Just say yes. Yes to your dreams. Yes to a possibilities that seem almost always out of reach. Say yes without knowing how to you’ll get there. Yes without knowing where the money is going to come from. Without knowing how you are ever going to find the time. Just say yes, because that is what you can do. Everything else, the how, the where, and the when is beyond of your vision and outside your control.
But say yes.
Take my life for example and I use myself not because I think I’m important but because my life is most accessible to me and I don’t want these pieces to become too philosophical.
Last weekend I presented a Sparring With Fear workshop at the District 60 Toastmasters conference. I asked myself many times what business I had in being there, and was tempted on a couple of occasions, just to get in the car, drive home and forget everything.
Two years ago I said yes to doing the workshop and I applied to the conference organizers to let me present. My pseudo mentor at the time told me not to bother because I would not be asked to present. I ignored her. And despite being right, she was wrong.
I applied and was rejected but I was offered a chance to present my workshop to some seasoned workshop presenters and get invaluable feedback. I presented the workshop and had to pick up shards of my confidence from all over the place, but I did and I presented the workshop again. The following year, I applied again and was given to chance to present it last weekend.
I have to tell you that it was an unbelievable moment in my life. What people had to say to me afterwards meant more than they can ever imagine, and all I had to do is just say yes. Yes to doing a conference before I was ready and knew what I was doing. Yes to something that someone advised me not to do. And lets get back to her for a moment. She was absolutely right that I had no business presenting a workshop since nobody knew who I was, but she was wrong, because if I never applied, I would have never presented it, presented it again, and finally delivered it.
Everything we do in life in connected in ways we cannot see. That’s why we are surprised all the time, but those deep connections are always there.
This is why it’s important to to quit or give up on something too early. Give it a go for a decade or two and if you don’t like it and are not where you thought you would be, give up and pursue something else.
Just say yes. Say yes to musical lesson, to steps backwards, and all the frustration that goes along with it. It might not be about the music in the end. You might end up growing in confidence. You might end up meeting someone or discovering something related or unrelated to music and you just never know do you?
But you can be sure that if you say no, or worse live in the stagnation of a maybe, you’ll be nowhere, except neck deep in regret and puddles of tired.
What ever it is you dream about. Take it seriously. Don’t let people shit all over it. Especially those closest to you. They might not be mean, they might simply be distracted.
Just say yes. Say yes. Look for the next step. The step after that and the one after that. Climb higher and higher. Bruise your knees. Fall down a little, but always get up and let each yes lead you to where you’ll thank me one day for being.
Cover photo generously provided by photographer Seth Doyle.
https://unsplash.com/@sethdoylee
