It’s an ordinary incident – just the phone ringing. Except that you’re in a rush, already running late. It’s your best friend. You don’t want to pick up, but guilt creeps in so you answer anyway. As you hang up the phone 45 minutes later you feel like screaming. You have so much pent up frustration. You don’t know who to be mad at, your friend for calling or you for answering. Or maybe you’re angry about the lie you told yourself – that you would only talk for a few minutes. Like that ever happens. So now what? You can’t turn the clock back. Those 45 minutes are gone. Even worse, you’re totally stressed out.

Guilt is a powerful emotion that can trick you into doing things you don’t want to do. Like talking with your friend, or reading your child a story when you’re tired, or volunteering to bake cookies for school … the list is endless. If you feel guilty whenever you want to say “no” you will never have any peace. Guilt is only appropriate when you have done something wrong and it’s not wrong to say “no” to a request.

By answering the phone when you didn’t want to you were making your best friends’ needs more important than your own. So even though it seems like the issue is the lost time, the real issue is that you didn’t take care of yourself.

Don’t beat yourself up; after all you had good intentions. You wanted to be there for your friend. It’s just that deep down you knew it wasn’t a good time for you to talk. Yet you chose to listen to your friend instead of listening to yourself. Listening to yourself would have meant calling your friend later and not feeling guilty about it.

The next time the phone rings – pause. Then notice how you feel. Are you happy to greet your caller? Or are you tense and feeling like you “have to” answer the phone? Remind yourself that you are a grownup. You don’t have to answer the phone. It’s a choice, and you are the one choosing.

Coaching Tips:

• Notice what happens to your energy level when you make unnecessary compromises.
• What happens to your connection with a loved one when you agree to do something that you really don’t want to do?
• Imagine what your life would be like if you put yourself first at least 50% of the time?