Learning to say no has shaped my income and net worth more than almost any yes. But before I learned that lesson, I had to humiliate myself in front of a mayor.
I woke up feeling like my skull was being used as a drum kit. I’d gone out the night before, stayed too long, and drank a little too much. All in all, not an unusual situation when you’re knee deep into Dutch student life.
There was, however, only one problem: in a few hours, I’d be part of a strategic meeting with the mayor of the city and several aldermen as a member of our faculty board. Afterwards, I had to give them a tour through the faculty building, followed by a presentation on student life there. High-profile guests and high reputational stakes, clearly the kind of day where you show up well-prepared.
I, on the other hand, had clearly underestimated the situation and overestimated myself. And the result? Me throwing up in the bathroom twenty minutes before the delegation arrived.
I swallowed painkillers, splashed water on my face, and somehow made it to the meeting room. The meeting itself was awful: my sentences came out jumbled, I was sweating through my shirt, and at one point had to let one of the other board members, a worldwide well-respected professor, take over to throw up again in another bathroom
The tour and presentation were just as bad, if not worse. The faculty staff looked mortified, while my fellow board members tried to cover for me. My friends thought it was as equally legendary as it was stupid, and congratulated me afterwards for pulling such an epic stunt. And I? I just wanted to do one thing: disappear and forget the day ever happened.
I was twenty years old and had just landed a board position managing the student portfolio across my entire university faculty: being part of the university’s executive circuit, shaping policy, real responsibilities, and a paycheck that was a small goldmine for a student. It was also an opportunity to learn from highly successful professionals and get experiences that could shape my entire career, and I’d nearly messed it all up because I couldn’t say no to a simple night out.
That morning broke something in me. Not necessarily my confidence, but the illusion that I could keep saying yes to everything without consequence.
Why I Couldn’t Say No
Before that day, I was essentially the kind of person that would always say 'As you wish' to be loved by others, even if it came at the cost of himself. Not because I loved being busy, but because I hated disappointing people and actively tried to avoid conflict at all costs.
So it was yes to the extra project, yes to the party, yes to “just one more” drink. Every yes seemed to keep someone happy, and keeping people happy kept the peace. But the cost was invisible until it suddenly wasn’t anymore.
The board role demanded roughly thirty hours a week, which came on top of classes, exams, and a social life I refused to let go of. I was stretching in every direction, which meant something was going to tear eventually. I just didn’t expect it to happen in front of a mayor.
Learning to Refuse
After that gruesome morning, I was forced to ask myself a different question. Instead of what I could add or take on, I asked what had to go if I wanted to graduate on time, do the job well, keep the income, and never humiliate myself like that again.
The list essentially wrote itself, but it wasn’t necessarily one that I liked: No more drinking before important days on the job, no more last-minute parties before important study deadlines, and no more projects that couldn’t actually be delivered without them impacting the commitments I’d already made.
For my entire two-year term, I had to say no on many occasions to protect myself and keep delivering on my commitments and responsibilities. I left parties early, skipped trips, and told friends I couldn’t make it when I knew I required a good night sleep more than another night out. It was awkward and lonelier at times than I could’ve imagined, but the chaos in my life gradually started to settle.
I graduated on time and, even more importantly, I learned things from that board role that shaped everything that followed. Working alongside professors and executives, I absorbed how they thought about decisions, priorities, and trade-offs. I built relationships and experiences that would later help me negotiate better salaries, and I developed a mindset around focus and delivery that has already helped me a long way into my still short professional career.
None of it happened because I said yes more, quite the opposite actually. It happened because I finally understood where to say no.
The Deadline That Didn’t Add Up
Years later those lessons around saying no showed up again in a meeting room at work, completely unexpected.
We were weeks away from one of the most important milestones of the year: the operational decommissioning of an old and critical IT system, where we had to migrate all the data from the old system to the one that would replace it. Senior leadership had requested a “scope expansion”, which in normal English simply means “more work, same deadline”. On paper, the request just looked ambitious. In reality, it would require my team to work evenings and weekends for a significant period of time.
I sat in on the call with our leadership team. The expectation was clear: say yes, figure it out, deliver.
Instead, I pulled up the numbers. “Here’s what we can realistically deliver by the deadline. Here’s what the expanded scope would require. And here’s what you’re asking from my team in terms of effort and availability.”
Silence. Then the project director leaned in. “So you’re saying no?”
“No, I’m saying this is what a yes actually costs. If that’s acceptable, we’ll do it. But I need you to see the trade-off clearly, especially in relation to the personal lives of my team members. Because in the end, they will be the ones paying for it.”
The conversation shifted, since no one really likes seeing their name attached to a decision that has a chance of burning people out. So instead, we talked about what was truly essential to achieve the desired outcome versus what wasn’t. The deadline wasn’t negotiable, understandably, but the definition of success became more realistic. My team delivered without burning out, and was given time to tackle aftercare at a later stage.
That meeting made me remember the key lesson from those student days: saying no isn’t refusal, it’s transparency and protection. It forces others to confront what they’re actually asking of you. And sometimes, when people see the real costs written out clearly, they make different decisions.
What No Buys You
What I didn’t realize until a little later was that those lessons around saying no also directly translated into income growth, though maybe not in the way you might expect.
Every time you (over)deliver on what’s promised instead of overpromising and scrambling, people will trust you with more things. More trust means more responsibility, and more responsibility means being considered for opportunities that others aren’t. Repeat that pattern a couple of times, and over time it gradually starts turning into salary increases and promotions.
Being strategically transparent about what my team or I could and couldn’t do became a contributing factor in several early career jumps. Not because I worked the most hours, but because people knew what to expect from me. Transparency and reliability made me more valuable than availability ever could.
I do my best to approach my own finances in a similar way as well. Every time I say no to lifestyle inflation when my salary increases, that money goes somewhere else useful. Every time I ignore a hyped investment, I stay with what actually works. And every time I refuse debt or make a purchase for something I don’t really need or want, I keep my options open.
That behavior has quietly compounded into a savings- and investment portfolio that gives me a certain degree of freedom I wouldn’t have had otherwise.
The Hangover That Taught Me A Lesson
I still think about that gruesome morning with the mayor sometimes. The sweating, the jumbled words, the faces of the people I’d disappointed. It was humiliating, but it also taught me something I’ve carried ever since.
You can’t say yes to everything without breaking something. Whether it’s your time, your energy, your reputation, your income, or your mental health: something always pays the price.
Saying no still doesn’t come naturally, but I’ve learned that constantly saying yes to make people happy isn’t a real strategy. It’s a path to burnout, being broke, or even both.
A “yes” scatters your energy, while a “no” focuses it. A “yes” makes you available, while a “no” makes you reliable. And the people worth keeping around aren’t the ones who’ll always need a “yes”. They’re the ones who respect you when you say no.
Say yes to the right things, and you grow. Say no to the wrong things, and you might grow even faster.
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