The "Yes" Experience

I’ve been thinking about the wisdom of saying “yes” in life. In accepting invitations to new experiences or activities, we enrich ourselves.  We cultivate shared memories with friends. We stretch what we know or what we think we know by trying new things. We step out of what is comfortable sometimes to simply place trust in ourselves, in the activity, in the experience.

I spent the last week saying yes. I said yes to playing disc golf though I still have so much to learn. I said yes to a spur-of-the-moment backpacking trip. I said yes to climbing a rickety fire tower in high winds to watch the sun rise. I said yes to dinner with friends. Each of these opportunities opened me in new and different ways.

I see how Groove can parallel this lesson. By giving participants the basic movement then asking them to consider other possibilities, they get the chance to say “yes” in deciding if they want to move their bodies in a certain way. While you always have the option to abstain from a creative alternative, what happens if you just say "yes"?

Jean Jacket: A Reflection on Adolescence

Unkempt hair cut by my mother.

A dark jean jacket I felt lucky to have received

After all, I had wanted one for Christmas.

But not like this. Not dark blue.

Not like the sky on a night with no moon and no stars.

I wanted stone-washed, pale

bleached, almost white.

I rubbed it on the brick hearth to create the stone washed look

but it didn’t help, so it stayed

hidden in my closet – a gift

I wanted to be thankful for but felt

too ashamed to wear.

(This was a brief exercise as part of the mentor training for the Climbing Toward Confidence program. The facilitator read a passage from My Sisters’ Voices: Teenage Girls of Color Speak Out and asked us to reflect on our own adolescence.)

What's your story of adolescence?