Saying Yes (Challenge)

To anyone that’s watched the movie “Yes Man”, you’ve probably tried this to some extent. I was no exception.

Years ago, after watching the movie “Yes Man” with Jim Carrey (very good movie!), I wanted to try following the same rules and say “Yes” to everything to see what opportunities would arise. I realised after watching the movie that I was one of those people constantly saying no and denying myself new experiences because I was too nervous to try it out (or some other excuses), and it opened my eyes to the experiences I was probably missing out on.

I was always very jealous of people that seemed to just have things happen in their lives for no reason, there was always something exciting going on, so I was hoping this would happen to me too.

Background: at the time that I decided to take this “challenge” I was jobless, finishing my first year of university, and had about 1 month left of accommodation on campus, meaning I was about to be homeless as well.

How it happened: I started saying yes to meeting people more and accept new experiences. What I noticed at first was that I was very scared for the little amount of money I had and that I was going to spend it all. And so, I decided to look for jobs as well.

Right away, by not shying myself from any jobs, I got one as a representative of the university, working at Open Days and introducing prospective students to the school. I worked 12+ hour shifts because I would say yes whenever people would ask me to work a little longer and met a lot of friends at the job.

I was also speaking to one of the colleagues I had just met, and she was looking for a flatmate right next to the university, right in my budget. I said yes to taking a look at the room right away and within a week I had a flat. This led me to meet some incredible people that changed my life.

At the same time, as I was finishing this job, I got another job at a retail clothing store, where I worked at for almost 2 years and where I met even more amazing people.

Results: by saying yes to “everything” (I’m not crazy, I had some limits on what I could say yes to), I opened myself up to make dozens of friends in weeks, got two new jobs, got a room next to university and stopped worrying so much about money and about meeting up with people. It was a great experience that I kept up for a good part of a month and had slowly implemented some of it on my daily life.

I should really go back to doing that. Have you ever tried to say yes to everything for a week? Tell me about it! 😊