How to Say NO...to YOURSELF!

I bet many of you suffer from the same weakness I do, which is continually starting and getting into TOO MANY PROJECTS. Here I am, retired due to 18 million health issues, and I'm way too busy, not slowing down, and focusing on some of the wrong things. Or maybe the more correct way to say it is: focusing on too many correct things if time were unlimited. It's not, of course, so it's too many wrong things.

Here, Lisa - are you listening? - are your priorities:

Health: Be as strong and active as you can be and eat as well as possible. Optimizing health is your job #1 because it enables everything else. This is also about sport - biking, hiking, walking, exploring. Bill and I want to spend more time having fun outdoors.

Gardening: This is a priority because I'm interested and we have nearly 175 plants. Because I love plants.

Creative work: Writing, mostly, but also some house craft projects.

Volunteering: As time permits. This area is outsized right now. I feel like I have four part-time volunteer gigs and that they are pushing the other stuff off the "done" list. Especially health and creative endeavors.

I'm nearly 60. Am I too old to learn new tricks? I hope not.

Ways to say NO to Myself:

Identify I have an issue that needs to be solved. Not just casually over a cocktail with a pal like complaining about too many streaming services. THIS is a problem like a boil oozing puss on my foot. I can't walk until this boil is treated. It's keeping me from living my best life.

Do some scenario planning. Visualize what life looks and feels like when I'm living in alignment with my priorities. Notice I'm not focusing on an end point because life IS the process. Reflect on if/then scenarios that help me get clear about where a new "no" is warranted. No, not right now, not in this way, not as much, or I can't but have a solution are all NOs.

Explore if there are win-win solutions that might free myself up. This is harder to do. I get stuck because I don't want to impose on others. And I value follow through. But I can't value diddly from inside an ash urn or when Bill turns my ashes into stones (see previous post).

Fall on my sword. Sometimes the best thing to say is "I screwed up. I thought I could do this but I can't and I'm breaking the promise I made to myself to focus on my health. Doing this well requires more time than I'm giving it."

Those are a few ideas I will reflect upon and put into action - fingers crossed - very soon. Do you suffer from YES, YES, YES, syndrome too? Let me know what works for you.