Today’s coping tip is to give yourself permission to say ‘no’.
This is my default, and it was something I consciously made a decision to do over a decade ago. In general, my instinct is to say no to new requests from others. Then if I have time, I can always change my mind if it’s important or I can fit it into my schedule.
I’m not so good at this in my personal life. My wife asks me, or I want to do something, I tend to say “yes” to myself. Especially if it’s a physical project that I can (or have) handle.
However, I do get myself overloaded at the ranch. I’ve started to try and remind myself to say “no” to some projects. Either they get delayed or we pay someone else to do them. I had some lawn work to do recently and I told myself “No” and asked a kid to tackle it.
Both a chance for me to say no and ask for help.
I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQL Server Central newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag.