While connecting with people to say goodbye before we leave Denver, I reflected on a friendship that I completed some years ago. The friendship ended not because we’d grown in different directions or no longer shared mutual interests but because I couldn’t bring myself to say ‘no.’
After my friend’s breast cancer diagnosis, I was very supportive. I took her to her biopsy appointment, was with her the day of her surgery to remove the tumor and did a Reiki (a hands-on energy modality) session for her the night before her first chemo treatment. She feared her splitting headache would prevent her from going to her first treatment but the Reiki session relieved the pain and allowed her to keep her appointment.
At the time I worked in a high stress job and wasn’t handling the stress well. Yet any time my friend called and asked me to do anything, I said yes. I said yes because there was a little voice in me that said that ‘no’ was not an option.
Soon I got burned out from saying ‘yes’ and distanced myself from my friend, which destroyed our relationship. The loss of that precious friendship saddened me. We had a long history together, learned and grew together and laughed a lot.
A couple years after our friendship ended, I did a Voice Dialogue session. Drs. Hal and Sidra Stone developed Voice Dialogue as a way to access the many voices inside us. In the session, I told the facilitator about the loss of the friendship and how I still mourned it.
She facilitated my access to the voice that couldn’t say no, which she called the Pleaser. Then she had me physically move and talk to the opposite of the Pleaser. This voice said that all I needed to do was say ‘I can’t do that, but how can I help you? Can I make some calls for you?
It seemed so simple. Why hadn’t I figured that out? To figure it out meant giving myself permission to say ‘no’ and open to different ways of being supportive. The inability to say no cost me a precious friendship.
I saved an email she sent me after an unsuccessful reconciliation attempt. She wrote “I was reminded of why I always valued our friendship so much…you are absolutely the most creative, rigorous, stimulating, funny gal on the planet, and I always felt you helped me to be a better person.” When I occasionally reread the email, it makes me both smile and feel remorse for the loss.
When our paths sporadically cross, I’m glad to see that she’s happy and healthy. Sometimes I wonder why I didn’t learn about the Pleaser in time to preserve the friendship. Maybe my mistake will serve as a cautionary tale and give someone else permission to avoid unnecessary heartache by the simple use of the word ‘no.’
What have you learned about the power of saying ‘no’?
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