Learn to say ‘No’

Assalamu’alaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.

I remembered my teacher said, “Learn to say ‘No'”  and that moment i sincerely myself to others.

I love this quote below:

It’s a matter of our heart actually.  People tend to say, “Just follow your heart” or “Listen to your heart” (*singing Listen To Your Heart) 😀  Anyways…

Sometimes, if people need need help from us, in our mind like “err, i had some stuff to do after this” or “full packed schedule” or “i could but…” or worst “no, i don’t want to help”.  But in our heart like, “but he/she need help” or “well, i have to help” or “just go with the flow” or “what to do? if i’m not help, pity, if i do help, i will be late”.  Mix feelings.  At the end “well what to do, i just help then”

Fear not…if we do sincerely, even though we have to, Allah will count our good deeds.  Let’s take an analogy.  Every morning at working hours, traffics all around.  Every time i drive, i always look people standing and waiting to get cross the roads.  Even though there is a bridge for people to get cross safely but it is too far.  Yet i understand those feelings.  Every time i saw a ‘U-Turn’ sign, i saw some cars, lining up and wait to u-turn.  Yet i understand those feelings.  Imagine we in that situation, that is the same feeling that people felt. Every single day.  So sometimes, what i do i just slow down and highlight to them and let them pass.  Even though i have to but i always imagine that if i am in that situation.  Because one of my friend shared from the hadith says:

Narrated Anas bin Malik:

The Prophet (ﷺ) said, “Make things easy for the people, and do not make it difficult for them, and make them calm (with glad tidings) and do not repulse (them ).” (Bukhari)

Masha Allah…

But how we learn to say ‘No’?

We can show our sincere, instead of saying ‘No’.  For example; if we have something emergency, and someone needs help, you can say, “i really love to help but i have an emergency that i need to go”.

Another example; if your colleague needs help to finish the paperwork and you also doing another paperwork, we can simply said, “i’m sorry i can’t do it now, but i can do it for you later after i’m finishing up my paperwork”

There are many ways actually.  The question is, how are we going to say it in a good way so that people could understand and try not to give them high hopes.  I know it’s kind of harsh and we feel sorry for ourselves and for them but sometimes there are lines that we shouldn’t cross it because it may be affect to our health if we over doing it.  So we must be slow and study.  Allah tests us in many ways, is just that how we handle it.  It is okay to say ‘No’ because we cannot manage to do everything ‘Yes’.  Unless if we do one at the time.  Islam never taught us to torture ourselves for do everything.  Islam taught us to take one at a time, maintain on what we do even if it small things.  The most important thing is, always refresh our niat for Allah Subhanahu Wata’ala.

Wallahu’alam