It is important in life to take risks and explore new ways of thinking and feeling. This is especially true when you are beginning on a new leg on your life journey. During these kinds of life periods, I adopted a policy of saying “yes” to all invitations. I call this doing the Desperado, a name I confiscated from my friend Suzanne who uses it to describe saying yes to everything.
I have grown fond of doing the Desperado. It is an acknowledgement that the universe is opening doors for me and I don’t need to force things to happen. Saying yes to everything is freeing, motivating, stimulating and very fulfilling. Now, you don’t have to be an idiot about it and do things you are certain you will not enjoy. For example, I’m not going skydiving if I am invited, I have not yet found a reasonable justification for jumping out of a perfectly good airplane. But that is me. If skydiving is reasonable for you, then should do it. Maybe I should have picked something more morose to illustrate the point like being invited to go to a cannibalism party. The point is to do something new, but it doesn’t need to be something that you are going to dread.
Don’t say yes out of guilt either. Guilt is not a good motivator. doing things out of guilt is a form of people pleasing and defeats the whole point of trying something challenging.
Life is about staying intellectually curious
Albert Einstein once said,
“When we stop learning we start dying.”
I am a believer of this truism. Growing older does not mean we should stop trying new things. We should strive to walk through as many doors as possible to learn something new and meet new people. This helps you stay intellectually alive, makes you smarter, allows you to differentiate what you like and don’t like. Your spirit has an endless capacity to grow and learn so it expands every time you try a new experience. This enables you to grow until the day you die.
There are other benefits from saying yes. Confidence grows when you try new things. You make new friends. Your perspective of the world expands.
The desire to not change is a preference driven by your ego. Entropy grows the more you agree to the ego’s desire to stay comfortable and safe and, as years of inaction go by, trying new things becomes harder.
Make a commitment to grow. Start by trying one new thing every day, even if it is something small. There is no formula to follow, except to keep trying. Saying yes to new things has made a huge difference in my life. It will in yours as well.
As always, wishing you a life filled with joy, love and serenity.
Photo by Filipe Dos Santos Mendes on Unsplash
