Why you need to say ‘no’ in your business

Welcome to episode #22 of The Goodness Squad podcast. I’m wondering if:

• You have ever bounced a check?
• Have you ever bounced one knowingly?
• Have you written the check knowing you did not have the funds in your account?

That’s what we’re going to be talking about today. I’m going to relate this back to your business and your need to say no more often.

What is your time worth?

I’m pretty sure that the vast majority of you said you had never knowingly written a check that you knew would bounce. I want to read you something from Elder Maxwell. He says this:

“Unwisely, we often write checks against our time accounts that we would never dare do against our bank accounts.”

We need to think about that. Would you write a check for $3,000 if your bank account only had $100 in it? Would you write a check for $150 if your bank account only had $100 in it? You wouldn’t, you understand the folly in that. And yet we do this all the time, as women, with our time accounts. 

When you say Yes to one thing, you say No to something else

There truly are only 24 hours a day. When you say ‘Yes’ to something, you are always, always, always, always saying ‘No’ to something else. When I say I’m going to give an hour to this activity, it means that is one hour I can’t spend doing something else. I no longer have 24 hours. I only have 23. But we don’t seem to think through this the way we would with our money.

I want to give you one more quote. This is from Rachel Hollis, who honestly, I don’t love because she’s very, very much about the hustle and while I’m about hard work for sure, not at the expense of family. I don’t think that constant hustle is necessary to see success, but I do love one thing that I have heard her say.

She says, and this is not a quote this is just me summarizing what she said, but if you want to like yourself, you must keep the promises you make to yourself. And she talks about how, if we had a friend who was a flake and said, “yeah, I’ll go to lunch with you” and then they don’t show up or “yeah, I can watch your kids” and then they call five minutes before and say they can’t, you would not trust or really like that friend very much.

Start making (& Keeping) commitments to yourself

We do this to ourselves all the time. We make commitments and then we don’t always keep those commitments. And we wonder why we don’t like ourselves. So, what is the solution? The solution is to give a slow Yes. I want you to think through these things that we’ve talked about.

Questions to Ask yourself before you say Yes

#1 – Can I?

I want you to think, can I keep this commitment? Am I 100%, certain, or at least 99% certain that I can keep this commitment? Because if I’m not, I don’t want to break that promise to myself.

#2 – What does that mean?

I want you to ask yourself, “If I say yes to this. What do I have to say no to?” I really want you to think through that process. Are you going to say no to sleep? Are you going to say no to a healthy dinner? Are you going to say no to exercise? Are you going to say no to the field trip with your kid? Are you going to say no to helping your mom? Or are you going to say no to helping your brother move?

What is it you’re going to say no to because you said yes to something else and then make the choice that is the best use of your time. Choose to say yes or no, based on truly what is the best use of your time.

For example:  I have decided to say no to my kids’ field trips. I struggle with some social anxiety and field trips are hard for me. I am on edge the entire time I’m there. I come home with headaches. I come home grumpy. It is not worth what it does to my health and to my ability to interact well with my family later that day; to be happy and enjoyable and positive as a mom.

I can also use that time to work. So for me, when I’m thinking, “okay, if I say yes to this field trip, what am I saying no to?” I am saying no to a nice evening with my family that night. I am saying no to being able to create this podcast episode for you. So, I have decided that I will not go on field trips.

Now does that mean I never spend time with my kids? Absolutely not. We have weekly dates and things like that, but I have made that choice based on what I believe is truly best for me instead of what other people are gonna think of me.

Now, as I say this to you out loud on a podcast episode where hundreds of you are going to listen to it,  is there a little bit of hesitancy? Yeah. That you might judge me because I never go on field trips with my kids? Does that make them sad? Yeah, it does. But I have made an honest and authentic choice that I believe is what’s best for our family.

I want you to ask yourself if I say yes to this, what do I have to say no to? And if I say yes to this am I nearly 100% sure I can keep that commitment (because I want to like myself)?

If you do those two things, I promise you will see more success in your business and in your work-life balance, because you will be focused on the things that truly matter. And you will start letting go of the things that do not.

A great resource for helping you set boundaries with your business and family life

Try this experiment. I would love to hear from you, in a review in the podcast app or as an email straight to me, of how it goes for you. Does this help you?

This is about a third of one of the lessons inside of The Good Start Game Plan. There are nearly 50 lessons inside The Good Start Game Plan. This is the second module where we talk about boundaries and how we need boundaries, and how do we keep those boundaries in order to keep that work-life balance that is so, so essential to us as Latter-day Saint women. I know that your family and your kids are important to you. But, so is your business and that’s okay. I would love to help you find that balance.

As a quick reminder, The Good Start Game Plan is currently $149 and it will go up to $249 on July 10th. I would love to have you join me there. I would love to help you build a firm foundation for your business to work through your mindset, your boundaries, your organization. I would love to help you discover your superpower and then find out what problems your target market has and create a solution for them. That is my goal with this e-course, and I would love to have you join me there at TheGoodnessSquad.com/goodstartgameplan.

Coming Up

Once again, thank you so much for spending your time here with me today. I know that it is valuable and I do all that I can to make it worth your while to be here. In the next episode we are going to be discussing your kryptonite – the one thing I believe can cripple you more than anything else in your business.