Welcome to It's a Good Life with Brian Bafini, founder of America's largest business coaching company.

Here's a short classic cut from one of our all-time favorite episodes.

Welcome to today's episode, How to Say No and Smile.

Warren Buffett says the difference between successful people and really successful people

is that really successful people say no to almost everything.

Many of us do have the disease to please, and many of us overestimate our capacity while

underestimating our current obligations. I'm going to share three concepts with you today

that will allow you to say no and smile. So the three concepts are the disease to please,

every yes is a no, and the benefits of no. So let's talk about the disease to please.

It is more important to be respected than light, especially in business. You know, so many people

struggle when family and friends or even past customers don't do business with them again or don't do

business with them at all. And they like you. And maybe they even trust you as a person.

But trust is made up of that character and competence. I know all about people pleasing.

I am one. And what I would say, I'm a reforming people pleaser. I've reformed in areas,

and I'm still reforming in others. When I was in sales in real estate, for example, I used to

really want my clients to like me. You know, it was important to me to be well thought of.

What I found about people pleasing in business, like I say, my early real estate

career, sometimes I would avoid sharing bad news or disappointing news with the client. Eventually,

as a pro, you go through those experiences. And I'd be on an appointment and the client would have

an expectation that their house would be worth X and I knew it was worth Y. And I'd look him straight in the eye and said,

I'd rather disappoint you tonight than let you down six months from now. What I found is that

when I delivered the difficult things and had the hard conversations with my clients,

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