So here's what I want you to work on this week. Pick one. One priority. Write it in present tense the way that you would actually say it. Read it in the morning and read it at night. And the first time that you say no because of it, give yourself a tally mark. High five yourself in the mirror. Here's your question to sit with between now and next week. What did you say yes to this week that you were quietly saying no to for yourself? Be honest. Really think about it. And if you want help figuring out what your priorities actually are, that's the work I do with clients every single day. So come find me@, uh, lindseymoulder.com and let's schedule a chat. I'm Lindsay. Thank you for spending this time with me. Now go tell somebody no. This week, I think you are going to love how it feels. And I'll see you next week on, um, Lead with Spark. Well, that's it for today. Thanks for being here and for doing the work. To lead yourself first. If this episode sparks something for you, take a second to subscribe, leave a review, or share it with another woman who's ready to own her leadership. And remember, the way you lead your life is the way you lead everything else. If you or your organization are looking for a speaker, an impactful workshop, or an executive coach, head over to LindseyMoulder.com and let's connect. Keep showing up. Keep leading with Spark. You got this. I'll see you next time.