How to Say No

What would any blog be without a post on how to say no?

If we don’t say no to things, we get to a point where we need to have three of us, all three of whom can never get enough sleep.

I like how James Clear describes it. He calls saying no the ultimate productivity hack, and reminds us that not doing something will always take less time than doing that thing.

There’s a lot of material written on this topic, of course. Rather than give you techniques on saying no, I wanted to give you my meta-observations on the material that’s out there. You see, it all falls under a certain set of principles. Once you understand the principles, you are in a better position to create tactics that suit your situation and personality.

Principle 1: Saying no is okay.

That’s right, reassurance upon reassurance that saying no is permitted. Of course, everywhere else we go, we are given completely the opposite message, that we cannot say no. We cannot disappoint people. We simply have to do what everyone else wants.

Now, of course, those messages are false. Any repercussions you may get from not saying yes to everything: they’re real, and they happen, but that doesn’t mean they’re reasonable.

So the purpose of this reassurance is really to give you the inner conviction that even if you incur disapproval for saying no, saying no is actually reasonable. 

Beyond exploring events in your personal history that may have given this “Can’t say no” message extra volume, a lot of this inner reassurance comes from hearing the “Saying no is okay” message a lot of times. It’s easier if you can get it from articles, books, podcasts, and other people than trying to say it to yourself, but one variant of saying it to myself that works really well for me is imagining my kids in that situation and asking myself, “Would I want them to feel free to say no?”.

A related idea is that you’re not obliged to explain your reasons for saying no, but more on that in a bit.

Principle 2: Give yourself time to think.

Given all the pressure I described above, we are programmed to believe we can’t say no. So we say yes. Automatically and robotically. The number of times I’ve said yes enthusiastically, thinking I really wanted to say yes, and in fact, it was just me being so immersed in the role of making everyone happy that I had lost sight of what I even wanted.

The idea prescribed here is to give ourselves breathing space to think and figure out if this is something reasonable to say yes to. Maybe there would be too many things on your plate if you said yes. Maybe you just don’t want to say yes because you’d rather be doing other things. That’s why we are advised to say things like “Let me get back to you”, “Let me check in with my family”, “Let me check my calendar”.

If the asker is extremely unconcerned about putting pressure on others, and keeps that pressure up in the moment, my favorite answer is 

“I don’t have certainty that I can say yes, so I’ll have to default to a no”. 

There you go, persistent asker, you can’t say I’m leading you on!

Principle 3: You may say no in a way that doesn’t actually sound like you’ve said no.

Okay, what I really mean is: softening the message, so you don’t feel like you’re sticking your neck out too much into this world that seems ready to slap you for every “no” you emit.

Of course, in an ideal world, saying no wouldn’t feel scary and complicated. It would be easy to admit out loud that a proposed option simply isn’t convenient for us. But there’s a good chance you’re still carrying fear of actually saying it, and wonder how to say it in the nicest possible way without upsetting anyone. 

Actually, there are good reasons to soften such a message. You always want to make a reasonable effort to communicate to the person that even though you can’t do that particular thing, you do care about them. So you add things to the message that are technically referred to as social padding. Things that you didn’t have to say to get the main message across, but that help everyone feel better about the interaction. As a bonus, then you’re not as likely to be hounded by pressure from without and guilt from within.

This is where it’s good to read material that will help you build up a repertoire of phrases. Write them down, and you’ll see that they fall into certain categories. At which point you can reuse them.¹

Here is my take on what the various categories are:

It won’t be possible (no other explanation).

But notice the impersonal nature of how it’s phrased. It’s not you who won’t do it, it’s not you who is saying no. It’s just—not going to be possible. And you’re allowed to be totally sad and sympathetic about it, but—it still won’t be possible.

I like Sarah Knight’s recommended phrase of “Upon consideration, it won’t be possible”. So professional. It sounds like “We scoured the earth for every possible yes under the sun, and sadly were unable to find one!” 

The equivalent of that with friends (because the above phrase sounds rather businessy and formal), is something like “I’ve thought about how I could fit this in, but it’s just not going to work!”.

It won’t be possible, due to something that isn’t me.

Businesses do this. “It won’t be possible within the current budget, but with additional funding we may be able to procure extra resources for the project”. 

I’ve done this with people who call themselves my friends but actually want free counseling. “I’m sorry, I’m so busy right now”.

I’ve done this at work. “My schedule and workload are maxed out”. 

At one point, I had someone asking me to attend a regular meeting that would have put me at way too many meetings. Their persistence was unbelievable. I must have used the above phrase about seven times in less than five minutes. But I was quite pleased with myself for being willing to behave like a broken record. He gave me all these arguments, and I literally repeated them all back to him in the most sympathetic manner to validate his concerns, to the point of saying “I know, you’re not even asking for much, it’s only x minutes a week”, and always finished with the same phrase.

Notice that the bad guy is always something other than yourself: the budget, the schedule, the workload! This is actually a way of giving a reason for the refusal—or something that sounds like a reason even if it’s not really informative—which is a way of softening the message and communicating that you care about the person.

It won’t be possible, but here’s what I could do instead.

“I won’t be able to come to your tupperware party, but do you want to grab coffee sometime?”. If you don’t really want to meet with the person, then don’t use this method; in that situation, your schedule is full, because in reality, it is, isn’t it? I bet even when you do meet up with people, you’re shoving aside something else important to fit it in. But if this is a friend you like to spend time with, but you really can’t cope with loud sports events without having to go to bed for a few days to recover, this method of suggesting something instead is a good one.

Principle 4: Some people won’t respect boundaries. 

Softened no’s will not work on them. They will demand you show them your calendar and try to argue with you about how their event really can fit into your schedule. If you explain that you need your sleep, they’ll tell you you don’t. They’ll literally set up situations where the polite refusals won’t work, because they’re storming past all the rules of politeness themselves. And then you’re wondering how you can possibly say no without offending them, because sadly, we’re programmed to go all out even trying to keep the boundary-stompers happy.

Unfortunately, saying no without offending someone may be impossible if their expectations are ridiculous. Like the nosy friend who demands to know if your partner treats you well in the bedroom (yes, I’ve actually had that one), I mean, what can you say other than “We won’t be talking about that”. The person was going all out under the banner of checking in whether I had married a nice enough person. Because, you know, they care about me or something. You may hate to offend people, but it might not be avoidable.

Principle 5: Saying no is easier if you can find at least one person who agrees with you.

This is one of my own; I didn’t find this written down anywhere though I can’t possibly be the first person to have thought about it. But it does come very much from my own experience. I’ve been through so much counseling to help me say no, it’s not even funny. Initially, I couldn’t say no to even the smallest thing without enduring agonies of self-doubt and sleepless nights until I could next process it with the counselor. When the delivery of the no was after my counseling appointment, but the same day, it meant sleepless nights for a week! I literally couldn’t believe within myself that it had been okay to say no, without having someone else to reassure me. It’s as though I needed permission from someone else.

Of course, that permission likely won’t come from the asker. Oh, some will support you and respond really positively. But in general, not so much. And going home trying to tell yourself, in opposition to the entire world’s message of “Can’t say no”, that in fact you can, is difficult. So, to the extent that you’re able to debrief with someone else (without turning them into your unpaid counselor), it really helps to get that reassuring message. It’s not unusual for friends to ask me, “Was I a jerk for saying no?”. It’s a reasonable conversation for friends to have. With time and experience, I found the “It’s okay to say no” message getting louder and more certain in my mind. In time, it was easier to only need my own permission.

Bonus Principle, especially for women: Unsafe people will try to use your reluctance to say no against you.

Gavin de Becker, in his book The Gift of Fear, claims that our emotions will often warn us of danger, but women have been trained to ignore these feelings in favor of being polite.

(He focuses on situations of physical danger, but I think it has a wider application. Such are: notice yourself feeling resentful? There’s a good chance someone has overstepped one of your boundaries somewhere).

For example, let’s say a man wants to get way too close to you and offers to help you put your groceries into your car. You politely decline. He grabs the bags anyway. What do you do? You might weakly protest “No, really, I’m fine”. Or you might let him put the bags in. Because you’re still trying to remain polite. When, in fact, the appropriate response is “I said NO!”. Why is it appropriate, even though it’s supposedly impolite? Because, that’s what the situation calls for. I would argue that, in fact, it’s perfectly polite with respect to the scenario you’ve been placed in.

Of course, maybe you’re trying to remain “polite” because you’re scared of escalating the situation. (Every self-defense class I have been to has included the instruction to start out assertive in every threatening situation, but does that apply to you in that given moment? That’s a whole other discussion and not my area of expertise).

Here’s my question: how much of your continuing to be polite is due to a genuine calculation of what is most safe versus an ingrained notion of having to appease people? Think about this a bit. I imagine none of us will instantly be able to throw off the pressure to appease everyone, but we can work on this. The more awareness we have of how a wish to appease can be taken advantage of, the more likely it is that we will be able to get out of a dangerous situation as needed. We are also more likely to apply this in a wider context, such as requests from average persistent people, and notice if we’re being pushed to do something we don’t want.

Where does all that leave us? Upon consideration (I just like that phrase), I think I can actually distill the above into actual steps to apply.

1. Keep looking for ways to tell your brain that saying no is okay (supportive friends, material created by people who write about this, etc). Particularly if the asker doesn’t have your best interests in mind. 
2. Get yourself a written repertoire of phrases to use.This includes phrases that let you:
   1. Stall for time and not answer a request in the moment.
   2. Actually say no. This can and should include not only softened no’s, but really blunt phrases to use on people who are being inappropriate.
3. Start with small no’s and build up over time. (A bit like with any new skill, really).

Bonus challenge: Once you’re more confident with saying no, ramp back on softening those no’s. Obviously, not in the sense of throwing being considerate out the window. But something like telling your kids: “No, I’m doing something else right now”, “No, my sanity matters here”, doesn’t sound too terrible, does it?

1. I recommend the book “F*uck No!” by Sarah Knight. She has her own categorization of different types of no’s, and lots of scripts for phrases to use. A lot of her no’s are rather blunt, but keep in mind that those are mainly for when the polite ones didn’t work. ↩︎

• Category: Productivity