Things We’ve Said No To

I’m going to be honest- as I brainstormed what to write for this post, I started to feel a little down on myself. I love to be the “yes” girl, the “yes” Mom, the “yes” person. “No” does not make for good blog content, nor does it please everyone, nor does it fill my personal love and contentment tank. And, yet, something that I feel like I’ve been learning a lot lately is how healthy saying “no” is! It may not always be the fun thing, but it’s extremely healthy to learn how and when to say no to things.

A couple life philosophies we try to keep in mind on this topic:

I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead. Honestly, this is terrible advice in general, but part of it rings true. We only have one life to live, and I want to guide my family into living that life fully- and well. The flip side of this is that I am not very good at resting, and can sometimes really overdo it. But, as a general rule, I would much rather get to the end of life feeling very tired, but having loved, served and lived generously than having lived a life of comfort and rest.

Every Yes is a No Somewhere Else, and Vice Versa. This is a concept I’m working really hard to teach my kids! If we say yes to one event, that means that we will have to say no to another event. If you want to go Trick or Treating, that means that you will have to leave Great Wolf Lodge early in order to do it. If you want to play a sport, that means that we may need to give up our weekly library trips or having a cozy read-aloud time at home each evening. And this applies as adults, too! If we want to have our kids in ever sport possible, we won’t have a slow family schedule. If we want to have a slow family schedule, we likely won’t be able to have kids in sports. If we say yes to serving in multiple capacities at school, we may not be able to serve as much at church. If we have animals, we can’t travel very much. If we spend all our money on Amazon purchases, we won’t have a budget to travel. Which leads to my next point…

What Do We Value as a Family? All of the examples I listed above don’t necessarily have a “right” or “wrong” answer- it has to be based on your personal/family values. If we value travel, but we are blowing our whole budget on random Amazon purchases, then we aren’t putting our “no’s” in the right place! If we value intentional family time, but are spending every single weeknight at the sports field, then we have our “no” in the wrong place! Every family is different and we have to make sure that our time and energy is spent where our values are!

With that in mind, here are a few things we have said “no” to:

• No to a big house – Yes to a large plot of land for homesteading
• No to debt- Yes to driving older model cars bought with cash and a tighter grocery budget
• No to going to the homesteading conference in VA this weekend- Yes to a Gala and time spent with family, plus avoiding two days of car sickness
• We are seriously considering saying no to the next season of sports- which means saying Yes to family time and evenings at home and less scurrying around
• No to brand new clothes; Yes to lots of thrifted things that make my heart so happy!
• No to going to Moms Night Out; Yes to a cozy evening at home with my family
• No to hitting snooze on my alarm; Yes to getting up and getting a workout in
• No to getting a workout in; Yes to hitting snooze on my alarm so that I can get a little bit more rest after a very busy week

I’m sure I could go on and on, but I’ll leave my list there! What is something you have said no to lately? I would love to hear from you!