What’s Your YES?

We almost didn’t go. We were resisting.
 
It was a foggy, chilly, blustery San Francisco summer day. Too windy and cold, we thought, to sit out on a marina listening to live music.
 
So, we hulled up. Stayed in.
 
We spent the day purging, cleaning cupboards, checking off house projects. We were getting things done. Important things. There were so many reasons not to go.
 
Finally, about an hour before the event was scheduled to end, my husband said, “C’mon, let’s just go.”
 
We dropped everything, and with that one decision, everything shifted. Not only did the sun come out (literally!), our moods got brighter too. After that, our weekend was a series of fun, full-on living moments that we came so close to never having.
 
Moments like these, when we come face-to-face with our own resistance and push through it to the other side are often some of the most beautiful.
 
I don’t know about you, but I often have lots of good reasons for not putting myself out there, lots of good reasons for staying where life is cozy and predictable.
 
There is something about knowing that we are at a turning point, however insignificant it may seem, and we have choice that makes what happens when we finally say YES feel all the more wonderful.
 
Many years ago, I was in a similar funk. I was feeling tired, perhaps even coming down with something. I wasn’t in the mood to socialize.
 
Worse yet, it was cold outside. East-coast wintertime cold.
 
I had been invited to a New Year’s Eve party, yet I balked. Did I really want to go out into the cold night? Get all dressed up? Maybe I’d rather take a hot bath and have a quiet night instead?
 
At the last minute, I decided to say YES.
 
On that particular New Year’s Eve, at that particular party, at the stroke of midnight, music blaring, a handsome man grabbed my hand, two glasses and a bottle of champagne and led me to a quiet place where we could chat.
 
My life has never been the same since. He’s still by my side, encouraging me to ignore all the reasons “not to go” (especially when there’s music involved).
 
Sometimes, we remember moments like these decades later. Other times, we forget how we almost chose comfort, safety and predictability instead of opening ourselves to experiences where anything could happen. We forget how there was once an aspect of ourselves that had just been waiting in the wings for us to say YES.