You know what scares me?
Creepy clown dolls.
Between watching Poltergeist when I was in junior high, to reading Stephen King novels (It for the clown, The Tommyknockers for the creepy dolls), plus not to mention being surrounded by centuries worth of old dolls collected by generations of females in my family when visiting my grandmother’s house (those dolls were EVERYWHERE! And the life-sized dolls! Yikes!), well, I’m not a big fan.
Even earlier this week when I visited my mom, she proudly showed me her newest doll: an ancient wooden Schoenhut clown doll with a maniacal face. (Really!?!?!?) I had to stop looking at it, and when my mom lamented that it had a broken foot all I could think of was “good…at least that should slow it down when it comes to life in the middle of the night to try to kill me.” (I have a healthy imagination, and I’ve seen that Twilight Zone episode: “My name is Talky Tina and I’m going to KILL you”.
Yeah. It’s things like that that make me want to jump back into bed and hide under the covers.
Creepy clown dolls. They just scare me.
You know what doesn’t scare me?
When you say “no” to my request because you’re listening to your needs.
I just ran into this one this morning. I had asked a colleague if he would be interested in a graphic recording gig, as I was already booked on that date. He’s a good guy, I dig his work, and I thought he’d be a good fit for this particular client. He wrote back with a resounding “yes”. . . Then later followed it up with another message explaining that he really needed to say no but was afraid that I would write him off or not think of him in the future or think he was a terrible person or stop liking him or something.
Not true on all fronts.
Here’s what I wrote back to him this morning:
Dude. Always, ALWAYS, trust your gut. No, I won’t write you off. I respect that you’re listening to yourself instead of saying yes for the wrong reasons. I would be pissed if you said “yes” and then resented the work – “why did you say yes to it if you didn’t really want to do it??” That sort of thing. ;^)
Thank you for saying no, and we’ll still need to get together before the end of the year!
I don’t want you to say “yes” to something that you know is not right for you.
I don’t want you to say “yes” to something you don’t really want to do, and then be all pissy and resentful the entire time you work on the project. Our mindset and vibe totally comes through in what we do, WHATEVER we do.
I don’t want you to put your own needs second to someone else’s request.
I want you to honor you.
I want you to listen to your needs and honor them.
I want you to trust your gut because you know yourself so well, and say no when what you’re being asked to do does not set you up to grow and shine.
I would rather you say no.
And I bet I’m not the only one.
Because when we can show up as a resounding “yes” from the heart, instead of a resentful yes from obligation, then great things can happen.
And I want great things to happen for both of us.
So, the next time someone asks you if you’d like to do something and you’re tempted to say “yes” for fear that they won’t like you or won’t ask you again, don’t do it. It’s the wrong reason to say yes. It’s the creepy clown doll reason to say yes.
Don’t be a creepy clown doll. Be your own kind of awesome instead. Say “no” to what feels wrong, and say “yes” to what feels right. Trust me, we won’t just understand: we’ll thank you for it.
I cannot wait to see what you draw forth,
