Learn to Say “No!”

Today’s   Saturday Stream of Consciousness  prompt is ‘no’.

I didn’t learn to say ‘no’ until I was 40 years old. That’s way too late. That was forty years of doing what I was told or what would make somebody else happy. Making myself happy would be selfish: good girls make other people happy. Saying ‘no’ to someone, especially someone ‘in authority’, would be brash and unladylike.

It was a volunteer counselor at a women’s shelter in a small town that first told me I could say no. We explored the roots of how I got that way. ……

Long story short (because I just found out my sister and grandnephew are coming for lunch.)

I learned to say “No!” firmly, brashly, uncaringly  ( Ok, those words don’t exist but I don’t care)  looking after my own interest. (But in a nice way, of course)

It feels great! I like to sing it down my hallway where it can reveberate, “Nooooo!”