The Power of No

Transcript of a Sage Hill Live Fully Podcast conversation with Dr. Chip Dodd. Lightly edited for readability; speaker labels omitted.

You're listening to the Sage Hill podcast with Dr. Chip Dodd. Sage Hill is a social impact organization that helps people see who they are made to be so they can do what they are made to do. In this podcast, Chip sits down with his longtime friend, Stephen James, to discuss one of the scariest words in the English language, no. Chip and Stephen explore the power of how boundaries can create freedom and clarity in our relationships. You know, Chip, in a lot of the work that you and I do in therapy and recovery Yeah. All that stuff, we talk about boundaries a lot. Right? And to me, one of the the clearest two boundaries anybody can ever set, like, the some of the shortest words in the English language, yes and no. Right? Yeah. And it's scary to say yes sometimes because then you're committed. But more often, my own personal experience, it's really scary to say no. It's so scary. And to say no with kindness is even harder. Oh, yeah. And to say no to the person that

that who really, really matters. And who really needs something. Or somebody that almost matters. Or someone you want to matter. Or somebody you want to matter or or somebody you're never gonna see again or yeah. You know? Or just anybody. Or just say no to anybody. Just say no is hard because, you know, no is it's a little bitty word. I mean I mean Yeah. It's like two letters. It's a tiny word. Yeah. Yeah. It's heavy. Yeah. And the thing is, I wanna be trustworthy. I I really do. But I want you to know it's very, very scary to be dependable and trusted because and a trustworthy people, their yes is never trustworthy until they can say no. I'll never trust anybody who can't say no. And and yet we are, like, trained at acceptability means being able to say yes. Yeah. If I say no, I'm not being loved. Oh, yeah. No means limitations. No means no. No means I want. No means I don't want to. No means all kinds of things. And, you know, Sonia, the person I'm married to Your wife. Yeah. Sonia. I'm learning how to say not my wife, you know. Oh, the person I'm married to There's no your wife, my wife. Possessive. Sorry. You're Sorry, Sonia. Behind the times. I'm only twenty years older than you, Stephen. You know, it's like, I'm so hip. Tragically old fashioned, I guess. Yeah. But, one Easter, I had come home. It's Friday afternoon. I'm tired. I just want to replenish in some solitude. So I'm out in our old barn, and I'm working out, you know, doing pull ups and lifting, and I'd already run. And and I'm just I really don't need to talk to anyone. I need to simply not think too much and just feel my body move and rest. Do you know? Yeah. Sweat. And, she came walking out to a barn. It's not too far from the back of the house. And she said, hey, Chip. You know? Hey. Let's go. I'm gonna go get the, and this is I know I'm gonna get judged for this, but I I Are you judging yourself? Exactly. Oh god. You know, I guess I really could've. But she came out to there, and she said, oh, let's go, let's go shop. And for the children, they're they're little little bitty, and for their their Easter outfits. And and it's like, oh, I looked at her, like, with a look like, okay. I know, like, this is special. I know I'm supposed to. I know that I would like to kinda, but, Sonia, I just no. I told her no. I said, Sonia, no. Listen. I'm sorry. I'm I'm I'm done in, and I I'm sorry about this. But if I go, honey, it's gonna be bad. I mean, I just I mean, you know how I've gone and done all these things that I really need to say no to? Punish you again. And I punished you. I I I could tell you it's gonna happen again. I could just I can tell you. And I remember the look on her face when she heard no. Her look was, like, really sad. Her look was, that's not what I wish. And she accepted no. She went, well, okay. And then she went. She went she went, and I didn't go. And nobody died. And she still loved me. And, it was a while after I told her no when she left. Listen. I'm grown. I have children, and yet still I went through all of that. Mhmm. And some all of you out there who listen to this thinking, god, at least at least you could have expended yourself on what's important. You don't pay attention to what you say you teach. Yes. I do. I don't think anyone's saying that, actually. But you know what I'm saying? It's like Yeah. My head has a consent. Know, also there's a committee. It's a committee of all kinds of things. It's like, even down to, she she may get tired of me. She may not love me. I'm gonna have payback on this. What am I not gonna get now? Her look, I could interpret as I'm so disappointed you always let me down. I mean, no The kickoff is to cascade of thethora. Negative stories and resentments and rejection. Have experienced. If you like. Yeah. No is not something our fear of saying no is not something we make up. Our fear of saying no is something we've experienced. And and no in many ways has been, unacceptable. A friend, a really good friend I hadn't seen in about a year, called me here in town and said, hey, I've got tickets to a box for the Predators. Hockey. Loud hockey. A game that that a game that You don't understand. I don't understand. And I don't know that I would ever like it if I did. And great guy. And this is what I said to him. I said, Jim, thank you so much. No. I I really appreciate it, but I don't wanna do that. Thank you very much. You're such an ass. But I would love yeah. But I but I would love to go get coffee and just talk and catch up. I, I'd love to go do that. Just but just I I just don't wanna do the game and the hockey and Yeah. I won't get to talk to you really anyway. Do you know? Yeah. And I didn't hear from him again for a year. So and nor did I call him and ask, were you heard and so on. It's just I told him the truth, and I still told him, that I more than You wanna be with him? Yeah. Yeah. Just wanna go to hockey. I don't wanna go to hockey camp. So experience no I'll probably get some hockey tickets now. Yeah. Experience

no is forever. I experience no as a rejection. I experience no as an ending. Yes. And that's not the truth. No. No. In fact, I don't like to hear no. I really don't. But I so respect no and because it makes the yes more valuable. And, you know, Stephen, really, if if we don't have the heart of a person with us, we don't have the heart of a person with us. It means, you know, if I don't if I don't have you really with me You have these, like, yogi bear isms? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. If any if you do what I do, you do what I do. Yeah. But I mean but I mean, if you if if I don't have the heart of the person, I don't have the person with me. Yeah. I can have I'll have their actions. I may have their brains. I may have their hands, their duty, but I don't have them. It's the difference between intimate, sex and sex.

You could have said yes to Jim and not been with him or no to Jim and been with him. And yes to Sonia and not cared enough about her to say, if I do this, you know, I will I will be negative. Yeah. I'll hurt you I'll hurt you feelings. So a lot of times, the hurt we create in relationship and the harm we create in relationship is by saying yes to things we really mean no for and then punishing the people that we said yes to because we couldn't say no. And I don't say no to control people. I don't say no to control people so they won't try to control me. And then I resent them for them having control because they were powerful enough for me to be afraid to say no, and then I make them pay on some of the other places I get passive aggressive. Tripped up the most with not saying no with my own kids

because I feel I can feel guilty and ashamed, afraid of just my own story with my own parents, my own past, that if I say no to them, they're gonna feel with me Yeah. Like I felt with my own dad and my mom at times. And it's not even just I'm not saying not saying no to discipline stuff. I'm saying, like, hey. Will you play with me? Yeah. It's like, I don't really wanna play that. Like Yeah. That game that we played again that you just click around the board and then rage at me for not doing it right. Like, that's not fun for me. You know? But my fear of saying no Yeah. Because they might have some experience Automatically leads to them having the experience I don't want them to have because I'm not with them Yes. When I'm playing that game. Yeah. I'm not liking it when they're playing that game. I don't wanna be there with them playing that game. Yeah. And so when I say yes Yeah. I end up creating the very thing I didn't wanna have happen to them. The difference between

when you are saying no because you know, k n o w, that it'd be a mistake if you do it, and you're just being selfish? I didn't used to. Like, I used to think it was all selfish Uh-huh. Or I wasn't aware of being selfish. Now I'm really learning, and and I think I'm getting much better at being able to say no because I, k n o w, know. If I do this, I know my limitations, and I can't do this. Right. It's gonna be a train wreck of that. That's just like and I love that, what you said. That is just like we were talking about, you know, passionate people and limits and no such places away. You, you know, even going back to the podcast we did about the doctor who needs to stop and just decompress for thirty minutes before joining the family, you know, not with alcohol, but with with with prayer, meditation, phone call, sitting, talking, stretching, tai chi. I mean, name it. Whatever. Playing the piano. Whatever. Something is not mood altering. Mhmm. You know? So it was like Mood vacating. Yes. Yeah. Yes. That your that your capacity to say no is very, very loving. Yeah. Yeah. I'm I'm practicing that and learning that. But

it's getting less scary, but I don't ever imagine it's not gonna be scary. And bullies don't like no. No. They don't like no. In fact, bullies depend upon yes people. Bullies depend upon people being untrustworthy. Bullies depend upon other people not having identities. I've got a friend, who's had trouble saying no, and she has a friend who's kind of an emotional bully Uh-huh. Who always calls Yeah. My friend in a crisis. Mhmm. And for the first time in my friend's life, she said, hey. I can't do that right now. Yeah. I can't come over and take care of your kids because your husband's an ass. Uh-huh. And the woman called her back, like, literally 20 times, could not understand. Believe it. Called other people, said she told me no. Yeah. Like Yeah. She went crazy. She yeah. She went crazy. All the more proof

for for how come people say yes to the bullies because we say the price of saying no isn't worth it. Yeah. And I'm saying, you you know, this is sad. This is difficult, but frankly, bullies are, they're black widow spiders. They mate and kill. I mean, that's the way it is. It's a dance. They promise that they're gonna do this, be that. They're very attractive people. But if you wanna bully proof your life, knows the way to do it. It's it is it's an anti venom. It's anti it's an antidote. Wow. Yeah. Think about that with church. Like, the fear of saying no to church. Yeah. And, like, the spiritual A boundary. Spiritual things that happen. If I set a boundary with my with my church or my parish Mhmm. All of a sudden now I'm somehow outside of the kingdom of God. And think about the people that if if the pastor, a preacher, a reverend, or priest

says no, he can get fired. Because a lot of times, groups with leaders depend upon the leader to be on some level of sycophant. In other words, the leader has to pay people to follow. And I think church is more beautiful when the pastor can have an identity as a human being who has a vision and cogency and limitations can invite those who would have a call to follow in this church's mission. And therefore, they follow the call knowing full well that they'll know they will hear no. They're not looking for a prop to make them feel better. They're looking for a person to, give them their competency. Do you know to Mhmm. Teach them about staying connected to an intimate relationship with God while they live in a place that's really, really harsh. Do you know? Mhmm. I want a pastor who can say no. Mhmm. And I don't mean say no with, like,

Like a threat. Like, no to me from a standpoint of no. No. No. No. No. Yeah. They they don't change. You're wanting to follow people who have boundaries with themselves. Yes. They know their own limits Yes. And are and are able to Yeah. Tell you, I have to stop here. Yeah. That's what my no means. Let's say as a leader, you have an employee that says no. One, the leader has a responsibility to ask if to ask themselves if they're asking for something irrational or outside of the boundaries of the job description. Therefore, job descriptions need to be pretty clear. But if an employee says no within the context of job description, then the answer is termination. So, I mean, you know There's no. Leaders need to be able to accept no and they also allow there to be accountability and consequence to the word no. So Oh, in organizations where people can't be terminated,

it's havoc. Oh, with no It's havoc. So I'll I'll I'm I'm talking about the word no from the context of response able people who, in whose intention is to live truthfully. So I'm gonna try my own synodism. You ready? Yeah. Because Saying no really means saying yes. Brilliant. Brilliant. Saying no means saying yes to dependability, trustworthiness, willingness for accountability, the recognition that I'm valuing you and I'm expecting the same from you, and equality of worth and a capacity to follow authority. This is Stephen James, the executive director of Sage Hill Counseling. Thanks for listening to the Sage Hill podcast with Dr. Chip Dodd. Sometimes in life, we get stuck or blocked or reach an impasse. At times like these, an intensive short term therapy could help you overcome what's keeping you from the growth and changes you desire. At Sage Hill Counseling, we offer therapeutic incentives to help couples gain new momentum in their recovery process. If you wanna find out more, please visit sagehillcounseling.com. Also, if you're a therapist, a pastor, or professional that works with people, and you'd like to be better equipped to help people live fully, we invite you to learn more about Sage Hill Training. This in-depth experiential training will help you bring your heart to the work you are called to do. You can find out more by visiting sagehilltraining.com.