I recently gave a talk to a group of sales professionals and told them that I set a goal to read 50 books last year.  Throughout the room there were rolling of eyes, groans and incredulous looks.  Essentially the feeling in the room was, “I don’t have time for that.”  P.S. Here is the list from last year.

Today’s Delivering Marketing Joy podcast digs into this topic.

We all need to stop say “I don’t have time.”  It’s a bullshit excuse.  You know it, and I know it.

You may not want to do it.  You may not prioritize doing it.  You might not want to put the work in.  These are all fine.  But we have a cultural epidemic of saying we “are too busy.”  We wear it like a badge of honor.  We all do it too.  If you don’t believe me, try to go a week without saying the word busy.  You will be surprised how often you have to hold it back.

What we need to do is to start saying “No” more often.  The problem, with many of us, is that we say “yes” to way too many projects that we don’t REALLY care about.  We have an entire calendar full of “meh” activities.  We are fine with them.  We are not against them.  But they are not projects that really excite us and make us want to get out of bed!

Derek Sivers has a rule for deciding what projects to take on…and which to decline.  His rule is simple.  If the answer is not “Hell yes!” then it’s “no.”  The idea, of course, is that if we are that excited (hell yes) about a project, we will make time.  But if we are not that excited, then it will simply take time, energy, and resources away from the things we are passionate about!

Listen to the podcast here…and don’t forget to subscribe.

We all need to say “No” to more projects…so we can say “yes” to ones we really care about!

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