Steve Jobs Secret To Success Is To Say No In Time

Steve Jobs Secret To Success Is To Say No In Time

This mental trick will help you say no at the right time and place.

More often than not, we believe that the key to success is to be the best in your field, to be able to say “yes” to all opportunities in your life. But many successful people believe that the matter is completely different: you need to be able to say not “yes”, but “no”.

Steve Jobs Secret To Success Is To Say No In Time

Steve Jobs, for example, believed that “in order to be able to concentrate, you need to be able to say no. He was known for ruthlessly rejecting even promising projects in order to fully focus on those that he was currently engaged in.

What you say no is often no less important (or even more important) than what you say yes.

Imagine what has come tomorrow

Those who want to achieve something in this life often face a serious dilemma. Life opens up many paths and opportunities for us. So how do you recognize those few invitations, suggestions and ideas that are really worth it to spend valuable time on them?

Many have tried to answer this question, but we want to give a short and incredibly useful suggestion by the writer, founder of Wired magazine Kevin Kelly. He calls it a “filter of normality”:

“One of the most valuable advice I received from the writer Annie Herbert, who said that every time she receives an offer to take up a project, she asks herself a simple question – would she take up this project/meeting/book, if this did you have to start tomorrow? It often turns out that the answer to this question is a solid no. “I use this mental exercise almost every day, and it has served me well.”

Why does it work – Steve Jobs Secret To Success

All the beauty and wisdom of this technique lies in human nature. Over time, our perception of certain things and circumstances also changes. At the deepest level, we value much more than the five dollars we can get here and now than the ten dollars we get in a week. The same goes for time. We are much more willing to hand out future tense than sacrifice at least five minutes of the present.

It is unlikely that we will be able to completely get rid of these irrational prejudices and a distorted view of the world, but we are quite capable of getting around them. Herbert’s advice is a simple but extremely effective way to resist the desire to waste your future time in vain (as well as the fear of seeming ungrateful or rude, refusing to offer someone else).

As Steve Jobs said, do not grab at every interesting proposal, spraying your attention between them. Just ask yourself: “Would it be worth my attention if you had to deal with it tomorrow?” And if you cannot answer “yes” unequivocally … Consider responding with a polite refusal.

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