Growing up, we were taught that there are basically two types of mindsets. Positive and negative. We learnt the different words and emotions associated with positivity like joy, laughter, gratitude, helping and sharing and we learnt the same for negativity like anger, fear, selfishness and what not.
Basically our minds learned to recognise anything we would say ‘yes’ to as positive and anything we would say ‘no’ to as negative. This learning was not done in a day however but took us our entire childhood as we learned from various experiences to classify things, people, circumstances and places as either positive or negative.
When we enter adulthood however, things don’t work in quite the same way. We come face to face with entirely new experiences where the lines between the two sometimes seem blurred. We often say ‘yes’ to things we want to say no to and ‘no’ to things we want to say ‘yes’ to.
Both these situations have the power to guide your life in entirely different directions and you may end up losing control of your own life. So, it is important that we re-learn the rights and wrongs of life and use the yeses and nos wisely.
We Have Limited Time
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Lets start with the concept of time. We all have a limited amount of time. We don’t know how much but we are sure it’s very limited. Therefore, it is very important that we achieve what we set out to in this limited time that we have. Different people want different things out of life and different ways to get there but we all have a place we want to reach.
However, there are other important things in our lives that take up a lot of our already limited time. There are our friends, family and peers without whom our lives would be empty, there are hobbies that we love to do but which don’t necessarily contribute to the greater plan and there are so many responsibilities and obligations to see to.
That is why, it is all the more vital that we treat our time as a resource and we can only do that if we start by decluttering our lives to use the said resource in the most efficient and effective way.
Say No
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Imagine you have a messy room and it literally suffocates you. What do you do? You clean it up of course! Life can get messy too. When we take on too many endeavours or make too many friends or are trying to be everywhere at once, it will quickly make your life a mess. You will have no option but to declutter your life.
Remember the blurred lines between the rights and wrongs? You will be faced with many situations like that when you are trying to streamline your life. Making friends is always considered a positive but too many can be detrimental to productivity. Say no to that. Taking on too many tasks or too many hobbies at once may seem like increasing your productivity and effectiveness but it will lead to you not being able to complete anything at all. Say not to that as well.
Helping out family, friends, colleagues or even strangers is a definite positive but you know what? Sometimes you have to learn to say no to them as well. If you get yourself too involved in other people’s lives, you will have no time for your own. Sounds like a negative doesn’t it? Sounds like being selfish but it is not. We often say ‘yes’ to people due to our concern that they might feel bad but you need to learn to stop trying to please people all the time.
Say no to toxic relationships that get you nowhere, say no to jobs that you hate, say no to people that bring you down, heck, say no to even your city or state if you feel like it is holding you back. Say no to anything and everything that clutters your life or takes space unnecessarily. Space that can be allocated to something else, someone else.
Say Yes
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Once the decluttering is done, you will feel a lot lighter and a lot less pressure. Only those things will remain that you actually care for. Since our time is limited, we can only focus on so much. So, choose the things you want to focus on and devote yourself truly to them. Success has a habit of coming to those who choose to do so.
Say yes to your dreams, inspirations and passions and the goals you have for your lives and the journey you have set yourself on to achieve all of these. Focus on them fully, give it everything you got and disregard every other distractions.
Say yes to like minded people or people who would rather discuss ideas with you rather than discussing events or other people. Surround yourself with these people and your life will be more fulfilling and enjoyable.
Remember, you might have to say no to a thousand things before you can say yes to one but it is totally worth it when you finally find it. Finding anything worthwhile takes time and even though our time is limited, it’s time well spent.