This month’s Esquire magazine (May 2008) has a nice article by Tom Chiarella titled “No” (as of this writing it’s not on-line yet, but I’m sure it will be). Chiarella writes about the simple power of the plain, unadorned, one word sentence “No.” For one month, whenever he doesn’t want to do something he just says no, clearly, unambiguously, but not in a mean way.

It seems to me that most adults have trouble just saying no. We say “No, thank you” to be polite. We say “I’d rather not” or “I’m not sure.” We offer long explanations, hoping not to feel guilty and not to hurt feelings.

When we were kids our parents said “Don’t you say no to me!” Kids who said “No, no, no, no!” were throwing a “tantrum” and sent to their rooms, punished, hit. I don’t remember any teacher ever praising me for my “no” - “I’m so proud of you, Chip, for the strength of your convictions and the clarity of your no.” Yeah, right.

Then there are those yeses, maybes, and I’m not sures that are actually nos. Either we “know” that the person means no, or we take the absence of a no to mean yes. In the first case, it was a no, we heard the no, why not just say no? In the second case, the inability or unwillingness to say no created a genuine misunderstanding. My experience is that such misunderstandings fuel anger and mistrust. In either case, the simple and direct no was certainly a better choice.

While I know that what I’ve written so far is true, I also know there are times when saying no can actually be corrosive. I’ve heard countless stories of intimate moments that get undermined by a no. When making love, instead of saying no to something, I often prefer to tell my partner something I like or appreciate about what I’m experiencing and something different I’d like. “I really love the way you ______, and right now I’d love it if you _______.”

A big part of being the man I choose to be has something to do with the ways I say yes - yes to life, yes to love, yes to service, yes to my family, yes to my community, yes to my passion and yes to my responsibilities. And an equally big part of being the man I choose to be has something to do with the ways I say no - no to injustice, no to deceit, no to hatred, no to knowingly inflicting unnecessary pain, and sometimes, no because that’s my truth.