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When I meet clients for the first time, they typically say that they want to work with me because they know that something is missing, but they aren’t exactly sure what that “something” is, or how to go about getting it. Many of my blog entries are about HOW to change or how to create a vision for your life, because it’s a starting point. It’s the beginning.

But what happens next? Often when we start advocating for what we want, the unhealthy people in our lives start pushing back, and it’s not fun. I’ll give you some examples. A client of mine was in an unhappy job for several years. It was a situation where she was set up to fail: her job description was vague, at best, and she was expected to have mastery over many different areas of a company, each requiring completely different skill sets. She had little administrative support at work. The more she did, the less support she received. She had tremendous responsibility, but no authority. And to add insult to injury, she wasn’t making nearly as much as she deserved. She stayed for a long time, mainly because she liked her co-workers (well, and because her self-esteem had taken such a pummeling that she thought she couldn’t get another job). The one bright spot in an otherwise bleak job was her community of friends at work. They went out for drinks after work on many nights, and bonded over their mutual miserable situation. They supported one another in their shared dislike of their unsupportive boss. They commiserated over how terrible it felt to be so stuck, and to feel as though one was doomed to unhappiness.

So guess what happened when this person decided that she was tired of being unhappy, and feeling stuck and miserable, and decided to go pursue a different career path that made her happy (and landed an amazing job, might I add)? Do you think that these same co-workers were thrilled for her, that they rejoiced for her success? If you haven’t guessed, I’ll give you the answer: No. They tried to talk her out of taking the new job. They tried to tell her why it wouldn’t work out for her, they tried to dash her dreams by convincing her to stay.

I’ve seen this happen over and over, both in my life and in the lives of friends and clients. You get ready take a bold, dramatic, gutsy step in your life, one that requires lots of willingness to step outside your comfort zone-and sometimes you are met with a lot of resistance. I’ve seen this play out in other situations, and in none so strongly as when I teach women how to say “no” to people and situations that drain them (I’ve often said that my favorite part of my job is teaching women how to be selfish!). Inevitably, after people start getting more assertive, the unhealthy people around them (you know, the ones who have relied upon their good graces) start pushing harder. It is not in their best interest for you to say “no” to them-it is far better for you to be a doormat. A lot of women I know are surprised by how much of the push back comes from other women, friends or other mothers-people that they assume would be supportive and understanding of their efforts to grow.

Now, I’m not implying that any of these people are bad or mean people. I have a theory about why this happens. If we believe that we are totally trapped or don’t have any choices, than we relieve ourselves of taking responsibility for our lives. When one person steps out of that trap and makes a choice, takes a stand, chooses something courageous, it implies that perhaps we have a lot more choices than we think. If you feel stuck in a miserable job, and think that there is nothing you can do to leave it, you don’t have to do anything. But if you suddenly realize that it is, in fact, possible, to leave that job, to get a better job, or to become a chef or fashion designer (or whatever it is that makes your heart sing) things can get a lot more scary. If we feel that we have to say “yes” to every single obligation around us, we feel trapped in our lives. If someone we know starts saying “no” to whatever it is that they don’t want to do, and the world doesn’t fall apart, we realize that we have choices too. Because that can imply that we might have to start making some painful changes, human beings often tend to try to suppress that instinct in others. That is to say that I believe there is a direct correlation between the speed at which someone rushes to throw cold water on your dream and the extent to which they feel trapped in their own life.

The good news about all this is that we DO have choice in our lives. Many of us have a lot more options than others, but I will argue that each of us has some small space where we can assert ourselves and make deliberate decisions about how we want to live. The other helpful thing to remember is the second of the four agreements, from the book of the same name by Don Ruiz: “Everything people do is not about you, it is about them. Take nothing personally.”

Saying “no” helps you make space in your life for the people who support you. These are the people who say, “that’s great,” instead of “it will never happen,” when you tell them what you want to do. You can’t choose whether others decide to stay stuck and unhappy, but you do have choices about your own life. In the words of Henry David Thoreau, “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you’ve imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler.”

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We value and respect our HERWriters' experiences, but everyone is different. Many of our writers are speaking from personal experience, and what's worked for them may not work for you. Their articles are not a substitute for medical advice, although we hope you can gain knowledge from their insight.