The art of saying "No" - How did you learn it?

I struggled for a long time until I joined Mckinsey, and they taught me a framework mostly to deal with demanding situations. Might look like I plug but just sharing as its fitting. I wrote extensively about it here: https://twitter.com/supermode_/s...

You have to learn where "always YES" is coming from. Tackle that and be happy forever, saying "no" with a smile. :)

The truth is that it's hard to live in a world that is constantly "under the microscope" of everyone. Work, social media, neighbours, country you come from, new place to live in - everything affects who you are because people give opinions on your work, commitment, products, look, behaviour and unfortunately not everyone will send constructive viewpoint. "Choose wise," they say. But how do you know what is 'good'? I think that by giving in to all sorts of trials in your life is one of the ways to learn to say NO. Because you don't have to say NO directly, show it with your actions. Have opinions, listen, read, talk to mentors - all this gives courage.

Still learning it :)

Have not learnt it. Love seeing the comments, they're helping me out.

Later on after college when I realized that I was always taken advantage of

Great point to discuss but still looking for better ways to say no.

I started doing it more when I started feeling what is going on inside me when I make a decision or communicate one. And now the voice is so loud that I can't ignore it.

Initially, I said yes to all feature requests. At some point, it became very clear that the product will become bloated quickly if we keep doing that and now we only approve those features that many customers requested and that fit our product vision. For all other requests, it is a polite "no".

once you just start it becomes empowering and therefore it becomes compelling and easy