Protect your big yes by saying a lot of small nos.

Every yes spends something that is then not available for anything else. Agreeing to small things feels harmless individually, which is exactly how a month fills up with obligations you did not care about and no room for the one you did. Saying no is not about being difficult. It is about keeping the thing you actually want possible.

Name the one commitment this season that matters most to you. Then measure requests against it: does this fit, or does it eat the hours that belong to that. No is a complete sentence, and you can always add that you would like to another time.