In my last video post, I talked bout how stress is killing you. I also touched on some of the things that we’re doing that is actually making it worse! Read more here.

Stress limits us. Imagine this. Instead of running around and putting out fires, we are able to be effective, calm and in control?

I believe that anyone can have a full life-transformation. Have you ever had a conversation with someone that touched you in a way that your life was never the same again? I’ve had several of those in my life and made it my life goal to bring freedom to people. That’s why I’m writing about stress again today. I want to give you one word that can break you out of the stress cycle

Learn how to say NO

Warren Buffett, one of the world’s most influential people said this:

“The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say no to almost everything”

Have you ever seen the movie The Yes Man played by Jim Carrey? The premise of the story is simple. The main character Carl Allen goes to a self-help seminar to learn to say YES more in life. He goes on to say, “yes,” to everything in life. After a while, he notices that his life is starting to burn all around him.

So am I saying that you are supposed to say no to everything in your life? NO!

But by saying no to most things in life, you are saying yes to the important things in your life.

So let’s begin by listing some things that bring us stress:

• The unrelenting requests of people around us
• The pull to put money into everything advertising tells we need to put in
• Distractions of social media… or really any media that keeps us procrastinating
• The desire to look good in front of others
• The desire to make sure everyone around us is happy and/or likes us.
• Absolutely crushing expectations for ourselves of who we must become

To be fair, most of these things we have already trained ourselves for years to say yes to. This is why it can be hard to break out of a stress cycle.

So what can I do? There is one simple tool I use every day in my mind to help me say NO to things.

It’s not a revolutionary tool, it is an old one that I’ve fashioned after the Serenity Prayer. Have you heard of it?

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.”

Read the rest of it here.

There’s a reason why this prayer is famous. It works. It’s been used in various settings and continues to be referred to.

What I do in my mind is simply this. I make a chart and separate everything in a current stressful situation into two parts. One part is everything that I cannot control. The other part is everything that I can control.

Let me give you an example from the list above:

Let’s say all of your friends are consistently asking you out to have food with them. You’re starting to get stressed because you’ve realized that you’re living from pay cheque to pay cheque. When you tell your friends that you can’t, they start making fun of you. What a stressful dilemma! You don’t want to offend your friends or seem like a loser. But you also want to get better at handling your finances.

Let’s start listing out in our mind in this scenario all the things you cannot change:

• I currently cannot afford to have food with them as often as they like
• I cannot change what people perceive of me
• I cannot change my friend’s spending habits
• I cannot change that I feel a bit like a loser when they comment

Then we start listing the things we CAN change:

• I can say no
• I can be kind in my approach
• I can take steps to change my financial future
• I can make a compromise with my friends to go out sometimes
• I can decide that people who say no are stronger than those who only way yes.

This categorization is helpful, it gives me structure on how to think about my situation. Now that I know there are certain things I cannot change, I can move towards accepting them. And since there are things I can change, I can muster up my courage to do it.

This thought chart allows me to say the word NO to some things in my life that I thought was necessary before.

Imagine saying no to a majority of requests from people so you can yes to some. You will be saying a better yes to those who are important to you.

Imagine saying no to all your distractions? You will be saying yes to self-development. You'll be saying yes to the good friendship, and yes to a life purpose that leaves an imprint in this world.

Imagine saying no to unrealistic expectations on yourself. You will be freeing yourself to say yes to loving yourself and yes to expectations that are possible.

The word NO is one of the most important words you will need to learn to say to free yourself from the stress cycle.

Now is this word going to reduce my stress completely? It is a good beginning point for philosophy, but stress is multi-faceted. You need to be able to help reduce stress in your mind, in your body and also in your spirit. Each of the statements above can be a book in itself. That’s why there’s no way to bust through stress completely in one blog post.

With that being said, I do hope you enjoyed it and found it useful. On Sunday, I’m going to post one more blog about stress and I’m excited to give you an offer in it as well. We have a free workshop in Barrie next Tuesday at 6:30pm called Breaking the Stress Cycle. It’s going to be hosted at Goodness Me! @ 79 Park Pl Blvd.

Again, I can only deliver great content when I have people like you who can give me feedback! Please comment below your top questions about stress or tell me what you thought about my blog. I will personally go through them and answer your questions.