Just SAY NO

Say NO to distractions, YES to focus and space for creativity.?

-Tanmay Vora

When we say YES to always being available to the world, we say NO to focus.?

How do we think, plan, execute, review, and accomplish if we don't focus on what's important to us?

It's easy to get caught up in what Steven Covey called quadrant three activity-Urgent, but Unimportant - like spending the day responding to emails, calls, and time-consuming errands. Your days fly by, but nothing of consequence gets done.?

Saying no and delegating is hard, so we tell ourselves:

• It's easier just to do it than to delegate.
• Somebody's got to do it.
• Their project is more important than mine.
• I like being needed.

We can spend our entire lives serving others and not ourselves and our goals. A dream is a goal without a deadline.?

In Louise Evans's Five Chairs, Five Choices, TedX, she talks about the importance of asking "what do I want." That's the vital question to ask to clarify what's important to you.?

Once you've identified what YOU want, give yourself permission and the necessary time to make it happen. Don't play the martyr or the victim. We are better than that, and we all deserve to live the life that matters to us. If we don't focus on what we want, no one else will.

In the words of the scholar Hillel from the Talmud: in the first century,

If I am not for myself, then who is for me, but if I am for myself alone, then what am I. And if not now, when?

-Hillel

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