Brace yourself, because this question is going
to make you really uncomfortable,
but trust me you'll thank me later.
A few years ago, I was sitting down with my coach
and we were talking about what we want from life.
What do I want from life?
And I was going in my creative, vivid vision,
grand ideas of what I wanna do in life.
I was all right, I wanna be a speaker on the road
all the time.
I wanna write a book a year.
I wanna be able to make millions of dollars.
I wanna be able to work with the top most clients,
a person can possibly work with.
I wanna produce a program every single month.
And then, at the same point of time,
I wanna spend all the time
with my wife and all the time with my kids,
and I wanna travel three times in the year
and I wanna be able to do this and that and this and that,
and it was just a beautiful, beautiful vision
that I had set myself up for.
I was so excited as I was sharing and pouring out
everything that I wanted from life, because why not, right?
And I said, wrote this beautiful vision.
We both celebrated it.
We both share that experience together,
and my coach then leaned into me and asked me a question.
She said, while you're saying yes to all of this,
what are you saying no to?
I paused for a second, and I said, I'm saying no to nothing.
I'm just saying, yes, I'm saying yes to everything.
I don't know what you mean by this question.
But she said, I just, I want you to slow down,
and between now and our next session
I want you to take some time, take an hour, two hours,
reflect on this question.
Think about when you say yes
to all of these different things,
what is it that you are unconsciously saying no to?
It is not to discount your vision.
It is to invite you to a conversation to understand
that unconsciously, you might be saying no to something.
Unconsciously, you might be saying,
I'm not gonna do X because I have committed to Y.
And so, with kind of a little bit confused feeling
because I wasn't sure about the question,
I said, all right, fine.
I'll think about it.
I'll think about it tomorrow on my walk.
And so I, we ended the session and next day,
as I woke up, I was going for my walk in the morning
and I said, what am I saying no to?
What am I saying no to?
And it occurred to me that a lot of the things
that I had written down in my vision of life,
in what I wanted in life, it did have a priority.
I did prioritize certain things more
and some things a little bit less.
So, while I was looking at the list, I was like, hmm,
I do prioritize my time with my wife
over being on the road and speaking 20 times a year.
I said, I do enjoy the freedom that I have of travel,
versus if I made certain amount of money or not.
There were priorities in my life that became clearer
because I started to say, when I say yes to something
am I really saying no to something else?
When I say yes to a particular experience of life,
what is it that unconsciously I am saying no to?
Something that is in conflict with my core desire.
You see the question is really simple.
When you say yes to something, what are you saying no to?
But if you really go to the root of the question,
you find that the truth of the question sits
in being able to prioritize as to what is important to you.
And what is it that you're willing to let go
when you are saying this is more priority for me.
Let me explain this by an example.
I prioritize my time with my family, with my kids,
with my friends.
I really enjoy life when I am with people that I love.
And that often means that I may not prioritize a speaking
engagement because it takes me away from my family.
What I recognize is because I know why I am choosing
to not say yes to a lot of speaking engagements
or being, having to travel long distances
to some speaking engagements is not
because I don't like speaking on stage,
but I value my time with my family,
and I want to be able to see if I can somehow do this,
while being present on stage.
And thankfully, right now you can
because you can be virtually present
on stage most of the times,
but if I was to physically move,
if I had to engage in packing a bag,
taking a flight, going there, staying, talking,
maybe doing some extra time there, taking a flight back,
I may actually decline that request
because my priority is different,
but it will not frustrate me.
You see, when you have all these goals
and you review your goals and you feel all of them
are equally important because they are your goals.
They're like, I want to be able to speak on stages
and I wanna do courses,
and I wanna spend time with my family.
And I want to be able to travel with free time.
Well, you may be conflicting between your goals.
If you wanna write a book a month
and you wanna create a course a month,
you may not have the time,
freedom to travel as conveniently.
So, it's not about that, can you have it all or not?
You can have all of it but there is negotiation
that needs to happen between the value
that you associate to each of the goal
for it to truly manifest in your life.
So, the question that can transform your client's life
if we pondered enough about it,
if we really go deep in it is,
when you say yes to something,
what are you saying no to?
What is it that is the price of that yes?
What is it that you have to understand
to understand what this yes really means?
Because it may be something that you actually value more.
If you are thinking about your visions, your dreams,
your goals, and your clients are thinking
about their visions, their dreams, their goals, go all out.
Write all of it and then prioritize and ask yourself,
when I say yes to a goal, what am I saying no to?
And be aware of it and be conscious of it,
so when you are pursuing that goal,
when you are pursuing that vision, you are not frustrated
because one thing is not manifesting in the same way,
the other thing is because you know exactly
what's more valuable to you, what's a real yes to you,
and what you're comfortable with saying no to
because of that real yes.
But before you overdo it,
ask the same question again and again.
Here are seven more of my favorite coaching questions,
you should definitely try.
See you there.