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Why You Can't Stop Saying Yes, and How to Finally Say No · The Queen Reset with Aja Diack

• 0:01
  Have you ever said yes to something and regretted it before the conversation was even over?
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  Someone asks you for a favor, and somewhere inside you you already know the answer.
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  You are tired, you do not have the time, you already have too much on your plate.
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  Maybe you simply do not want to do it.
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  But before you even had a chance to check in with yourself, you hear yourself saying, Yes, of course.
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  Sure, no problem.
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  I can do it.
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  And then the conversation ends.
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  And there you are.
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  Standing in your kitchen, sitting in your car, looking at your phone, thinking, Why did I just say yes?
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  That is what I want to talk about today.
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  Because if this happens to you over and over again, I do not think the problem is that you do not know the word now.
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  You know the word.
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  The problem is that somewhere along the way,
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  No stop feeling emotionally safe.
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  And that is a very different problem.
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  Welcome back to the Queen Reset.
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  I'm Aja Diack And today we are talking about why some of us can say no perfectly well in our heads, but when another being is standing in front of us, suddenly the word
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  disappears.
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  Because I know this pattern.
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  And I know how easy it is to tell a woman you just need better boundaries.
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  Okay.
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  But what does she do at 6 30 in the evening when someone calls and asks her to handle one more thing?
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  What does she say to the family member who is used to having access to her to her whenever they want?
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  What does she do when her stomach is saying no, her schedule is saying no?
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  Her energy is saying no, but the person in front of her is wanting no, is waiting for an answer.
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  That is where this conversation has to become practical.
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  because saying no is not usually difficult because we lack vocabulary.
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  It is difficult because of everything we believe might happen after we said it.
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  Will she be upset with me?
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  Will they think I'm selfish?
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  Will they stop asking me?
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  Will my family say I have changed?
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  Will I look unreliable?
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  Will they think I do not care?
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  Will this become an argument?
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  And sometimes the question underneath all of those questions is even deeper.
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  If I stop being the person who always says yes, who will I be to these people?
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  That is why this pardon can become so powerful.
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  Because your yes may not just be something you do.
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  It may have become part of who everybody believes you are, the dependable.
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  The strong one, the one who handles things, the one you can call, the one who figures it out, the one who never makes a fuss.
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  And there is something beautiful about being dependable.
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  There is something beautiful about generosity.
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  I do not want us to turn kindness into a problem.
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  That is not what I'm saying.
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  Community matters to me, family matters to me.
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  Showing up for people matters to me, but generosity and self-abandonment are not the same thing.
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  And sometimes we confuse them.
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  There is a difference between I want to help you and I'm afraid of what will happen if I don't.
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  Those may sound identical when the answer coming out of your mouth is yes, but inside your body they feel completely different.
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  A freely chosen yes has room in it.
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  A fear-based yes often feels tight.
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  You may notice your stomach drop, your shoulders tense, your chest tighten.
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  You may immediately start calculating how you are going to fit this into a life that already has no space.
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  Sometimes your body tells the truth before your mouth does.
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  And that is the first thing I want you to practice.
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  Before you answer, Notice your body.
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  not because your body makes every decision for you, but because it can give you information.
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  If somebody asks, if somebody asks you for something and you immediately feel that thinking, feeling, do not override it in the same second.
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  You do not have to decide what it means yet.
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  Just notice something in me is hesitating.
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  That hesitation deserves five seconds of your attention.
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  Not five days, five seconds.
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  Because many of us have become so good at reading everybody else that we barely give ourselves those five seconds.
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  What does she need?
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  What will make him comfortable?
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  What is everybody expecting?
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  How can I make this easier?
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  Meanwhile, nobody has asked Azure.
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  What can you actually do?
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  And sometimes we have not asked ourselves either.
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  So here is the practical change.
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  Stop answering immediately.
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  You do not owe every request an instant decision.
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  Try.
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  Let me think about it.
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  Let me check my schedule.
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  I'll get back to you.
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  Give me a little time before I answer.
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  Those are not no.
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  They are not yes.
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  They are oppose.
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  And
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  For a woman whose yes has become automatic, that pause is powerful.
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  Because the pause gives the decision back to you.
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  Now, once you have created the pause, ask yourself three questions.
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  And question one is: Do I actually want to do this?
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  Not can I physically make it happen?
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  Those are different questions.
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  Women are very good at making things happen.
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  We can rearrange, cancel something, stay up late, wake up earlier, skip lunch, push something to tomorrow, make three phone calls, move something around.
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  Technically, yes we can.
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  But I want you to stop using can I somehow pull this off as the definition of capacity.
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  Ask yourself, do I want to do this?
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  You are allowed to include desire in the decision.
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  Question two.
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  Do I have the capacity to do this without resenting it?
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  That question has helped me think differently about giving.
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  Because sometimes I genuinely want to help somebody, but this week I do not have it.
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  and if I say yes when I do not have it, then I might show up tired.
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  irritated, distracted, or quietly angry at the person for accepting an offer that I voluntarily made.
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  That is not fair to them either.
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  sometimes resentment is information.
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  It can be telling you that your yes and your actual capacity are too far apart.
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  And question three If I say yes, what am I saying no to?
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  Because every yes costs something.
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  Sometimes the cost is small.
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  Sometimes the cost is sleep, your workout, your quiet evening, time with your child, work you already committed to, your own appointment, your peace, the hour you needed it to sit
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  down and do absolutely nothing.
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  And because those things belong to you, we often treat them as more movable.
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  That everybody else's needs.
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  That has to change.
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  Now, let's say you ask yourself those questions, and the answer is no.
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  This is where women get stuck again.
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  Because now we think the no needs an entire presentation.
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  We start building a legal case.
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  I would love to, and normally I absolutely would, but Tuesday I have this thing, and then Wednesday I have to do that.
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  And I have been so tired lately, and I hope you don't think.
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  By the time we finish explaining the boundary, we have accidentally created three ways for the person to negotiate with it.
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  that's okay, we can do Wednesday, if not Tuesday.
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  it won't take that long.
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  you can come later.
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  Now we're trapped again.
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  So here is another practice.
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  Make your NO shorter.
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  I can't do that this time.
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  That doesn't work for me.
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  I won't be able to make it.
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  I can't take that on.
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  Not this week.
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  I can help with this part, but I can't do the whole thing.
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  And notice something.
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  None of these sentences are cruel.
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  None of them say I don't care about you.
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  They are simply information.
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  And I know somebody listening is already thinking, but what if they are disappointed?
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  They might be.
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  That is the part nobody likes to say.
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  You can set the kindest boundary in the world and somebody may still be disappointed.
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  especially if your previous lack of boundaries benefited them.
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  that does not automatically mean the boundary was wrong.
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  Disappointment is a feeling.
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  It is not always an emergency.
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  And other people's feelings matter.
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  Of course they matter.
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  But the feelings cannot become the only information you use to make decisions about your life.
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  This is where I think the deeper work begins.
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  Because after you say no, there may be guilt.
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  And a lot of women interpret guilt as proof.
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  I feel guilty, so I must have done something wrong.
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  Not necessarily.
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  Sometimes guilt simply means I did something unfamiliar.
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  You can feel guilty and still have made the right decision.
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  You can feel uncomfortable and still be growing.
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  You can love somebody and still disappoint them.
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  You can care deeply and still be unavailable.
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  Those truths can exist together.
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  So if guilt comes after the no, do not immediately run back and undo the boundary.
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  That is another pattern.
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  You say, I can make it.
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  Twenty minutes later, the guilt arrives.
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  Then you text.
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  Actually, let me see what I can do.
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  No.
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  Give yourself time to experience the discomfort without fixing it.
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  Ask, did I harm somebody or did I simply disappoint somebody?
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  Those are not the same thing.
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  If you were unkind, repair it.
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  If you made a mistake, own it.
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  But if you respectfully say no to something you genuinely could not do or did not want to do, you may simply be feeling the discomfort of changing an old pattern
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  Let the discomfort pass without using another yes to make it disappear.
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  And I want to give you one more distinction that I think matters.
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  There are different kinds of no.
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  There is the complete no.
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  No, I can't do it.
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  There's a partial yes.
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  I can't do the whole thing, but I can help you with this part.
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  There is a later no.
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  I can't do it today, but I can look at it Friday, and there's an alternative.
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  I can't take that on, but I can tell you who might be able to help.
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  A boundary does not always mean closing the door and walking away.
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  Sometimes it means deciding how much of yourself is actually available Instead of handing over the entire thing.
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  That can be especially useful when family and community are deeply important to you.
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  We do not have to choose between being completely self-sacrificing and becoming completely unavailable.
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  There is a middle.
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  There is generosity with limits.
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  There is community without disappearing.
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  There is love without unlimited access.
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  And that is what I want more women to practice.
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  So this week, I want you to experiment with something very small.
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  Not the hardest person in your life.
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  Please do not leave this episode and choose the most complicated relation you have as your first boundary exercise.
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  Please start somewhere ordinary.
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  The next time somebody asks you something and you feel that automatic yes coming, do these four things.
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  Pause Notice what your body is telling you.
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  Ask yourself whether you want to do it and whether you actually have capacity.
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  then answer clearly.
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  And if the answer is no, let the no stand long enough for you to learn that discomfort does not mean disaster.
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  That is the practice.
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  And the more you practice it, the less foreign it becomes.
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  Eventually you begin to discover something important.
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  Your relationships do not need access to the most exhausted version of you in order to know that you love them.
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  Your goodness is not measured by how difficult it is for you to say no.
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  Your usefulness is not your entire identity and your value does not disappear when you are unavailable.
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  Now if you are listening to this and you're thinking, okay, Aja I understand what you're saying, but when somebody is actually standing in front of me, I still don't know what
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  words to use.
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  That is exactly why I created the stop people pleasing mini starter kit.
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  Y'all, seven days to start choosing yourself.
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  It has ready to use boundary phrases for work, family, friendship, and relationship, plus a seven-day practice to help you begin using them.
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  I will put the link in the show notes, but whether you use the kit or not, I want you to leave this episode with this.
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  You do not have to become a woman who says no to everything.
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  You are learning to become a woman whose yes actually means yes.
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  Because it came from choice.
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  Not panic, not guilt, not fear, not habit, choice.
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  And that changes everything.
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  Thank you for sitting with me today.
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  This is the Queen Reset.
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  I'm Aja Diack Welcome back, my queen.