Learning To Say No

Since starting my journey towards a simpler life, one of things I’ve had to learn is to say “No” more often.

Once upon a time, no matter what people asked of me, if I was able to do it, I did. Rarely was there any real gratitude shown and all too often, when I asked for a favour myself, that person was either too busy or just unwilling for whatever reason. Not everybody was that way, obviously, but too many were.

The fact is, people will keep on taking whatever you offer them and all the helping out I was doing was starting to wear me down. I spent so much time and energy doing things for other people that I found myself increasingly unable to do the things that actually meant a lot to me. My life, it seemed, belonged to others.

Nowadays I’m much more inclined to say no although to start with it did feel pretty weird. I’d find myself having to offer reasons for not being able to help but the truth of the matter is, nobody has any right to demand another’s time and an excuse really isn’t necessary. If you’ve said no then you clearly have a reason and have every right to decide yourself whether you want to share that reason or not.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying we shouldn’t extend a helping hand but we don’t need to say yes to everything that’s asked of us. The following are a few basic guidelines that I use now when deciding whether or not to say yes.

Who is this person?
Sounds like a strange question because in all likelihood, if you didn’t already know them, they wouldn’t be asking a favour of you, but what I mean by this is what kind of person are they? Would they be happy to help you out when you need it, or are they blood suckers who just keep on taking without ever giving much back in return? I don’t mean that they have to do the same kind of favours for you, or even of the same magnitude - everything depends on a person’s abilities etc - but if they don’t show willing often enough (or ever, for that matter), start saying no more often.

Am I comfortable doing this?
I’ve put my life in danger to help others out and while I was ok doing that because the situation was serious, that wouldn’t always be the case because there are some things I really cannot do because they’d either be irresponsible of me (what would have happened if I had been hurt - who would have looked after my family?) or just plain difficult. If I’m not comfortable doing something, then unless there’s really no other way and somebody’s life depended on it, I’d say no.

Should this person be asking this of me?
People who know us well should know our limitations but still I’m often asked to do something that’s beyond what anybody should really expect. Once upon a time, I’d have done my best to do it anyway but nowadays I just think that they ought not have asked in the first place and put me in a position where I feel I have to help and simply say no.

Could this person do this for him/herself?
One example of this was people constantly asking me for loans even though they had at least as much and often more coming in than I have. If I can budget and make my money last from one pay day to the next and save a bit too, then surely they can. By helping out with loans the whole time, I wasn’t really do them any favours so instead I offered to help them set up a budget, an offer that has been declined by each of those people who‘d regularly ask, so now I just say no. As they say “give a man a fish and you’ll feed him for a day, teach him to fish and you’ll feed him for a lifetime”.

How important is the favour?
There’s a big difference between getting out of bed at two in the morning to take somebody to the hospital because a loved one’s just been admitted with a serious illness and could die and picking somebody up from a night club because they've spent their taxi fair home. If I don’t really think the person should be asking the favour of me, then I say no.

What are my own priorities?
Do I have the time or energy to do this? How important is it compared with the plans I’d already made for my time? Can I afford to do it and, if not, are they able to pay themselves (or even willing to)? If I feel that my own priorities are more important - and this is one where I often fell down before because I put other people’s need (real or perceived) before myself all too often - then I say no.


Since starting to say no more often and give more consideration to my own needs instead, some people have stopped contacting me as much. Fine. I know where I stand with them now. Those who really care about me understand that you can’t always do everything for everybody and have started expecting less of me. I still help out when and how I can, but I don’t jump around like a puppet on a string anymore and am actually spending time helping myself instead.

Sharon J xx

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Image Source: Tyla75

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We Don't Need No Education

We don’t need no education
We don’t need no thought control
No dark sarcasm in the classroom
Teachers leave them kids alone


Most of you will probably recognise those lyrics as belonging to Pink Floyd’s ‘Another Brick in The Wall’, which I was listening to last night surrounded by candles (LM’s doing, btw) and those lyrics, no matter how many times I hear them, always hit a chord with me.

I’m a believer in free education, y’see. By that, I don’t mean education that doesn’t cost anything, although I do believe in that too; what I mean is education where youngsters are allowed to form their own opinions and conclusions rather than having to go along with what teachers and text books say is right, where the pressures of ‘performing’ are obliterated and where kids can be free from bullying, not only by fellow pupils but by teachers too.

Mainstream education may well be the right choice for some but for many it isn’t. I remember Lise’s first year of Junior school, and how she was reprimanded for not writing ‘joined up’. Oddly enough, the same teacher had earlier commented on how beautiful my hand-writing is, so I went to the school and asked her how she could punish my daughter for not writing in the way the school had decided was correct when my handwriting was perfectly acceptable and so was hers. The teacher had no answer other than “it’s school policy that children should be taught to write this way”. Not good enough I’m afraid. I pointed out that hand-writing is individual (hence why we have graphology) and the teacher had to admit defeat. I was not going to allow my daughter to be pressured into writing in a way that didn’t come naturally to her.

There have been many such incidences that, on the surface, may appear petty and insignificant, but they can have a huge impact on a child’s sense of ability. Everybody isn’t good at sport, math, language, science etc. We all have our areas in which we thrive and we all have things that we really don’t enjoy. By utilising the subjects that our children do enjoy, we are, I believe, giving them a far greater chance for the future than by pushing them to do well in areas that just don’t come easily to them. By doing so, I believe we’re bullying them - pulling rank - into being something they’re not.

And then there’s the playground bullying. I don’t care how much a school’s administrators insists that bullying doesn’t exist in their school, it does. It exists in each and every mainstream school I’ve ever encountered (and my kids have been to a fair few) and it isn’t easy to stop. Kids are bullied going to and from school, in the playground and in the classroom (just a look can be enough) and too many kids have already ended their lives because of it. My own children were traumatised by it and eventually I realised that there was an alternative - home education.

I’m sure there are good private schools around too, such as Steiner schools. I don’t have any experience with them so I couldn’t say, but a good friend of mine was once a teacher in a ‘free thinking private school’, teaching philosophy to five year olds in order to open up their minds and allow them to think for themselves, thus drawing their own conclusions and forming their own opinions. That has to be a good thing but we can do it ourselves too. Children need to be able to explore their minds, make mistakes and learn from them without chastisement, and learn to be true to themselves. This, I’m afraid, rarely happens in mainstream state schools.

All too often they’re ‘educated’ to be Just Another Brick In The Wall.

Sharon J

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Photo Credit: LNX

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Harking Back To The Past

Image: madalena-pestana

I spend a considerable amount of time thinking about the past. My own past and our collective pasts - pasts that we didn’t experience but that we know happened. History. Personal, national and global history.

Some would say I should stop ‘living in the past’ and look to the future instead and while I agree that we can’t get too stuck in our ways or we’ll never evolve, I believe that the past can help us understand which path the future needs to take.

For me, finding simplicity in my life again has been largely dominated by a time in my past where I lived much simpler than I have been doing for the past decade or so. I look back and compare how I felt in one stage with how I felt in the other, how my different choices affected both me personally, my family, the community around me and the planet as a whole. What changed? Did it change for the better or not? Was I happier? Did I have more or less time to spend with my family? Was I under more or less financial pressure? How was my relationship with my friends? These, and others, are questions I ask myself and the answers let me learn and develop as I move forward through the changes I‘m implementing now and, because we‘re continuously evolving our lives and attitudes, they help me map where I want to go.

When I listen to my mum tell stories from her past; from a time when reusing was the norm and recycling just happened without needing a name, I’m learning ‘new‘ ways of wasting less. When she tells me how the neighbours all rallied around for one another, looking out for the elderly and making sure the new or sick mum had the help that she needed, I realise that we intelligent, evolving humans have built a society of loneliness and isolation; we close our doors and the rest of the world can just ‘get on with it’. She has so much to tell me and I have so much to learn.

Yes, we can hark back to an ideal and imagined past when everybody was happy and all was well with the world and long for a utopia that hasn’t and never is going to happen, and yes, there are some who do just that, but reflecting on what has been doesn’t have to mean we’re living in a dream state, exiling ourselves from reality, but that we’re learning from the mistakes and triumphs that we’ve experienced personally, or that our ancestors experienced before us.

And yes, the past has happened and we can’t go back there, but we can build on certain elements of history, incorporating them into our lives in order to create a better, more fulfilling future where contentment and freedom from commercialism, debt, isolation, endless rules and regulations that strip us of our personal responsibility, and the constant need to keep up with the elusive Jones’ can again be enjoyed; a life where stress, anxiety, depression and exhaustion are no longer part of ’the norm’.

The past was what set me on my path to rediscover a more simple way of living - I knew I’d been happier without credit cards, fast food, endless rounds of shopping, expensive holidays taken just for the sake of it, closed doors amongst neighbours I barely know and ‘stuff’ cluttering every corner of my life. By looking back I could identify what had changed, how it had changed and what I needed to do in order to incorporate some of my past ways into my present life. I can’t turn the clocks back to become young and healthy again but I can find some of that past contentment and happiness that had been lost amongst the endless ‘wants’ I’d developed - wants that had led me to a life less pleasant.

The past has happened and we can learn from it - the future is nothing more than fantasy.

Sharon J

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Re-evaluating My Financial Situation

Image by .KM.

I’ve decided to put the idea of building up a ‘rainy day fund’ on the back burner for a while. I hate not having any back up funds now that I’ve resolved to not to buy on credit again but what with the kitchen savings, trying to get rid of as much debt as possible, and the price of food sky rocketing, there just isn’t anything left over and saving what you don't have isn't as easy as spending what you don't have is.

Some would no doubt say that having an emergency fund is more important than a new kitchen and in some cases I’d agree, but I’m being totally honest when I say that my kitchen redesign isn’t just something I want but something I really need.

It isn’t based on a flight of fancy because interior fashions have changed or even just a desire to put my own stamp on it – although I will, of course. I need a new kitchen because the one I have just isn’t in the least bit practical for my needs. I can’t keep moving the table and chairs to get to the food shelves and I can’t keep moving the vacuum cleaner, clothes horse and sewing machine every time I need something from a particular set of drawers – I just don’t have that kind of energy or muscle power. There are other problems too, including a floor that’s unbelievably difficult to clean, things stored in boxes that are stacked here, there and everywhere making it difficult to get to things, and then there's the fact that it’s depressingly dingy and absolutely not the kind of place that inspires me in the cookery department. So you see, I really must save up for the kitchen. It’s about quality of life.

As for the debt, it isn’t going down as quickly as I’d originally hoped but there are reasons for that. I originally organised my finances on a Google spreadsheet and knew exactly what I had and where every penny (or thereabouts, anyway) was going. I knew when every bill would be drawn or needed to be paid and how much would come into my account and when, what I'd saved and for what, how much I owed and the rest. Alas, I became very ill and just didn’t have it in me to follow up. I'm sure most would have been the same in my situation. Then my laptop went to electronic heaven so for a couple of weeks after I was finally well again, I had no Internet access. By the time everything was back to normal, catching up just seemed too daunting a task.

Then creditors started hassling me for money and it all became depressing again. I knew I had to get back on track so I grabbed the bull by the horns and made a start. I’ve got most of the figures together again (waiting for a final few bills to arrive so that I can get the figures for them) and with any luck I’ll have the long awaited new kitchen by the end of the year and some of more of my debt will have been paid down.

This is how things stand at the moment:

Kitchen Fund Target = £1,800 (by March 2009)
Have £785

Debt Target = £0 (by Dec 2010)
Owe £7,671(approx.)
Paid £1,665

Emergency Fund Target = £2000 (by June 2011)
Have £0

The debt figure scares me because I can honestly say that apart from the washing machine and a bed I bought as a housewarming present for my 'almost' daughter, I have nothing to show for any of it. Until about 5-6 years ago I didn't even own a credit card and then suddenly I had three, all maxed out. Still, the sum of my debts was over £9,000 at the beginning of the year so I haven't done too badly, I suppose. It's not as if I'm on a high income or anything and there are only so many notches on the belt. What I do know is that if I hadn't been willing to tighten it up as far as I could, I wouldn't have stood a chance of paying down anywhere near as much. I realise it's still only a little over £200 a month but on top of all my other bills, that's a lot of money to find when you don't have much. And the money for the kitchen's been saved in six months too, some of it just by saving coins in a jar.

The annoying this is that I should never have gotten into this situation in the first place because it's not as if I didn't know better. I managed perfectly well for over twenty years without buying stuff on credit and although some of it was almost forced on me when our income dropped drastically (after I became seriously ill and couldn't work at all while Richard stayed home caring for me), that isn't the reason behind all of it. Some of it I brought upon myself through sheer stupidity.

The fact that I’m saving up to go to Norway in September isn’t helping but it’s something I have to do. LM’s moving out there and needs mine and Richard’s help to get her stuff over, get her work permit sorted, register herself as a permanent resident and what have you. I'm really looking forward to it though - it always feels like going home to me - but right now it'd be nice if Norway wasn’t such an expensive country to visit. At least LM's going halves with me on the hire car (no, that's not a luxury - it's a necessity).

I’ll start the rainy day fund once the kitchen’s finished but it’ll still be more important to keep snowballing my debts because they're costing me a whole lot more than I could ever earn in interest through saving. But then there's the peace of mind involved in having an emergency fund so I shall have to try to strike a decent balance.

Boy, am I gonna celebrate when that last pound's paid off my debts!

Sharon J

Financial Calculators including savings, credit card interest and mortgages

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Home Schooling in England

Because we’ve moved around a lot – by choice I may add, not by necessity – my daughters have been to a number of schools. Some people have inferred that I’m a bad mother for dragging my kids “from pillar to post” but when asked, they’ll tell you that they’ve lived an adventurous life with lots of experiences they otherwise wouldn’t have had, met lots of people and had a whole lot of fun. Sometimes, preconceptions of how things ought to be aren’t always right. People – families – we’re all different.

Sadly, after moving back to England, both girls were badly bullied at school. No doubt because they were Scandinavian and therefore different and we all know it doesn’t take make to stand out from the crowd and become a victim. That the lads were drawn to them didn’t help; I doubt the girls liked that much.

DD1 eventually moved back to Norway to live with her dad and DD2 was miserable. I could see she was becoming depressed and a young teen shouldn’t have to live like that. After speaking to various members of staff and listening to empty promises I finally made the decision to take her out of school and give her a home education.

Plenty of people were against it; the people from the local education authority certainly were and although most friends understood and supported my decision, a few were clearly perplexed. “Drag her to school kicking and screaming – don’t let her have her own way” I was told. Well I’m sorry but I don’t treat my children that way; there’s no respect in that.

The LEA threatened me with court action for keeping her away from school but I knew my rights. The law of England and Wales states clearly that “all children of school age shall receive sufficient full-time education in school or otherwise.” They had to admit defeat; there was nothing they could do about it. I promised that they would be allowed to monitor her education to ensure that she was indeed being educated and in return they were willing to provide us with a qualified tutor who would visit DD2 for an hour, four times a week, something that was in fact very generous of them; most local authorities don’t do this.

Contrary to what some people believed, she wasn’t being lazy or just ‘trying to get her own way’. She knuckled down and got on with her work. We bought curriculum books to follow so that she’d have a chance of passing her GSCEs and eventually gain entrance to higher education, and we made up projects of our own. Our own local surroundings gave us lots of opportunities for geography and history projects; we have canals that date back to 1791; we live in a historic railway town; we have a park just a few minutes walk away with a well stocked lake (both fish and birds), a woodland walk, formal gardens and more. Lots could be learned about the environment just by walking around the town and I’m sure she learned a whole bunch of stuff that she would never have learned at school.

To our frustration, when the time came for her to sit her GCSEs, we were told that because she was home educated, she wouldn’t be allowed a mark higher than a ‘C’ as she could only sit what’s called the foundation tier rather than the higher tier. She was devastated. She’d worked hard and knew she could manage ‘A’ passes. I tried discussing it with them, practically begged them; her tutor tried talking to them (she also believed DD2 could achieve grade ‘A’) but they were adamant; that was the way things were.

She did get her ‘C’ passes in Math, English Language, and English Lit, the three exams she sat, but she wasn’t sure whether that would be good enough to get her onto the college course she wanted. Her dream was to be a photographer but for that she’d need at least two ‘B’ grade passes. We went along to the college, spoke to the head of the department and luckily, after a long chat with DD2, he said that he believed she had potential and didn’t want to see it wasted so would accept her on the course. I could have kissed him.

She’s now in her final college year and is planning to go to Uni although she is considering taking a gap year. She's very stressed at the moment, what with college, holding down a part-time job and helping me so I do understand her reasons. People also grow tired of ‘school’ and sometimes need a break. But whatever she chooses, those who insisted she’d never make anything of herself, that she was just being lazy, and so forth were definitely wrong!

Home schooling appears to be more widespread in the US than it is here but if your child is unhappy in mainstream education, maybe home education would be the better alternative. Stick to your guns and don’t let the LEA or anybody else intimidate you. Everybody doesn’t fit the standard mould (does anybody?) and only you know what’s best for your child.

Sharon J xx

I’ve never let my schooling interfere with my education ~ Mark Twain

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More information on home schooling can be found on the DirectGov website

[Photo credit: banafsh3 at Flickr.com]