Finally Learn to Say No
Episode Stats
Summary
When someone asks us to do something we don't want to do, we often say yes even though we want to say no. Why do we have such a hard time saying no? Today, on the show, Dr. Vanessa Patrick, who is the author of The Power of Saying No: The New Science of How to Say No, answers that question and more. She explains how to give an empowered refusal, a no that s phrased in a way that makes it less likely to create offense or pushback.
Transcript
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Brett McKay here and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.
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When someone asks us to do something we don't want to do, we often say yes, even though we
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want to say no, because we think saying no will feel terrible. But my guest, Dr. Vanessa
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Patrick says the opposite is true. We actually feel great when we say no. So why do we have
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such a hard time doing so? Today on the show, Vanessa, who is the author of The Power of
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Saying No, the new science of how to say no that puts you in charge of your life, answers
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that question and more. She shares how to categorize the ask you get into quadrants to determine
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whether you should say yes or no to them. And she explains how to give an empowered refusal,
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a no that's phrased in a way that makes it less likely to create offense or pushback. So you
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can start saying no to the things that don't matter and spend more of your time on the things
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that do. After the show's over, check out our show notes at awim.is slash say no.
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All right, Vanessa Patrick, welcome to the show.
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Thank you so much for having me. I'm delighted to be here.
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So you are a professor of marketing and you've done a lot of research on why people have a hard
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time saying no, even when they really want to say no. I think a lot of people have this problem.
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I know I have this problem. And today we're going to talk about what you can do about it and how you
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can get better at saying no. But first, let's talk about why it is that saying no can be so hard.
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You say it has a lot to do with our desire to belong to groups. What's going on there?
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So the two-letter word, no, it's a tiny little word,
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but it causes a lot of us a lot of angst and is ridden with conflict and anxiety.
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And so the reason that I'm really interested in is why is that the case? And so in my research,
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I've identified three main reasons for why we find saying no so difficult. And it boils down to
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people and how people think about us and how we relate to other people. And so those three reasons
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are, one, a concern for our relationships with others. So we want to have good relationships
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with others. We want people to like us. We want to belong to social groups and we want friends.
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And so we believe that when we say no, we are likely to damage that relationship. So we often
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say yes when we want to say no. The second driver of saying yes when we want to say no is our concern
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for our own reputation, the desire to look good in the eyes of others. And that essentially is this
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motivation for us to look competent and capable and able to do anything, regardless of how difficult
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the ask is. And we are very motivated to impress others in this way. And so we sometimes say yes,
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because we want to impress people and take on stuff that is difficult. The other reason, and this is a
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very, very important reason. And that is that we have never really learned how to say no effectively.
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I mean, if you think about when we are born, we are born pretty selfish and focused on what we want.
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And if you think about a toddler, they are very good at saying, no, I don't want this and I don't want
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that. But we socialize that out of our children, right? We tell them that they need to be cooperative and
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kind and giving and sacrifice their own wants and allow other people to have their way. And so we kind of
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socialize that out of people. So people have never really learned how to say no effectively, which is where
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All right. So speaking of that idea that our desire to belong to groups and nurture relationships, you call this,
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you say no is the harmony buster, right? Because as soon as you say no, you think, oh my gosh, this person's not
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going to like me anymore. And that, that hurts.
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Yeah. Yeah. And you know, when people ask us a favor or ask us to go somewhere or invite us someplace,
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they are expecting us to say yes. They wouldn't have asked us if they didn't expect that yes.
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And so saying no goes against that expectation. And that is something we struggle with a lot and is
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filled with conflict because we have to actually go against the expectations of others.
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So I described no as a socially dispreferred response because no one wants us to say no to
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Right. I think we've all experienced that when a family member or a friend made a, like a pretty
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heavy ask, right? You're like, oh geez, that's going to really be inconvenient. And I just don't
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have the bandwidth, but you still say yes because you care about the relationship and you feel like
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Right. Right. And in the book, I, you know, help people categorize those different asks and also
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learn to say no to the things that don't matter. And even if it's a big ask from someone important,
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if it's really a hell no for you, then it should not be something that you engage in.
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Well, this idea that our desire for reputation or status also contributes to us saying yes
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to things to which we want to say no. I thought that was interesting because you talk about
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this, you see this a lot when we say yes to acquaintances. I think most of us have no problem
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saying no to a complete stranger or it's not saying no to like a close friend or a family
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member because you know, well, you might have a tight relationship with them. So, you know,
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if you say no, they're not going to care and they're not going to think less of you.
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But acquaintances, that gets hard because you say we can fall into this acquaintance trap.
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So the acquaintance trap is essentially this idea that we have different types of relationships with
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different sorts of people. And so, as you rightly pointed out to a complete stranger, it's not that
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hard to say no because we're never going to see them again. And you can say no without any fear of
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your reputation or relationship being damaged because it's a non-issue. And with people who
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are very close to us, we are very secure in those relationships. And we are not worried if we say
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no to our mom, that our mom will stop talking to us. I mean, you know, our mom is going to be our mom
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and she will get over it and talk to us eventually. And so, essentially, it's the whole bunch of other
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people who form the majority of the relationships in our lives, who are our acquaintances, to whom we have
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the most difficult time saying no. Because we have good relationships with them, but not great
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relationships with them. They are weak social ties. And we do care about how we look in their eyes.
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And so, that combination of reputation and relationships with acquaintances put us in a
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situation very often where it's really hard to say no to them.
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Okay. So, our drive for wanting to belong or keep relationships strong or our drive for reputation
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makes it hard to say no. And we'll talk about this idea that we don't know how to say no. We're going
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to dig deep into that. But before we do, you've also done research on what happens whenever we
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say yes to things we want to say no to and how it makes us feel. What does that research show?
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It's interesting because most people feel that they are going to feel really guilty for saying no.
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No. And that saying no is going to make them feel bad. And that is actually a forecast that is
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incorrect. What actually happens in real life is that it's when we say yes to the things we don't want
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to do that we feel really bad. We feel resentful. We feel angry. We feel guilty. And when we say no to
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those things, we feel relieved and happy and freer. And so, even though we think that saying no will
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feel bad and make us feel bad, it's actually the opposite. It's saying yes to the things that don't
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motivate us, that are not aligned with our purpose, that don't leverage our unique strengths. Those are
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Yeah. I imagine that's a source of a lot of burnout that people might be experiencing.
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Oh, absolutely. 100%. When we fill our calendars with busy work and stuff that's not aligned with
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our identity, stuff that doesn't make us feel energized and good about doing it, we feel really
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resentful to the people who are making us do those things and angry with that. And if we spend more time
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doing the things that give us joy and are fulfilling and tap into what we are able to uniquely contribute,
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So, saying yes to things you want to say no to, it makes you feel put upon, disempowered,
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not an agent like you're acted on. Like it just, that doesn't feel good.
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Yeah. And I think it's interesting. I know I've experienced that where
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I'll have this ask given to me and I'm just wrestling with it. Oh my gosh, I don't want to do this.
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And then I finally say no. And I'm like, oh yeah, that wasn't so bad. But then when I say yes,
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just think, oh, this is awful. And I'm just complaining about the entire time. And for some
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reason, I can't remember that. You'll feel worse saying yes to this thing instead of saying no.
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Yeah. Yeah. The fact is that when we say yes to something and we feel really bad,
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our psychological immune system kicks in. And we immediately want to start coping with that.
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And to do that, we often try to search desperately for a silver lining,
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something that's good about the fact that you are spending your time doing this thing that you
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really did not want to do. And I recommend that we kind of manage that psychological immune system
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so that we don't repeat the mistake again. So, when we do feel resentful and when we do feel that
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sense of, I'm wasting my time, I really shouldn't be doing this, it's a learning opportunity for us
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to really recognize that this is something that I really don't like to do. I should avoid doing it
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in the future. Rather than let that psychological immune system kick in and not learn from that
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experience. Another thing I think, and you talk about this in the book, that contributes to
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us having such a hard time saying no, is that we often go around in the world thinking,
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well, I'm the only one that could do this. And it reminds me of a quote from Bertrand Russell.
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He said, one of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one's work
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is terribly important. Like you're this indispensable person. But actually, when you say no,
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there's probably someone else that can do the thing that you said no to.
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Oh, absolutely. In fact, that's a very, very vivid thing to remember. That whenever you feel
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that you're the only person who can do this, you need to check yourself. Because I often remind
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myself that the graveyards are full of indispensable people. The reality is that when someone makes a
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request of you, most often, they just need that thing done. And while you might be a great candidate
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to do it, you might not be the only candidate to do it. And the reality is, when you say no,
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they're simply going to go back to their list and go down that list to the next person.
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Yeah. The graveyards are full of indispensable people. Reminds me, my great-grandfather,
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he self-published a short memoir. And at the end of it, he had a poem called The Indispensable Man.
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And Dwight Eisenhower actually used to carry this poem around. And it goes like this.
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Sometime when you're feeling important, sometime when your ego's in bloom, sometime when you take
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it for granted, you're the best qualified in the room. Sometime when you feel that you're going
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would leave an unfillable hole, just follow these simple instructions and see how they humble your
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soul. Take a bucket and fill it with water. Put your hand in it up to the wrist. Pull it out,
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and the hole that's remaining is a measure of how much you'll be missed. You can splash all you wish
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when you enter. You may stir up the water galore, but stop, and you'll find that in no time, it looks
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quite the same as before. The moral of this quaint example is to do just the best that you can.
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Be proud of yourself, but remember, there's no indispensable man. So I think it's a good reminder,
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you know, when you're feeling like, man, if I don't say yes to this, then everything's going to fall
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apart that, you know, no, in most cases, other arrangements will be made and things will just
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keep moving on without you. Yeah, I mean, it's really humbling. And you know, you become able to
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say no to a lot more things when you have a more realistic view of what you can contribute. Having a
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clear idea of what you can do and do uniquely is so important because in some domains, we might be
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indispensable. And it's so important to be able to focus our energies on those domains because there
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we can make a positive difference in the world. If we scatter our attention and do anything that
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everyone asks us, then we diffuse the impact that we can have. And so our self-awareness needs to kind
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of focus on where am I truly indispensable and where am I not? All right, well, let's dig into how
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people can start saying no more often and feel good about it. One thing you recommend is that
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people avoid calling themselves a people pleaser. And I think a lot of people who have a hard time
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saying no, they do like, well, I'm just such a people pleaser. Why do you recommend people not
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labeling themselves as that? You know, in my research, I would very often ask people to tell
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me stories about when they said yes, when they wanted to say no. And they would tell me those stories,
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but they would also give themselves the excuse or give themselves an out by explaining to me that,
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oh, I'm just a people pleaser. You know, I have this terrible people pleasing tendency.
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And the idea is that the words that we use are really important. If we call ourselves people
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pleasers, we are more likely to act like people pleasers. Because the self-talk, the way we speak to
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ourselves, the way we describe ourselves does implicate our identity. So we need to be able to
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talk to ourselves in a way that allows ourselves to act in the way we want to act. So we should not
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call ourselves or give ourselves a label that puts us in a situation that we don't want to be in. So
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people pleaser is definitely one of those labels. Because we make greater inroads into our identity
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when we use words like that. And it tells us who we are.
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So part of how to say no is knowing when to say no. And you mentioned earlier about categorizing the
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and you actually have this really useful quadrant that people can use for deciding when to say yes
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and when to say no. Can you walk us through these four quadrants?
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Right. So this is the framework that I call the decipher the ask framework. And it's really about
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deciphering between the good for me activities versus the not good for me activities. And the framework
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takes two lenses. The first lens is how costly is taking this on going to be for me? Is it going to be
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very, very, very effortful, time consuming, energy consuming, etc.? And so that's one dimension. How costly is it
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for me? Versus how much benefit will the asker get from me doing this? You know, like, is this tapping into
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something that I can uniquely do and really make a positive difference? Or does it have no real benefit for me
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doing it at all? And so it's got these two dimensions that we consider. And so if you think
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about the different asks, you can think about something like low cost to you ask, pretty easy
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for you to do, but has a huge benefit for other people. I call these as pass the salt asks. So
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imagine you're sitting at the dining table and the salt shaker is sitting in front of you and someone
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says, hey, Vanessa, can you pass the salt? And I just lift up the salt shaker and pass it along the
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table. For me, it was super easy to do, not a big deal. But for the other person, presumably, you know,
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they really needed salt for their meal and it's going to transform their meal. So it's a big deal
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for them. There are some asks like those, which the pass the salt asks, which might be useful to think
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about saying yes to because they are very low cost to you, but they actually make a positive
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difference in the world. In complete contrast to pass the salt asks are what I call bake your famous
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lasagna asks. These are asks that are very costly for you. They are hugely time consuming, like baking a
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lasagna, for example. They might be effortful. And so if you've been asked by a friend to bake this
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lasagna for a potluck party where everyone else is bringing party trays or picking up cookies from a
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store and you are the only person who's slaving, making this tedious dish, maybe those are the kind
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of asks that you should be thinking about saying no to. And so thinking about the kind of asks that
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are coming your way are really important. And the reason we need to say no to bake your famous
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lasagna asks is so we can say yes to hero's journey asks. So hero's journey asks are the ones where
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they might be high effort for you. You might have to give a lot of yourself, but they also make a
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positive difference in the world. And so we need to think about where, and we talked about this a
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little bit earlier, right? When we're talking about where you spend your energy, how do you find the
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things that you can uniquely do that you are indispensable for in that specific domain in
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the moment? And so spending our time doing those because those are energizing and motivating and
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feel good because you know that you're uniquely contributing to the world.
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And then that final one, that low cost to you, but low to other people, that's the email tweet post
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ask, right? Yes. So those are the kind of asks which are low benefit to other people, not very high cost
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to you, but are they worth doing? So in the book, I talk about a few things, you know, I call them
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bullshit jobs because they are probably not worth doing. If you are, if you see yourself doing stuff
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that's making no difference to the world, however easy it is, you should probably not spend even a
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minute doing it, right? And so you can think about discussing with the asker whether those things
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should even be done or should they be outsourced or just eliminated so that no one has to do those
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kind of jobs. And so once we identify and become much better at spotting the kind of ask that it is,
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deciphering the kind of ask that it is, then how we respond to those asks becomes pretty obvious and
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straightforward. Yeah. I thought this quadrant was really useful and it's, I've been thinking
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about the ask that I get and putting it into there. So the low cost to you, low benefit to others,
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that's the email tweet post, automatic no, probably maybe it doesn't have to be done. The low cost to
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you, high benefit to others. Examples of that you gave in your line of work since you're a professor,
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you know, writing recommendation letters, giving feedback to student presentations,
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things like that. It's, it's easy to do, but high benefit of the person. But you also say,
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you got to be careful saying yes to those things because you have this idea from George Washington.
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Right. Yeah. You don't want to say yes too much. Then your entire workflow is just
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caught up with these little small past the salt ass.
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Yes. Yes. And when you were talking about the bake your famous lasagna, that made me think of
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like the no indispensable man problem, right? It's like, well, you're the only one who can make
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this lasagna. It's like, well, you could get a lasagna from Costco and it'll probably taste the
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same. Just do that. I don't need to do this. Oh yeah. Just go to the grocery store and buy a
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party tray like everybody else. Yeah. You'll be good. And then I like the hero's journey. If it's a high
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cost to you, but a high benefit to others, then say yes, but then just make sure you're really
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measuring the benefits. I think that's a really useful quadrant.
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Yeah. But even, you know, in the hero's journey, one needs to be very careful that it is in fact
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a hero's journey and that the benefit that you're conferring on others is real. So you need to,
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even when you take those on, ask the right questions. Don't just make assumptions about
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the benefit or sometimes just asking, why are you asking me? You know, I know you've approached me
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for this, but can you, can you explain why you asked me to do this? And sometimes you'll hear
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stuff about why their thought process, how they see you as a person, what you contribute,
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and then you can get a better understanding of, you know, how your talent is viewed in the context
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of the organization. We're going to take a quick break for your word from our sponsors.
00:22:11.440
And now back to the show. Okay. So we've talked about the groundwork for saying no,
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don't refer to yourself as a people pleaser and decide when you should say no by categorizing
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asks into quadrants. So you should probably say no when it's low effort for you, but low reward,
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or a lot of effort for you, but low benefit. And you should probably say yes when it's low effort
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for you and high benefit to others or high effort for you, but high potential reward too.
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Now let's get into actually how you give a no. So you and your research team have developed this idea
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that's called the empowered refusal. And it's a way of saying no, that will allow you to still
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maintain relationships and maintain your reputation. So what is an empowered refusal?
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So the empowered refusal is a way of saying no. And it's a way of saying no that stems from your
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identity. So you look inwards and identify what are the values, priorities, preferences,
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and beliefs that you have. And then you communicate your no using who you are, your identity as the
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basis for saying no. And so because you implicate your identity, you come across with greater
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conviction and determination and come across also as much more persuasive to the other person
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Well, so what's an example of that, of saying a no that's tied up with your identity and saying
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So when you speak from your identity, your identity is who you are. It is a stable stance,
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right? And so words that are empowering and implicate your identity are words like saying
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I don't, I never, I always. It is my policy too. As soon as you use words like that, you come across
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as much more empowered than if you use words like I can't, I shouldn't, I wish, I could, but.
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So the language that we use can communicate and tap into identity quite effectively. So in our
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research studies, we've contrasted the phrase I can't with the phrase I don't. And what we show in
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our work is that when you say I can't, you come across as disempowered, not in control of the
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situation. You communicate that in some other circumstance you would, but the situation does
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not allow you to. So you come across as disempowered. As soon as you say I don't, you come across as
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having a much more stable stance on the matter. You talk about who you are, you implicate the kind
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of person that you are. So it's a small change in the language, but it has a tremendously powerful
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impact on the listener as well as on yourself. Yeah. I've noticed with my, my own experience,
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I've do that with, with my work, I get asked to like, you know, come speak to things or maybe do
00:25:23.840
something like that. And I, my answer is, uh, I just, that's something I don't do. And it's because
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like, I just want to be with my kids. Like I want to be a good dad. Like that's, that's the priority
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for me. And it makes it easy to say no. Like I don't have to think about it. Yeah, exactly.
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Exactly. And the research shows that when you tell someone no using an I don't phrase,
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they're more willing to accept it. And if you say I can't, they're, they'll start trying to
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negotiate with you. Is that how it works? Exactly. And so we basically show that, you know,
00:25:52.440
saying no in a way that stems from your identity and using words like I don't is so much more
00:25:59.540
empowering and is so much more effective in persuading the other person that you are not
00:26:07.600
the right person for this job. And it's important to remember that when you are saying no, because
00:26:15.120
you make it about yourself, your no is about you and not a rejection of the other person.
00:26:21.040
And that's a really interesting kind of change in the way we think about it. If we say,
00:26:26.640
I'm giving voice to my values, what I, my priorities, my preferences, my beliefs,
00:26:33.440
this is not about you. This is certainly not personal and it's not a rejection of you.
00:26:41.580
So this is how you're able to maintain the relationship or even make it stronger.
00:26:46.820
And it makes it stronger because now people know something about you that they didn't know.
00:26:50.980
So related to this idea of tying your no to your identity and saying, I don't instead of I can't.
00:26:58.900
Your I don'ts grow out of setting what you call personal policies for yourself. So not doing
00:27:05.260
speaking engagements because my priority is being a dad is a personal policy. What are some other
00:27:11.640
personal policies that you've seen in your own life, but also in the research you've done?
00:27:16.420
So personal policies are simple rules that we set up for ourselves that guide our actions and
00:27:23.220
decisions. They are the ways in which our values and our preferences get manifested in how we operate
00:27:31.420
in the world. So for example, you know, I'm a morning person and I like my mornings to be
00:27:38.380
dedicated to creative work, writing, research, thinking. And so I have a personal policy where
00:27:46.100
I don't do meetings in the morning unless it's a standing administrative meeting that I have no
00:27:51.040
control over. So those are the kind of things that you have to think about. You have to think
00:27:57.120
about how you would like the world to be and to what extent can you control and manage the situation
00:28:05.020
so that the world is the way you want it to be? How can you create operating principles?
00:28:10.780
You give examples of several creative type people who have created these sorts of policies for
00:28:16.080
themselves. Like there's a lot of writers who say, you know, look, the thing I'm good at that
00:28:20.000
allows me to give the most value to the world is writing good books. So they say, here's a list of
00:28:25.240
things I don't do. I don't do speaking engagements. I'm not going to read your manuscript. I'm not going
00:28:29.620
to meet with you. And it's not because he doesn't like you and doesn't wish you well for whatever thing
00:28:34.860
you're doing. It's like, it's going to prevent him from doing the writing that he knows will actually
00:28:39.400
have a big impact. Yes. And understanding that, you know, where you can impact the world in a
00:28:44.980
positive way, how your talent can be best used and your time can be best used. These are really
00:28:53.220
important things for us to reflect on and then make policies around. It sounds like having these
00:28:58.520
personal policies and understanding how to use the I don't language, this would allow you to create
00:29:05.700
templates for yourself on how to say no when you do get those asks. So instead of having to think
00:29:09.840
about it every single time, you get an email for with a request and you already have the template
00:29:14.860
because like, all right, here's my identity. I know what I'm all about. Here's my personal policy.
00:29:19.560
And then you just, you create a template that can be used in any request.
00:29:23.820
Exactly. And I think that that it can be very efficient to have those sort of decision rules.
00:29:28.760
So I'll give you an example, Brett. One of the things that happens quite often as a mom
00:29:34.080
is that you get asked to volunteer for various different things at your children's schools,
00:29:39.800
right? Now having a lens with which to decide what you volunteer for and what you don't volunteer for
00:29:46.520
is efficient and effective. So in my view, I look at it and think if it has to do with teaching the
00:29:53.640
kids something, sharing my knowledge, I'm all in. I will go and read to the kids. I will go and do a
00:30:01.560
presentation. I will do career day. I will do those kinds of things. If it doesn't tap into those
00:30:08.020
things, I'm less likely to do them. So if you ask me if the teacher wants someone to stuff envelopes
00:30:14.420
or, you know, go and buy treats for the class, I don't typically volunteer to do those kinds of
00:30:21.480
things because I've got a lens with which I decide what I'm going to volunteer for and what I'm not
00:30:28.140
going to volunteer for. Okay. So we've talked about how to say no by sorting ask into quadrants
00:30:33.740
by saying, I don't, instead of I can't, and then developing personal policies that these I don'ts
00:30:41.200
grow out of. Something else you talk about in the book is how this preparation can help you manage
00:30:46.360
what you call the spotlight effect. And this is when someone asks you to do something and you just,
00:30:51.100
you feel put on the spot. Like everyone's eyes are on you waiting for your answer. And this can either
00:30:55.860
be in your head, like you have a psychological audience in your head, or it might be literally
00:31:00.460
someone asks you to do something and everyone else, there's a whole bunch of people there watching
00:31:04.700
you waiting for your answer. So you feel under pressure. And so you end up just saying yes to
00:31:09.880
make the spotlight go away, but some preparation can help you deal with that spotlight. So you don't
00:31:14.640
automatically say yes. So how would this play out in an example? Like let's say you're at a work
00:31:20.360
meeting and the boss says, Hey, can you stay late to do X? Yeah. So it would be really helpful to
00:31:27.760
have a policy around that. Now, if it is important, so the book is not about getting out of things
00:31:35.840
that are your actual job or getting out of things because of, you know, laziness or other sorts of
00:31:43.440
priorities. So it's really about taking on stuff and saying no to things that are not your
00:31:50.400
responsibility. So the first question you need to ask is why am I, why is he asking me? Is it super
00:31:57.180
urgent? Is it super important? Is it something that can be handled in a different way? So imagine that
00:32:03.900
there's a crisis at work and it needs to be done. Maybe that's not the best time to push back and,
00:32:10.340
you know, exert your own personal policy. Perhaps it's a good time to just help out. But then after
00:32:18.140
the crisis has died down to go back and speak to your boss about, you know, a last minute change and
00:32:27.580
asking me to stay late doesn't work for me because I have these family commitments or, you know, whatever
00:32:34.400
the reason is that you want to say no. Alternatively, so if it's not a crisis situation, you could
00:32:41.380
just say, hey, you know, you know that I've got family commitments starting at 5 p.m. and there's an
00:32:46.660
expectation that I'm going to be home at 5. I can't change that last minute. So those are the kind of
00:32:52.160
things that you have to learn to communicate and learn to respond depending on the situation. What personal
00:33:00.100
policies do is that you've already decided what you prefer, what you hope will happen. So they just
00:33:07.460
become easier to use as the infrastructure to be able to communicate a more effective refusal.
00:33:15.640
Let's say you give an empowered no. I think most people are going to be like, they're good people.
00:33:18.820
They're like, okay, I understand that. And they move on. Some people though, they just can't take a
00:33:22.700
hint and you're going to get a lot of pushback. How do you handle people who have a hard time taking no
00:33:27.860
for an answer? Yeah. So we will encounter pushy askers, unfortunately, and there will be people
00:33:34.680
who will not take no for an answer, even if you've said an empowered refusal. I think recognizing
00:33:41.140
how these people operate and learning to manage them is very important. So, you know, in the book,
00:33:49.260
I call pushy askers, walnut trees. And I use the metaphor of a walnut tree because it becomes a vivid
00:34:00.260
imagery to describe people who will not take no for an answer. So the long story short, the black
00:34:08.040
American walnut tree is essentially this beautiful tree with a luxuriant canopy and a root system that
00:34:16.280
goes out 50 feet in the area. But it dominates the landscape. It stunts the growth of all the other
00:34:25.560
trees around it. And this is because it exudes into the soil, a toxin called juglone. And so walnut trees
00:34:33.900
are like people who will not take no for an answer. It's all about them and what they want, your preferences,
00:34:40.020
your values, they don't matter. What I've found in my work is that as soon as you kind of reframe
00:34:47.800
people from being, you know, toxic or jerks or difficult or all these things that people talk
00:34:54.880
about in the literature and in management books, as soon as you reframe those kind of people into
00:35:01.660
describing their behavior as walnut tree like behavior, then it becomes easier for you to handle
00:35:09.340
the walnut tree, easier for you to manage the pushback that they are giving you. And so, you know,
00:35:17.400
it's important to recognize how walnut trees act. You will find that walnut trees very often
00:35:22.860
will make a request face to face. Research shows that we are 34 times more likely to say yes to a
00:35:30.540
face to face request. They know that. And so they'll make sure to ask you face to face. The other thing
00:35:36.540
they'll do is that they'll insist on leveraging or capitalizing on the spotlight effect. So they will
00:35:42.760
insist on getting an immediate response from you. And that immediate response when you're under the
00:35:50.540
glare of the spotlight is going to be yes. And so they know that too. They often will create a home
00:35:58.720
court advantage where they are in a situation where it's impossible for you to say no to them. So they
00:36:07.160
might invite you to their house. They might take you for lunch to an expensive restaurant and foot the
00:36:12.340
bill. They basically put you in a vulnerable position so that that spotlight glares even more
00:36:18.420
brightly. So the first point with dealing with walnut trees is recognizing walnut tree behavior.
00:36:25.680
Second is recognizing how walnut trees respond to your no. Some walnut trees will explode with anger.
00:36:36.960
How dare you say no to me sort of walnut trees. Other walnut trees will give you the complete opposite.
00:36:43.740
They'll just do a silent treatment. You said no to me and I'm never going to talk to you forever.
00:36:48.240
You know, so neither response is great. But walnut trees tend to be very demanding in this way. They're
00:36:58.060
essentially trying to push you to say yes. And so I talk about two types of strategies, active pushback
00:37:06.820
and passive pushback that walnut trees engage in. So active pushback is the screaming at you or making you
00:37:15.360
feel really guilty or giving you one reason after another as to why you should say yes to their
00:37:24.020
request. So that's a much more active way they are pushing back against your no. A passive way is by
00:37:33.060
making you feel really guilty, telling you all the things you are going to miss. You know, walnut trees
00:37:39.740
are great at creating FOMO or the fear of missing out. Oh, you must come because think about all the
00:37:46.360
things you'll be missing out if you don't come. Those are passive because what the walnut tree is
00:37:52.160
trying to do in those situations is get you to change your mind, right? Yourself. So you change your
00:37:59.080
mind and say you're right. You're probably right. I should go. And so recognizing the patterns of the
00:38:05.860
walnut trees and then deciding for yourself how you are going to communicate your empowered refusal.
00:38:14.100
So I've got a whole set of strategies associated with how do you communicate your empowered refusal.
00:38:21.100
So for example, if someone's yelling at you, one strategy is to go softer, create like a vocal
00:38:26.980
contrast. If someone's yelling, you talking softer makes it very salient that they are yelling.
00:38:33.460
Repeating yourself. So saying, I just said no. I think it was pretty clear that I just said no.
00:38:42.800
And so when you repeat yourself, it sounds like you are definitely not budging. And so these are all
00:38:50.900
the different things that we have to learn and understand and think about as we are dealing with
00:38:56.400
that sort of pushback. Yeah, that advice or that insight about walnut trees will try to make the
00:39:03.380
ask in person and in their own home turf. I've had that happen to me. People will be like, hey,
00:39:09.080
send me an email. Brett, I'd like to talk to you about something. Can we meet X or can we get on
00:39:13.940
the phone X? They never say why. And like, I know, I understand like they're trying to do a power play
00:39:18.560
here. Like they're trying to like throw me off. So I just, I balance things out. Like, hey, you know
00:39:23.040
what? To best prepare for this, I'd like to know what it is we're going to talk about so I can
00:39:26.420
prepare for it and make it a productive conversation. Precisely. And that's, that's how I do it. And
00:39:30.460
oftentimes they, if they kind of are wishy-washy, it's like, well, I'm sorry, I can't do it. It's
00:39:35.400
going to be a waste of time. So yeah. Sorry. Yeah. So you mentioned this earlier about this
00:39:41.480
empowered. No, I think people might hear this idea of empowered. No, I think, well, I just got to say
00:39:44.260
no to all the things now that I don't want to do, but you have caveats about this. It's a nuanced
00:39:48.360
thing. Sometimes you got to say yes, even though you want to say no. So in the example of the boss
00:39:53.300
putting you in the spotlight because something has to get done. It's do or die. But you also
00:39:57.320
talk young people, when you're young and starting off in your life and your career, it often pays
00:40:02.160
more to say yes, because you're trying to gain experience and more, yeah, just more opportunities.
00:40:09.540
And then as you get older or progress in your career, then you need to start saying no more
00:40:13.680
because you got to start focusing on those things you are really good at. Yes, exactly. And so as you
00:40:20.480
said, rightly said, it is very nuanced and there's a time and place for everything. So when you're
00:40:26.720
starting out in your career and you are exploring, sometimes junior people have to go through the
00:40:34.500
motions to learn about what it takes to do all aspects of the job, even if you don't necessarily
00:40:41.780
like all aspects of the job. It's once you reach a slightly senior position that you actually have some
00:40:48.440
choices about what you'd like to focus on, that you have the choice. But very often when you're
00:40:55.820
young, you have to do everything. So if you think about the movie set, for example, you think about
00:41:01.300
Steven Spielberg, you know, he didn't reach there by not doing all the basic menial tasks that every
00:41:08.840
gopher has to do on a movie set. You do all of that. You learn a ton through that process. And then you
00:41:16.040
reach a point where, you know, you gain certain expertise in certain areas, you've got a position
00:41:23.340
where you can choose. These are the things I want to focus on and these are the things I'm not. So
00:41:28.560
it's really important that we allow ourselves to experience different things. And so the other aspect
00:41:37.380
is even for people who are more experienced, let's say you are looking to reinvent yourself.
00:41:42.480
When you're reinventing yourself, very often you have to explore different pathways. When you're in
00:41:49.380
exploration mode, thinking about what are all the different things I could do? That's when you say
00:41:54.840
yes to a lot of things. And then once you've had those experiences, and then you begin to focus,
00:42:01.860
okay, now I've experienced all these things. And I've decided I like this subset. And now you have to
00:42:08.440
learn to say no to the things that are distracting you from focusing on that subset. And so it is a
00:42:13.960
very nuanced issue. And one has to use prudence and judgment when deciding what to say yes to and what
00:42:20.340
to say no to, depending on the situation. And that's when it's useful to do some reflection and
00:42:26.240
maybe do some, maybe categorize those asks in the quadrant. I mean, that can be really useful.
00:42:32.560
Well, Vanessa, this has been a fantastic conversation. Where can people go to learn more about the book and
00:42:38.080
Thank you so much. I've enjoyed chatting with you too. Well, my website is probably a good first
00:42:43.500
stop. It's vanessapatrick.net. Happy to connect with listeners on LinkedIn. And you can follow me
00:42:52.580
Well, Dr. Vanessa Patrick, thanks for your time. It's been a pleasure.
00:42:55.140
Thank you so much. This has been great fun. I've enjoyed it.
00:42:58.800
My guest today was Vanessa Patrick. She's the author of the book, The Power of Saying No.
00:43:02.720
It's available on amazon.com and bookstores everywhere. You can find more information
00:43:06.040
about her work at our website, vanessapatrick.net. Also check out our show notes at aom.is slash
00:43:10.980
say no, where you can find links to resources where you delve deeper into this topic.
00:43:21.680
Well, that wraps up another edition of the AOM podcast. Make sure to check out our website
00:43:25.640
at artofmanless.com, where you can find our podcast archives, as well as thousands of articles
00:43:29.720
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00:43:33.100
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00:43:36.660
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00:43:44.660
the continued support. And until next time, it's Brett McKay reminding you to not listen to the
00:43:48.120
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