And so I felt some pride swell up in me when people I'd known for years would call me up, offering congratulations for making it to the League — and, "oh, by the way, my transmission just dropped, could I get, say, $1,200 off you?" Or, "I'm opening a restaurant, maybe you could invest a few hundred thousand." Or, "My kid needs braces." Or, "my lights are getting turned off tomorrow." Some of the stuff you hear is truly creative.

I'm not saying that helping people out drained me. But one of those what ifs that lingers is the thought of what my financial situation would look like if some of those $500 light bills or $1,000 car repairs that I paid had been sitting in an account, gaining interest for the last 15 years... I almost don't want to think about the numbers, but I do want you to think about those numbers, because if you don't they'll haunt you forever. I'd so much rather you learn from my mistakes than from your own.

When people believe that they're more likely to receive a No than a Yes, they'll be less likely to test you. Your boundaries become firmer to the outside world and to yourself. You start to think of yourself as a discerning person and you start to think through your decisions. Your new, old friends will be slower to ask for money, and more appreciative with what help you do give rather than continually expecting more, and more, and more.

I'm not saying be cheap, or stingy, or distance yourself from people you've known your entire life. I'm not saying any of that. I'm not saying don't help people out when you can. But that's the key word, right there: when you can. Not because you can.

Take it from my experience — you don't want to see that sour look on Pawn Shop Joe's face when you go into his shop, hat-in-hand, hoping to pawn your Super Bowl rings for a few hundred dollars in cash that you need now, like today. That look where he wants to turn you down, but doesn't, because he knows that you need the money more than the rings at that sad moment in your existence.

Such is the fate of the player who fails to harness the Power of No.

Clayton Holmes is a three-time Super Bowl winner with the 1990s Dallas Cowboys. Today he is a motivational speaker for parents and young athletes. Next week he will be writing about how to manage the attentions (and intentions) of female suitors — better known as groupies.