5 Reasons Why You Should Start Saying NO For Your Better Self-Care
Have you ever experienced a time when you had to push yourself to go somewhere, or felt the anxiety to join a party full of strangers? Maybe it was just a catch-up with friends for dinner but you didn’t feel like socialising with anyone?
I know how you feel, I have gone through this so many times! What is most interesting is that we tend to do things with force. We may, “feel obliged” or “feel bad for another person” or we might think, “I don’t have many friends so if I don’t join, my friends will be upset and I might lose the friendship.”
Does this sound familiar to you?
Well, let’s look at things from a different perspective. Before the global pandemic became a big challenge for all of us, many people went to work sick coughing, a runny nose and sometimes even with mild fever was quite normal. The reasons can be similar to the ones listed above such as, “I feel bad letting my team down.” Or, “My boss will not be impressed that I have fallen behind in my tasks.”
Nowadays, calling in sick and staying home when we are feeling unwell has become the new normal.
I think the same can be said for the social scene. We should be able to decide accordingly about how we socialise and connect with people.
I am not saying we should say NO to everything, I am saying we should start listening to our inner voice and start honouring ourselves better so that we can influence others positively.
As a Naturopath, Neurolinguistic Programming certified coach and a student learning to become a Tibetan Medicine practitioner, I strongly believe that maintaining a mindset positively is the key part of healing ourselves better.
“Maintaining a positive mindset” means not ignoring challenging emotions such as anger, sadness, fear, hurt and guilt. First, acknowledge when challenging emotions arise and then we start examining or scanning ourselves to figure out where these emotions are coming from and how it all began.
Doing examining/scanning helps us tremendously to be able to observe things more objectively, rather than react to things.
Increase productivity – when you start saying NO you can start seeing more clearly what you want to do in your lives because we purposely designate time for ourselves. Because you allocate time for yourself by saying NO, you can have less clutter in your mind hence your focus is better, therefore, and productivity also increases.
More time for your self-care – as I mentioned above, when you start saying NO you start having more time for what you love to do such as painting, reading your favourite books, even cuddling your cats and dogs, and simply going for a walk alone. There is some literature suggesting the benefits of solitude – overall well-being, increase creativity, and mindfulness.
Increase confidence – when you start saying NO you also have a better understanding of your boundaries. You will start choosing what you feel joyful and comfortable therefore you will be naturally doing well which give you more confidence.
Reduce anxiety and worrying – this is probably one of the biggest effects of saying NO. Because you dare to say NO, therefore, relieving your stress and pressures such as “What am I going to wear tonight even though I am not keen to go”, “What if I look silly in the dress while others look amazing”. Those anxiety and worries are not necessary to help you calm and relaxed state.
Reduce FOMO (fear of missing out) behaviour and shift to JOMO (joy of missing out) – oh this is one of the best ones. When you start saying NO you will become more immune to FOMO behaviour. It means you will become more selective with information and you would know which information is important to you and you feel less overwhelmed with overloaded information because you are sure about yourself. You will feel the joy of missing out and not getting involved. You know what you want therefore you do not need extra information
Finally, saying NO has so many benefits for us, it can be physical, mental and also emotional! It is a great way to do better self-care by being honest with ourselves and prioritising our emotions instead of hiding them and pushing ourselves through.
There will be a time when we can prioritise others first, such as when our loved ones are not well and they need us to take care of them.
However, practising self-care properly can help us to deal with things better especially when an extreme situation arises in front of us.
Perhaps saying NO could be one of the steps you can start from today alongside the self-care you already do. They will work well synergistically for you to feel better about yourself and this will ultimately have a ripple effect on others you love and care about.
Did you know I am a naturopath who is passionate about supporting all my clients to feel well physically, mentally and emotionally?
I want all my clients to find their purpose in their lives = IKIGAI which I support fully and passionately.
Please go visit my other blogs which I wrote about IKIGAI and my naturopathic journey.
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Thank you for tuning in.
Reference:
Per Lenberg Chalmers and University of Gothenburg et al. (2018) Psychological safety and norm clarity in software engineering teams: Proceedings of the 11th International Workshop on Cooperative and human aspects of software engineering, ACM Conferences. Available at: https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/3195836.3195847 (Accessed: April 17, 2023).
Lenberg, P., & Feldt, R. (2018). Psychological safety and norm clarity in software engineering teams. Proceedings of the 11th International Workshop on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering. https://doi.org/10.1145/3195836.3195847
Whitener, S. (n.d.). Council Post: How Setting Boundaries Positively Impacts Your Self-Esteem. Forbes. Retrieved April 17, 2023, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/2019/12/11/how-setting-boundaries-positively-impacts-your-self-esteem/?sh=4959ee60339c