Do you say YES or NO to opportunities?

Experiences and impressions hits us all the time, and many of them at times when we are not aware of their importance. When I was introduced to mindfulness for the first time, as part of a process to deal with stress, I didn’t realize how significant it would be for my life later. At first I thought it was stupid and wasteful. Now it’s a lifestyle.

We are bombarded every day with knowledge and opportunities that can really change our lives in a positive direction, but we are not always ready to receive these new impressions. I am now aware of many concepts, mechanisms and tools that I can remember having been introduced to earlier, but that I just wasn’t ready to receive in both the consciousness and the subconscious mind.

How many times a day are we presented with opportunities that could change our lives for the better? Where we simply do not see these options because they are not accepted in our subconscious mind! To say YES to these strange and unimaginable opportunities, “feels” wrong. How often have I not heard myself and others use that phrase, “it felt wrong, so I said NO.” I have discovered that everything feels wrong when it’s unknown and new, and it’s often the reason that makes us say NO to new opportunities.

Let me say it quite clearly: as long as you make your feelings decide, there will never be changes in your life. You say, “why are good things never happening to me? Why do others experience that their lives are exciting and packed with opportunities?” The secret is that new opportunities are offered when you open your eyes and see them and dare to explore them. Then you will find that opportunities are dumping for your feet – constantly.

I think of Jim Carrey’s movie “YES MAN”, which is about a man – Carl Allen – who always feel ignored and never feel that good things happen to him. He says NO to all opportunities that present themselves for him, and even his best friends are trying hard to get him to realize that the reason that nothing good happens to him is that he himself  is the reason for his misfortune. He is simply not capable of seeing this himself.

A day, Carl is coincidently invited to an event with a spiritual guru whose philosophy is embracing all possibilities and literally saying YES to everything. Now something finally happens in his life. After being in the claws of the charismatic guru, Carl leaves the event with the conviction that if he says NO to new opportunities, terrible things will happen. Thus inspired by the fear of these terrible things, Carl is now saying YES to all the opportunities offered to him. This creates a lot of trouble for him, but slowly in all the challenges, he begins to realize that life blames him because he blames it.

Listening to your feelings is always a good idea, but we do not always have to act on them. Next time you face an opportunity that at the same time feels exciting but also feels “not right”, try to decide to explore the opportunity. Before you teach yourself to get used to the feeling, “being in the unknown and uncomfortable”, there will never be new opportunities in your life. Each time we say NO to opportunities offered, it may in fact be a NO to something amazing, and something that may end up being the best we have experienced. Such experiences I have had many of the last year. If you really think about it, you may have experienced the same. But did you say YES or NO to the opportunities?