How can I overcome pressure? How can I learn to say no?
To begin with, we must understand three important laws of life. First, pressure is not something that is naturally there. It’s created when we question our own ability. When we know what we can do there is never any question. If you are unprepared for a school exam you feel pressure, but if you know you know the answers because you have studied and practiced, there is no question and no pressure. Pressure is eliminated by confidence, confidence is created through consistency, consistency comes through perfect practice. If this is so, any of us can do it and eliminate pressure from our work, school and play.
The second law of life is time. There are only 24 hours in a day—not just in some people’s day, but in everybody’s day. Time makes everybody equal. The way we become unequal, better or worse, successful or a failure, is determined by how you decide to use those 24 hours. Because we cannot be two places at once and do two things at the same time, instead of worrying so much about how to say no to negative influences, if you use your time wisely by dreaming mighty dreams and setting positive goals and simply saying yes to something positive, you won’t have time for the negative; your positive actions will say no for you.
The third law is to realize there are two ways to be controlled and influenced – from within and from without; by you and by others. The solution to pressure, then, is finding out who you really are and what you really represent. Only then will you know what you want to be. As you learn this, others won’t be able to adversely affect your actions. In fact, you probably won’t even associate with others who don’t act or think like you do and, therefore, you’ll avoid outside pressure altogether.
Remember, if the things you think about are different from the things you do, you’ll never be happy. When you’re consistently yourself in thought, work, and action, pressure will not affect you.
