There are plenty of reasons to say no in life. Some of them are much more important than the reason I said no last week.
Or maybe not.
I decided to drop out of the National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo) challenge. I just said no to blogging every single day. I’m going back to my schedule of three days a week. (In my previous post, I was already debating this.)
Skipping my first day wasn’t easy. I am not a person who backs out of a commitment, even to myself. Which is why my saying no to this is more important than it might seem.
I struggled a bit against letting that first day go by. But once it did, I felt unshackled. I felt lighter.
Even more important, the writing I’ve done since has just flowed out of me. I’m inspired, I’m having fun, I’m writing things I feel good about.
Saying no is liberating.
This is not a new idea. We all know that saying no is a way of expressing our freedom, our independence. It’s a way of asserting ourselves. I’m just not always very good at it.
I don’t say no easily. I take on everything that interests me — and everything I’m asked to do — and damn the consequences. But that’s not always a healthy decision for anyone, especially myself.
Saying no is empowering.
Instead of being forced to write something every day, just for the sake of writing something, I have the luxury of taking my time. I can write the terrible first draft and come back to it later and edit it so it’s not terrible anymore. I can let things incubate. I can polish and play. I can have fun. I can express myself clearly and creatively.
It’s not just a writing lesson, though. It’s a life lesson.
As I was pondering dropping out of NaBloPoMo, one of my biggest clients called with a rush assignment on a project I’m the exclusive writer on. I said I didn’t think I could pull it off. I didn’t want to overpromise and underdeliver. Could she find another writer to handle one part of the crisis while I helped with another? She agreed that was a good strategy.
There’s a time I would have said yes to the entire project. But instead, I found the voice to say no. It was the right thing to say for everyone involved.
Can we say no to everything in life? No, and we shouldn’t. Sometimes we say yes because it’s polite, or it’s business, or it’s just the thing to do. Saying yes can also open unexpected doors, even if we’ve been standing there pulling against the doorknob trying to keep it shut.
But should we say no to some things? Yes. And I’m getting pretty good at it, if I do say so myself.
I have never been a quitter. In fact, go ahead and tell me I can’t do something. I’ll just be that much more likely to do it.
But National Blog Posting Month is killing me. It’s not writing the posts themselves. It’s fitting them in with everything else. I’m super-busy at work, the holidays are approaching way too fast, and other opportunities I don’t want to pass up are presenting themselves. Not to mention the normal stuff of daily life. Writing a blog post every single day is falling down the list of priorities — and fast.
Even more to the point, though, is the fact that I don’t want to crank out blog posts simply out of a sense of obligation. I want them to be outstanding. I want them to be pieces I enjoy writing and other people want to read.
I haven’t decided for sure yet, but I may let National Blog Posting Month go by without me.
I love the idea and adore the discipline. But there may not be room in my life to do it well enough to make it satisfying.
Maybe if I try being less of a perfectionist, I can pull it off. I’m keeping this post short and not worrying about links and photos and such.
If I do decide to give up the daily blog grind, I’ll still keep blogging on a regular schedule. Just one that makes more sense. One that means never having to say, “I’m sorry. That blog post wasn’t my best work.”
The power of the people inspired me today, more than usual.
It actually started yesterday, when the voice of reason prevailed in many elections across the country, with people triumphing over politics. Today, I had the honor of meeting Congresswoman and Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who I admire greatly. And tonight, I had the privilege of speaking about President Obama’s accomplishments to date at a volunteer team meeting for Organizing for America (OFA), the President’s grassroots team.
The last 24 hours have had an energy about them, a feeling of forward momentum and optimism. When Debbie Wasserman Schultz walked in the OFA office where we were phonebanking, she brought even more energy with her. I say this with the deep respect her position warrants: She’s a spitfire. She’s smart, strong and articulate. She’s passionate about wanting to do what’s right for the country and its citizens, and she’s not shy about speaking her mind to get the job done.
The Congresswoman is a born leader, but she’s also very human. She made phone calls to constituents with the rest of us and didn’t hesitate to pitch in when furniture needed to be moved. I learned as much from that team spirit as I did from her brief remarks, which underscored that all of us can play a role in making our country better.
We, the people, have the power to make a difference.
I carried the Congresswoman’s energy with me all day and into the evening’s OFA neighborhood team meeting. This was the first of what we now think will be a series of educational sessions to inform our friends and neighbors about key issues and mobilize more volunteers.
Fellow team members spoke about the three branches of government and recent obstructionism by the GOP, and I concluded the presentations by talking about the President’s accomplishments to date. In my 10-minute time slot, I didn’t even smudge the surface.
I came armed with two pages of bullet points. And meeting the Congresswoman reinforced what ties all those bullet points together: Everything President Obama has done — and wants to do — is focused on doing what’s right for people. Creating jobs. Growing the economy. Making healthcare coverage more affordable and available. Improving education. The list goes on.
The President, the Congresswoman and many other elected officials want to do what’s right for the country and its people. So does every single person who was at the volunteer meeting tonight.
When we asked the newcomers what they thought of the meeting, some said they felt energized. Others appreciated the learning opportunity. One woman said she’d been disillusioned, but now felt hope for the country. And every person there was motivated to take action.
My day began with inspiration from one of the leaders of the Democratic Party. It ended with inspiration from my fellow citizens. In between, I was reminded that we, the people, have the power to make a difference.
