Say "No" more so a "Yes" actually matters

^James Clear in his 3-2-1 Newsletter on May 20th

One idea that seems to keep coming back into my view is that when it comes to making future commitments, you should say no FAR more than you say yes. A future commitment involves a limited upside with a potentially unlimited downside. When you commit to something that is months in advance, you are saying yes to one concrete thing, but you are saying no to a potentially unlimited number of things.

A good way to think about making future plans is to ask yourself "If this event was happening this afternoon, would I still say yes?" This filters out the dopamine rush that we all get when we make someone happy by saying yes to something and brings the immediate reward (saying yes) into the same time horizon as the responsibility (doing the thing). Not only does this work but it's also a necessary exercise because humans are so good at Hyperbolic Discounting. Meaning that people will more often take a smaller reward that arrives sooner rather than a larger reward that arrives later because of some evolutionary programming that kept us alive as cavemen. Forcing yourself to go through the "Would I do this today?" thought experiment seeks to eliminate this cognitive bias and makes clear decision making more likely to occur.

Ideally, there would be a way to turn on some socially acceptable two-factor authentication when committing to plans. This would work by responding to an invitation at the time of the invite and then having another, completely acceptable opportunity to respond to an invite the day of the event. This would allow everyone to have their cake and eat it too. Giving the dopamine rush of saying yes in advance and then being able to opt out if something more important comes up in the meantime. This is of course pure fantasy. If people were allowed to behave like this, planning would be an impossible exercise. Without commitment nothing can happen so while fun to think about, this is an impossibility in practice.

This topic has been on my mind a lot lately because we are approaching "Hot Vax Summer'' in the US. States. Meaning that bars, restaurants, concert venues and more are opening back up as vaccination rates exceed 50% and options on how to spend your free time are seemingly limitless. Coming off of a year of “No,” I want to say “Yes,” to everything and I want to see all of the people I have missed dearly during the pandemic. This desire is at tension with my own personal development goals (this blog for example), my desire to dedicate my time to doing well at my new job, and spending large amounts of quality time with those that are close to me. All of this is to be balanced with the continual goal of taking care of myself both physically and psychologically.

The ability to say no is an important one to cultivate, and one that comes hand in hand with the self awareness to know what activities you derive joy from, and which you do more out of social obligation. This knowledge is ever more important this year, given our "No" muscle has largely atrophied over the last year with not much to decide between and even less that felt safe. Saying no is hard enough for people you don't care about (salesmen know this and exploit it when making a pitch), but saying no to people who you care about and would like to spend time with is another thing entirely. Like most people, I don't like to let anyone down so I'm going to adopt a new approach to committing my time. My default response, if it isn't a fuck yes, is a "I don't know yet." Obviously I will go into more depth with a response but the core principle is that I, along with most humans, am bad at long term planning. So while something may be interesting to me right now, I can't commit to something that far out when I don't know how my schedule is going to look at the time. This doesn't apply for a clear "Fuck yes" but if its not a fuck yes, then for me, I think it's going to have to be a "I don't know yet."

That being said, I find myself not being able to follow this fully already. As concerts come back and I find myself finally able to go see live music again, I have been saying yes to pretty much everything. If I’m honest with myself I think I find myself in a period where "Yes" is a great default answer. We all have a lot to catch up on given the last year. However, I expect this period to die out within a few months and then for an equilibrium to be struck where we all curate our time more carefully as we realize that constant social engagement deters personal development.

A note that I feel like I have to add is to say that just because I turned down an invitation on something to do this year, doesn't mean that I don't still respect the inviter as a person or want to keep them in my life. It’s just the fact that we only have so much time in the day, and the time spent on productive tasks is going to be by far the most growth oriented time that we get. For my readers, here is what I am looking to spend my time on the most this year, and what makes up the top of my priorities list for 2021.

1. Publish 20 pieces of writing to this blog

2. Start a side hustle selling Nashville Hot Chicken at least once a month out of our house in Venice https://www.instagram.com/sidechickvenice/

3. Spend more quality time with my girlfriend and family

4. Go deep into my job and get something concrete out of my 40+ hours of work per week

5. Travel to at least one new destination

So if we are close and you haven't heard from me in awhile and you're wondering what I have been up to, it's likely going to fall into one of the above buckets. Or going to concerts this fall because we are BACK, baby! But, if you're out at the bar on Friday night and you're wondering what I'm up to, don't be surprised if I’m not out because I've locked myself in my kitchen to get the perfect dredge on our chicken sandwich recipe for #SidechickSaturdays.