{"id":201,"date":"2009-03-04T14:00:50","date_gmt":"2009-03-04T14:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/freshliving\/2009\/03\/the-life-altering-power-of-yes.html"},"modified":"2009-03-04T14:00:50","modified_gmt":"2009-03-04T14:00:50","slug":"the-life-altering-power-of-yes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/freshliving\/2009\/03\/the-life-altering-power-of-yes.html","title":{"rendered":"The Life-Altering Power of ‘Yes’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"yes_2.jpg\"
\n <\/span>A friend and I were walking down the street yesterday, talking about our mutual tendency to, when a good thing happens in our lives, instead of embracing it, say “but….” As in, “I have this great new apartment possibility, but…<\/strong> maybe it’s not really right” or, “I met a fantastic guy I love, but….” <\/strong>“I won a million dollars! But…” <\/strong>I’m guessing you know the drill.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

She said she had forgotten, but that the remedy to Big But Syndrome (BBS) is another equally powerful word: Yes.<\/strong> <\/p>\n

As in, “Want to go to Hawaii?” YES! “Would you like to meet this new person?” YES! <\/p>\n

Being a big fan and forgetter of Yes, I mentioned that book “The Year of Yes”<\/a> in which the author decided to say Yes to almost every invitation or offer for 12 months. I haven’t read it, but I think she had a pretty interesting time (apparently interesting enough to make a Jim Carrey movie <\/a>out of it). <\/p>\n

Then I remembered that John Lennon met and fell in love<\/a> with Yoko Ono at her 1966 London installation art exhibit<\/a>–you had to climb a ladder and when you got to the top, you picked up an attached magnifying glass and read the word Yes painted on a canvas. Even though they were both married and didn’t get together for two more years, he was hooked. Yes.<\/p>\n

So we’re still walking down the windy, sunny street having this conversation and I notice an old building is newly bright yellow and that a huge sign on it reads, “One word can change the world.” I stop and step back to see an ad mural with rain-slicker yellow letters as tall as me: “Yes!”<\/p>\n

We just stared at it, at each other, and started laughing. And laughing. “We get it!” I yelled happily at the sky. “YES!”  And more hysterical giggling and “Oh my god-ing.” (Turns out it’s an ad for Western Union’s charity campaign.<\/a> Not to add snark to a happy moment, BUT, the company could start to say Yes to the earth by not using giant vinyl sheeting to display their cool message–here’s some eco info on vinyl<\/a>. Or maybe that’s just an example of BBS.) <\/p>\n

Yes. Clearly there’s something there. Yes, yes, yes. It moves me forward. It feels scary and exciting. It makes me feel intimate with the world. Like it’s a lover, not a foe. I feel energized. Not stopped, not but-ed. And in my heart, not my analyzing head. Yes might just be the opposite of fear. Yes. Less No, more Yes. I’m going to remember this time, until I forget and another billboard has to shout it at me. <\/p>\n

Maybe you’ll join me in saying Yes to life more? Not Yes to projects that are a bummer, chores that drain you, but Yes to the places your wild, beautiful heart wants to go but is afraid to. How can you say yes today?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I’ll leave you with this quote I just found from Yoko:<\/p>\n

“LET EVERYBODY IN THE CITY THINK OF THE WORD “YES” AT THE SAME TIME FOR 30 SECONDS. DO IT OFTEN. “
–YOKO ONO, EXCERPT FROM “LET’S PIECE I” (SPRING 1960)<\/p>\n

Yes!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

 A friend and I were walking down the street yesterday, talking about our mutual tendency to, when a good thing happens in our lives, instead of embracing it, say “but….” As in, “I have this great new apartment possibility, but… maybe it’s not really right” or, “I met a fantastic guy I love, but….” “I won a million dollars!…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-by-valerie-reiss","category-holistic-living"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Life-Altering Power of 'Yes' - Fresh Living<\/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\/freshliving\/2009\/03\/the-life-altering-power-of-yes.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Life-Altering Power of 'Yes' - 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She was a founding editor at Breathe magazine, and her writing has appeared in The New York Times, Newsweek, Women's Health, Natural Health, Yoga Journal, Lime.com, Vegetarian Times, and ABCNEWS.com. A native New Yorker, Valerie holds an M.S. from Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism and a B.A. from Beloit College in Creative Writing with a minor in Women's Studies. She also lived in Maui for a while where she drank green papaya juice and taught some creative writing. 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