The Power of saying No!

I can’t believe it took me this long to write about this. I remember discharging myself and leaving the hospital last year, after having a panic attack earlier that day and dealing with anxiety for the first time in my life, induced by the circumstance and the doctors (who probably didn’t mean to or intend to, but sometimes I guess we all have our bad days, and I like to think it was one of those days for him.). Coming home with no plan, back to square one in a worsened condition than when I got admitted to the hospital, when everything seemed very dark and hopeless, what changed my life was, starting to say No.

Being home after a panic attack, having anything or anyone around me that made me feel even remotely bad, made it harder for me to breathe. I guess my body simply couldn’t afford to deal with anything bad or stressful anymore. I was physically exhausted for awhile by then and was starting to be mentally exhausted.

The good thing about anxiety was it led me to remove anything and everything that didn’t feel good, out of my life. May it be a job, a person, a song, or food, simply anything in my environment. I don’t even mean things that were draining or negative, simply things that didn’t give me a higher energy or a positive energy to me I eliminated. I quit my job, completely stopped talking about the disease. Though my friends wanted to help and recommended other doctors I really couldn’t listen anymore. After two years of being to every doctor around, I knew I’m not going to hear anything different at this point. Having learnt a lot about the body by then, I knew what I was doing and I had to just go back to trusting myself and my body. So even though it seemed easier to simply listen to someone for a few minutes than having to go to the extent of saying “I’m sorry I don’t want to talk about this right now”, which may seem rude when someone is really trying to help, I just had to say no and I’m so grateful I did.

Before I knew it, I was surrounding myself with only the things that made me feel good or feel amazing. I did not talk about anything I didn’t want in my life. I stopped complaining completely. Even if I felt sick or was in pain, and I really want to share that pain with someone, I didn’t. I didn’t want to give it more energy than it already had.

The thing about saying no is we are mostly worried about saying no because we are afraid of what we are losing when we do that. May it be a job, a person, or just cancelling plans, we are afraid of missing out or find it hard to say no sometimes. But the thing is, the more we hold on to an energy that is not great and exciting for your body, we are living an okay life. A jaded life. We think, “it’s okay, there’s nothing wrong, so I’m okay with this.” But why not live a life, where everything in your life is not just good but amazing! When you initially say no to a job or an event it might initially feel uneasy and negative though you know it’s not something you want to do, because you feel like you are denying an opportunity. But trust me, you’ll wake up the next day feeling amazing, cause you are now that person who is able to say no and say “No, I want better.” Before you know it you will have life bombarding you with more opportunities and events that fit a higher energy that excites your body!

I’m saying that not because I think it is what would happen but because I already lived it, and continue to live it! Each time I say no to something that doesn’t shift my energy to a higher state, I’m inviting in better opportunities as what I’m saying to my body or the universe or whatever you relate it to, is that I’m saying no because I have something better coming along. My body and mind believes that and presents me with better and better things!

You don’t have trust me on this, just try it for yourself, even if it’s not something big, the next time you are saying yes to something when you want to say no, just say no and let the magic happen! See for yourself what shows up or at least see how good and freeing it feels! 😊