In 2013, Learn How to Say 'No'

This will be a special new year for me. With a December 31 birthday, I'll start 2013 as a newly minted 50 year old.

That marker has given me both pause and resolve to live a successful life. And here's what I've discovered: Success is grooving with the right rhythm of Yeses and Nos. A successful 2013 is not simply saying Yes to a series of new resolutions.

Several years ago, I learned firsthand the peril of too many Yeses.

I found myself on a treadmill for the purpose of generating an EKG. This on the recommendation of my doctor: "The pains you feel in your chest might be something more serious. Let's have your heart get checked."

With electrodes strapped to my chest in a Manhattan cardiologist's office, worried and confused thoughts filling my mind: "What? Me? Is this serious?" I was young with no previous health problems.

It may be sacrilege to say in our current technology-crazed world, but saying a constant Yes to technology partly caused the problem. It was the hundreds of emails I'd receive after a week of vacation, the fact I could listen to calls on my cell as I walked home from work, and the experience of being "wired in" at all times in a fast-paced, technologically advanced city where (I've been told) "you're 55% more likely to have a heart attack if you're a New Yorker."

But soon enough, I heard the words: "Your heart is fine. Any problems you're experiencing are elsewhere." (In fact, I later found it's a genetic predisposition toward hypertension.) That day I felt elated. Grateful. But I also realized that I needed strategic Nos to support the important Yeses in my life.