{"id":3104,"date":"2012-07-20T12:01:52","date_gmt":"2012-07-20T16:01:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/?p=3104"},"modified":"2012-06-08T11:46:04","modified_gmt":"2012-06-08T15:46:04","slug":"do-you-have-minute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/2012\/07\/do-you-have-minute.html","title":{"rendered":"\u201cDo You Have Minute?\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I just got a call from someone at a charity I\u2019ve donated to in the past. I was working. Busy. Not happy to be interrupted. Grrr\u2026. She asked, \u201cDo you have a minute.\u201d I wanted to get sarcastic and say \u201cSure, I\u2019d rather spend time listening to you try to get me to give more money than get my work done.\u201d But I held my tongue and just said, \u201cno.\u201d<\/p>\n

How many times have you gotten calls soliciting something or trying to sell you a product or convert you to a different electric company? Often they seem to know when you\u2019ve just started dinner or have your hands full with something. I used to control my annoyance and listen to their pitches but seethe inside because my time was wasted or my flow with writing was interrupted.<\/p>\n

No more! When I was a DoorMat I had to please everyone, including strangers who interrupt me with phone calls. Now I know I\u2019m not obligated to be an ear to listen to pitches I\u2019m not interested in. I used to believe I had to be nice, polite, and it was impolite to hang up quick. It didn’t seem nice to do that! I hear many people complain that they try to be polite but it drives them crazy to have to listen to someone they have no interest in. After leaving DoorMatville, I experienced an epiphany: We don\u2019t have to listen!<\/p>\n

Now I see the light and believe it\u2019s not polite to call me and disturb whatever I\u2019m doing. I\u2019m not nasty to anyone. I just have a different attitude. Nice and polite doesn\u2019t mean having to listen to a pitch that doesn\u2019t interest you. It also doesn\u2019t mean staying on the phone longer than you\u2019d like. Nor does polite mean you have to justify yourself to the person who calls about why you\u2019re not interested in making a purchase or donation or changing your phone service, etc. Expecting you to do so is not polite!<\/p>\n

We\u2019re not obligated to speak to people who call when we didn\u2019t invite them to. Some people just hang up. That\u2019s rude. And since I am still a nice person, I\u2019ll say something first. For me, \u201cDo you have a minute?\u201d is a joke. What they pitch will take more than a minute. And when they call in the middle of a work day, I have no minutes to spare. In the past I\u2019d have explained I was too busy to talk in answer to that question. But since I don\u2019t know the person and will donate when I choose, not because they call, I just said, \u201cno.\u201d<\/p>\n

As soon as I hear that the person who called is trying to sell me something or solicit business I just say “I\u2019m not interested.” I\u2019ll even interrupt them to say that. Why waste time listening more than necessary? If they continue, I politely say, \u201cI\u2019m going to hang up now\u201d and hang up. Time is valuable and it\u2019s unnecessary to give yours away. If you like talking to strangers, do so. But if you\u2019re like me those calls are annoying and can be stopped by politely saying you\u2019re not interested. Period. That’s being nice to you!
\n***************<\/p>\n

Take the 31 Days of Self-Love Challenge<\/strong><\/a>–a pledge to do something loving for yourself for the next 31 days–and get my book, How Do I Love Me? Let Me Count the Ways<\/a><\/strong> for free at http:\/\/howdoiloveme.com<\/a><\/strong>. Read my 31 Days of Self-Love Posts from 2012 HERE<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Please leave comments under my posts so we can stay connected.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I just got a call from someone at a charity I\u2019ve donated to in the past. I was working. Busy. Not happy to be interrupted. Grrr\u2026. She asked, \u201cDo you have a minute.\u201d I wanted to get sarcastic and say \u201cSure, I\u2019d rather spend time listening to you try to get me to give more…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,14,2,15],"tags":[380,88,137,381],"class_list":["post-3104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nice-people-can-finish-first","category-positive-mental-attitude","category-self-empowerment-confidence","category-self-love-acceptance","tag-people-pleasers","tag-self-empowerment","tag-time","tag-unsolicited-phone-calls"],"yoast_head":"\n\u201cDo You Have Minute?\u201d - Lessons from a Recovering Doormat<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/2012\/07\/do-you-have-minute.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u201cDo You Have Minute?\u201d - Lessons from a Recovering Doormat\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I just got a call from someone at a charity I\u2019ve donated to in the past. 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Daylle's books have been translated into over 10 languages and are popular around the world. She speaks for colleges, organizations and corporations. Through her company, Project Self-Empowerment, Daylle creates programs and materials to help people empower themselves. One goal is to raise the money to self-publish her book, How Do I Love Me? Let Me Count the Ways and give it away for free in colleges and through organizations, to give thanks for all her blessings. Daylle uses her writing and speaking to help others find the kind of contentment and empowerment that she has.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/author\/dschwartz"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3104"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3209,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3104\/revisions\/3209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lessonsfromarecoveringdoormat\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}