One of the things I really find hard to do is to say NO! Yet, I read lots of advice saying that learning how to say no can be very therapeutic. Maybe I need to learn!
At the moment, I’m heads down on a couple of major client projects which happened to coincide just before the holidays and are continuing this month. Don’t get me wrong – the work is great, the projects are very interesting – but my bandwidth for anything else has gone to zero. In fact, it’s gone negative. (I’m cheating a bit by writing this post!)
One of the things I’ve learned about myself is the unusual cost that comes with switching contexts. Dropping out of the “flow”.
I used to think nothing of filling up my calendar with meetings on various subjects – and then wondering, at the end of the day, why I apparently didn’t get any real work done.
Doing real work – for me – means blocking the calendar, closing the door, shutting down email and other distractions and then, most of the time, just writing – or thinking first and then writing.
Anyway, this is just a bit of a rant on my feeling tonight behind the power curve – having to say “NO” more often than I’d like to non-project interruptions – but realizing that’s probably best and, frankly, something I need to get better at. Hope friends understand!
How do you deal with saying NO?