Say “No” To Stuff You Don’t Want To Do With Just One Word

It’s not the word you think it is.

If there’s something someone asks you to do — at work, or in life, or just on the street, maybe — and you really don’t want to do it, the word that arises to your lips and nearly escapes from your mouth is “no.” Saying no is hard when you’re accustomed to saying yes. Saying yes feels polite; it feels correct. It feels like what you should say when asked to do something at work or in your social life, because hey, why not, someone’s asking you, so you might as well.

But if you’re a person who says yes all the time to things you’d really rather say no to, especially in the workplace, where agreeing to tasks is part of the reason they hired you in the first place, saying no feels bad. The great news is that you don’t have to say no. You can say something entirely different and not come off like (too) much of a jerk.

Here’s the Most Effective Way to Say No to Things You Don’t Want to Do

A study from the Journal of Consumer Research proved that the easiest way to feel better about setting boundaries and saying no to things that you’d really rather not do is to reframe the rebuttal. The trick is to replace “can’t” with “don’t.”

Saying “I don’t eat X” when tempted by an unhealthy snack, for example, made participants feel more “psychologically empowered” than using “can’t.” The same held true with a scenario about resolving to exercise each day: “I don’t skip my workout” was a more powerful motivator to get to the gym than “I can’t skip my workout.”

What a beautifully effective way to set personal boundaries without feeling like you’re cutting yourself off at the pass and hindering your own abilities. Technically, you can find the toner for the printer at work. You are perfectly capable of writing emails on Saturday mornings before you get out of bed, especially if they are flagged with that panic-inducing Microsoft Outlook red exclamation mark. In many office environments, both events are presented with the gravity of an imminent nuclear threat. The former is merely an inconvenience that will surely be resolved by someone else; the latter could be important, but could also be the result of your office manager finally going off on the individual who leaves dirty dishes in the sink even though there’s a dishwasher literally right there.

It feels strangely presumptuous — selfish, even — to say that you “don’t” do things. But breaking yourself of the habit of being an unwitting yes-person at work or in your friendships or in your family isn’t selfish. Don’t say yes to things you don’t want to do. Don’t say yes to things you can’t do. Even if all you do is tell yourself “I don’t go to poetry readings” before politely rebuffing your friend’s invite or whisper “I don’t answer phone calls from my boss on a Sunday” to yourself before letting the call go to voicemail, that’s better than caving to the impulse to say yes, yes, yes to everything out of the need to feel useful or of value. It still counts. If you really don’t want to do something, don’t say you can’t. Just say you don’t.

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