There must be a correlation between how nice you are and your ability to say no. I see this being an big issue in to different circumstances. The first is will discuss comes when dealing with telemarketers, and people wanting to sell you stuff. For me I'm awful at telling these people no right away. Do i every really want to buy what they are selling or answer their questions, no. But i find it really hard to cut them off and let them know I'm not interested in their office supplies or that i could save hundreds of $ on ink if i only bought it from them. I've gotten better when it comes to people on the phone, usually if I'm lucky and they don't reel me in too fast I'll ask them if they are trying to sell me something and then that gives me the opportunity to say I'm not interested. If i don't get that question out their they're never going to make it easy for me to say I'm not interested, so I'm screwed. I once agreed to "go to jail" for an hour and raise money for muscular dystrophy, man where those people good. Once they sent me the info i emailed them back and told them i was unable to do it lol. I don't get many people coming to my door trying to sell me stuff due to the fact the apartment complex i live in doesn't allow solicitors, but sometimes one will slip through. I'm probably the worst when i comes to these fokes. They are always so nice and friendly and i never want to be rude to them, its impossible for me to just shut the door in their face. I will somehow say no to them it just takes forever to get it out. In all of these circumstances I'm usually dealing with people I don't know and things I really don't want to buy or give an answer too. Still this can be all too difficult.

Where I can really have issues is when it comes to doing favors for friends and people I know. I for one can't say no to someone asking me to do a favor for them if it fits in my schedule. If I'm going to be gone or doing something important at the time of the favor its very easy for me to let them know i won't be able to do whatever it is. But if its just the fact that i don't what to do whatever it is or i want to do something unimportant, or if it's something i have scheduled for myself. Also if changing that won't effect anyone else the its like I'm programmed to say yes. Now this usually only happens when someone asks me something to my face or on the phone. If it's threw and email or a text that's a whole different ball game. Now don't get me wrong, it's not that i don't want to help people, i actually love doing things for others. What i really need to work on is not over crowding my schedule. Lately I've felt like i don't have a moment of rest. I'm not saying that I'm running around constantly with out some break all the time, but recently a lot of my days have been like that. Then there are times where i could rest, but because of things I've agreed to do, I'm someplace where I'm not getting the most rest out of that time. Something i think I've know but not actually realized until last semester during my leadership class is that as an introvert i need time by my self to recharge. I find myself around a lot of extroverts which is why i exhibit extrovert tendency. Extroverts need to be around people to recharge. So you could say that i spend the time i should be by myself with others recharging them and not myself. This can be very detrimental to a person. This summer sometimes i would go to work on Monday and think to myself OK now the next time you're going to have a free moment is after work on Wednesday for about 30min. Then the next time you can "rest" is while you drive home Saturday morning. That can really make you stressful. I loved all the things i did this summer, all the new people i met, and all the cookouts i was in charge of. Looking back i realize that i needed to say no to some activities, and i needed to take a vacation of some sort, get away and recharge. It seems a little backwards but i think my school year might be less stressful than the summer.

So all in all i need to work on saying no when its going to be harmful to myself even if i can fit it in my schedule and work on being more aggressive when it comes to those pesky telemarketers and door to door salesmen. They may seem nice but its just because they want something from me.

How do you guys deal with the pesky people? How do you handle the time you give to others?