How to Say No without Saying No So You can Enjoy your Holidays

I have found the Christmas season is a time when the life balance I work so hard on all year seems to be tossed out of the window. Especially when Christmas requests from others seem to be rolling in daily. I used to load my calendar up with nearly every request that came in for my time. I found that by the time I got to Christmas morning, I was exhausted with all the activities.

Over time, I have learned to prioritize these requests along with my personal tasks into three lists: Commitment to Daughter, Must Do and Nice To Do. What I do is make a list of all the activities I have and I put them in one of the 3 categories.

Daughter Commitment - This is time I'm committing to an activity to enjoy the holiday with my daughter, I usually aim for 4 hours a week. My list typically looks like this:

• Buying and Decorating the Christmas Tree

• Annual Outdoor Outing: Skating, Shopping on Magnificent Mile one night or High Tea at the Drake

• Attend her Annual Holiday Dance Show

• Attend Church Christmas Program

• Watch the Grinch on TV (Our Favorite!)

A Must Do list could look like:

• Christmas shopping, wrap and mail gifts

• Sending Christmas cards

• Planning Christmas Dinner at my House

• Putting up Outdoor Lights

A Nice To Do list could look like:

• Creating the Christmas letter to go in my Christmas cards

• Baking for my Church's annual cookie exchange

• Attending a colleagues Christmas party

• Christmas Dinner my Girlfriend

A note on these lists. This is how I would prioritize for the way I live my life. You may feel that putting up outdoor lights is a Nice To Do activity and your child balks at the thought of decorating the Christmas tree. By all means, customize this list to your preferences. The idea is to list out ALL the activities and make a decision where they go.

I then take out my calendar and start putting these activities on the calendar; starting with commitment to my daughter child; then Must Do's. The idea of putting these on the calendar is the time is to be honored no differently then an important meeting at your office. The Christmas season is about enjoying time with your family and the Children Committment and Must Do activities around that. Any Nice To Do that gets on my calendar is a bonus in my opinion.

When you get to Nice to Do, if you are like me... you'll find that you have way more activities than can be done on the calendar. This is the time where you need to draw a line in the sand on your time and decide what you will do and what you have to decline. You'll find some of these may be from your list (ex. Christmas Letter) and others will be outside requests (ex. Christmas party)

I have found that saying 'No' can come in different forms. When my daughter was in elementary school, she would bring home paper asking for parents to volunteer their time for in-class parties. I use to always contact the teacher or organizer and explain my Single Mom situation and would offer up to send a check or pick-up whatever item they needed during one of my grocery shopping trips. I often found they were grateful to receive a check or goodies in lieu of my attendance.

I have also discovered that declining to do certain activities; like baking for cookie walk... people are more than fine if you state the truth. "I would really like to assist; but I don't have the time in my schedule to commit to that activity." Other ways of saying 'No' is to schedule the activities at a different time or to hire someone to do the activity for you.

Examples of these are:

• Dinner with a Girlfriend - we actually now celebrate the holidays in January and have both found this is a much more enjoyable than trying to schedule it in December.

• Hire a neighbors child (or yours) to bake those cookies. As a teenager I use to do this and absolutely loved doing this for the neighbors; they loved the assortment and I enjoyed the extra Christmas money.

• Prepare all your Christmas cards and letter in November and drop them in the mail December 1

• Buy all out of town Xmas gifts by end of Thanksgiving weekend; wrap and drop them in the mail on December 1

• At my house, outdoor Christmas lights ALWAYS go up the first weekend after Halloween that is warm; but I don't turn them on until Thanksgiving night. I have neighbors who pays a neighborhood teenagers to put up their lights every year.

Other personal appointment, I strive to do is to get my hair cut late in November and then early January. Any annual appointments with Dentist, Doctors, etc are never scheduled in December. For me, planning is the key to a relaxing holiday season. My viewpoint is that my daughter will only be this age once; Christmas for her next year will be a different experience from this year. I only have this year once; and intended to enjoy it with her.