Saying no is essential when you want to pursue something in life.
It does not matter what it is because when you focus on one thing, spending time and energy on it, you have to spend less or none on other things.
Time and energy are both naturally limited.
You can’t create more time.
Neither can you create more energy.
So, you can’t cramp everything in those.
It’s impossible.
You have to shift your time and energy.
In other words, you have to give up something, aka sacrificing, in return.
That doesn’t need to be permanent; most sacrifices are temporary.
For example, if you start a business to provide you with a comfortable life, you’re up to a lot of work. You’ll need to put in huge efforts, aka spend time and energy on it.
While doing so, other parts of your life will get less or none. Frankly, many will get under the bus and vanish. Only the most important will survive.
At some point later, it will shift naturally.
Business blooms and is mid-term or long-term stable and voila, you have more time and energy for other parts of your life.
It is part of life.
Just pick what you want to focus on and also pick what has to go or gets less and go with it.
You can change it at any time.
However, making sacrifices can also be bad.
Especially when those sacrifices do not come from yourself but are brought or even forced upon you from the outside.
It’s also why, paired with its religious origin, why I dislike that word.
Often, those sacrifices are not in your best interest.
For example, when a politician tells you, “We have to sacrifice some of our wealth to support XYZ”, it simply means they want you to be happy to pay the price for the problems they created in the first place.
While they will make sure not to sacrifice anything themselves and even gain something in return.
I firmly believe if someone in a mass setting wants us to make sacrifices, it’s in our worst interest and not something we should make.
Don’t fall for it and believe them.
Even if you have to suffer, as long as you don’t believe it, you can find ways to navigate around or through it.
Be aware and try to stay in control as much as you can :-)
Pick your own sacrifices and not the ones of others, especially not the promoted ones they don’t pick up themselves.