I Wanted to Say No, But “The Year of Yes” Found Me Anyway
There’s a saying that goes, “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans,” and it always makes me chuckle…until it happens in real time. It’s like one of those things you kind of brush off until your resolutions and goals go awry. Okay, awry makes it sound like I tripped over an uneven crack in a sidewalk as I walking. No, no no. I watched my plans implode as I was thrown from the wreckage and barely had enough time or strength to roll away from the falling debris. Yeah, that’s more like it.
I haven’t been shy about how rough it’s been and I told myself I’d rather take a step back instead of allowing certain things to trigger me. Although I know everyone responds to their grief or trauma differently, I don’t want to be the person who resents others for celebrating happy moments in their life while I’m trying to catch my breath from turmoil. Seriously, I’m the person who will go take a nap, journal, pray or touch grass before I do that.
Still, I guess my plan to disappear into oblivion for a while wasn’t quite the vision God had in mind.
For unknown reasons, I always seem to come across Shonda Rhimes’ “Year of Yes” book whenever I experience a pivotal shift. It’s a book that guided me through figuring out how to carve out my own independence, the early stages of my current relationship, and now? It’s meeting me at a point where I’m confronting and letting go of limiting beliefs so I can finally embrace who I am + where I’m going.
Enough yapping! What’s this “Year of Yes” thing you’re talking about?
By now you should know who Shonda Rhimes is, but let’s quickly walk down memory lane if you’re clueless. If you’ve ever watched Private Practice, Grey’s Anatomy, Scandal, How to Get Away with Murder or the heart-pining, spiciness that’s Bridgerton, you’ve interacted with Shonda Rhimes vast imagination. But, what if I told you that she stopped showing up in her personal life because she’d become consumed with work and slowly shrank herself over time?
You might think it’s impossible for a successful, imaginative woman who has a grand way with words to feel any ounce of imposter syndrome or insecurity, but she’s human.
If it hadn’t been for her older sister Delores being fed up with her boasting about event invites while she prepped Thanksgiving dinner, Rhimes may have never given the world the gift of a book that chronicled her personal “year of yes.”
Debbie Allen & Shonda Rhimes in Conversation During the Year of Yes 10th Anniversary Book Tour in Partnership w/ Brave + Kind
For an entire year, Rhimes committed to saying yes to things that scared her and I’m not just talking about fancy appearances. She said yes to confronting former beliefs about motherhood, setting boundaries, being clear about marriage, learning how to play again, loving herself, and showing up in life.
Was it easy? Heck no! It was scary for Rhimes to do things she was intentionally and unintentionally avoiding, but she gave herself permission to lean in. She gave herself her own chocolate factory so to speak and surpassed her written vision for Cristina Yang. (We all know how much Yang means to Rhimes).
It’s why she decided to celebrate the 10th anniversary of her book Year of Yes by debuting an updated version that contains 7 new chapters and 120 more pages than the first edition.
Is there a point to Year of Yes crossing your path again?
I can’t promise Shonda Rhimes will see this and think, “There’s another strong, Black writer. Let’s put her on the team,” but her Year of Yes book tour stop in Atlanta put a little more balm on healing emotional and mental wounds. And OMG. THE storied Debbie Allen moderated the event which means I, along with other attendees, got to hear these women speak eloquently for an hour.
Besides hearing Debbie Allen and Shonda Rhimes drop incredible gems about learning how to show up in our lives or pick up the pieces when we fall down, I got to feel the magnetic energy of other attendees. It was so much love and light in one room, plus there was a diverse crowd.
It wasn’t just a reminder that everyone’s just trying to get through life, it was also a visual representation of people from all walks of life being connected to each other. I’ve long known that the media contributes to divisiveness, but turning off the news or logging off social media to physically be around people is another thing I want to say yes to.
There’s beauty in rewiring the beliefs we have about ourselves, other people and life in general. Though it may not always feel that way, I’m beginning to believe reroutes are necessary to help us widen our perspectives. That we’re not always being “punished,” but nudged towards more than we’ve allowed ourselves to embrace.
P.S. The CommUNITYATL Choir was specifically requested by Shonda Rhimes to perform a rendition of “Lovely Day” by Bill Withers! Here’s a clip of them singing below:
I can say yes to this.
