Just Say No!
In Female Lawyers’ Club last week, we were chatting about saying no to things, and how difficult we found it. I talk about saying no a lot but this doesn’t make it any easier for me to do it!
Case in point. I’d been contacted a couple of weeks ago by a colleague who asked if I could speak at an event in Leeds, as an employment colleague had dropped out. I really wanted to help my colleague out, but it would have been a nightmare:
I had no childcare that day and was due to pick up my two kids from their separate schools.
It was only the second day back after a few days off over half term, and I’d still be catching up with emails and work.
I don’t live anywhere near Leeds and it would have basically taken the whole day to travel there and back and attend the event.
I’d joined in with events at that venue before and it had never led to any enquiries, let alone any work.
Despite all of this, I STILL really wanted to say yes. Because, well, that’s what we do, isn’t it? We help people out when they ask. Even if there’s nothing in it for us.
I’ve recently read “Take back your brain” by a former lawyer turned coach, Kara Loewentheil. It was FANTASTIC. It’s all about how a patriarchal society gets in our heads and conditions us to agree to things, be compliant and helpful to everyone despite us already being overloaded with commitments. It’s also about how we need to change our self-talk so we don’t undermine our own confidence.
This book helped me to see that saying no makes me feel really uncomfortable, but that’s ok; that’s just a natural consequence of our social conditioning over many years. Just because it feels uncomfortable doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it! This helped me to say no to my colleague despite feeling bad.
One point Loewentheil made stopped me in my tracks.
She asks us to imagine if a law was brought in requiring that 50% of all corporate boards be comprised of women. Companies must comply within the week.
The new law would superficially achieve equality for a time. However, the women newly promoted to these boards would still have their “old brains” which have been conditioned by the patriarchal society we live in, and would be plagued by their own negative self-talk which undermined their confidence. They would use limiting language during board meetings (“I may have got this wrong, but…”) and fail to “own” their contributions for fear of being seen as boastful. They would volunteer, or say yes to, non-promotable unpaid work because they feel they should, or don’t want to be seen as selfish or unhelpful. When the time came to discuss pay rises, they wouldn’t ask for more money because they don’t want to be seen as greedy. Soon enough, the inequalities that were thought to have been eliminated spring back up, because the women were continuing to act in a way that reflects their old conditioning and thought patterns they were taught that maintain the status quo of gender inequality.
Loewentheil says this wouldn’t be the women’s fault; they’d been conditioned to think and behave this way over thousands of years. However, without being aware of these patterns, we inadvertently maintain the status quo of inequality. Ouch.
In her book, Loewentheil argues that we need to do the internal work to challenge our thoughts, so that we can truly step into our power. This all takes work but is essential for the world to truly become a more equitable place. If we don’t do this work, the structural gender inequalities that have prevailed for thousands of years will remain in place, despite progress in all other areas of life.
So let’s be aware of our default thought patterns and keep an eye on how they may be affecting our lives. To make it as easy as possible for you to say no to the things which are not going to move you in the direction of your goals and the life you’d like to have, I have a free gift for you. I’ve created a printable PDF containing some easy-to-use ways to say no in a multitude of situations, for you to keep handy. That way, when you get caught on the hop by a new request, you can quickly glance at your guide and find the right phrase before your gendered social conditioning kicks in and you’ve said yes before you’d had chance to think!
I should add that OF COURSE you won’t be able to say no to every request, especially to your boss or clients. Many bosses expect you to do whatever work you are given without question, and some clients expect additional advice without charge in exchange for their continuing instructions. Depending on your level of seniority and role, there may be little you can do about this. However, the point of the guide is to challenge the automatic yes as the default option - is there another way? And to empower you to say no if you consider there may be scope to refuse and it is appropriate to do so.
Let me know how you get on. Have you said no to anything recently, despite feeling pressurized to say yes? I’d love to know!
Enjoy the rest of your week.
Rachel