After watching Jim Carey’s movie ‘Yes Man’, I came to the rather disturbing conclusion that I am a ‘No woman’. What’s a ‘No woman’ you ask? Well, a ‘No woman’ quite simply is one of those people who rather instinctively says no to any opportunity that presents itself. For instance, someone walks up to you and says “Hello, a couple of us are going out later. Do you want to come?” And although you have nothing to do and you could probably benefit from the experience you say no and then slink back home to vegetate in front of the TV or to take a nap, or clean the house, or do nothing at all.
Now I don’t know what your reaction would have been, but watching that silly comedy and being confronted with a disheartening view of my choices, I was appalled. And I was challenged. After all, I thought, how hard is it to say yes? With that in mind I went about my day with the firm intention of saying yes to the reasonable opportunities that came my way. I dubbed it my ‘Yes vow’. That afternoon I came across a friend who is an active member of an organisation. Just as he has been doing for the past three years he invited me to join. I could feel the no forming on my lips, every fibre in my being rallied against joining an organisation I have no real interest in anyway but still I squeezed out a yes. And then tried not to revoke it when my friend began to lecture me on the history of the organisation. Later, as I sat through my first meeting as a member of the organisation I cursed the hour and a half I spent watching the movie. And I cursed my stupid ‘Yes vow’.
I should mention that there is nothing I love more than a good book. It is because of my love for books and my constant need to bury myself in one that I have, unwittingly, developed this’ No woman’ complex. So a few days after my ‘Yes vow’ I was standing on campus clutching a novel I was dying to get home and read when a classmate/ friend came up to me and told me about this Seminar being held. In my head I knew that the seminar would be good for me and that I would learn a lot but the rest of me; body, heart, and soul wanted nothing more than to block out all thoughts of the seminar, to just go home and read the perfect book for what would be a perfect couple of hours. My nails dug into the fat paperback and with an amazing amount of willpower I didn’t even know I possessed, I said yes. The seminar was terrible for me partly because it was suffocatingly hot, but mainly because I wasted two hours waiting for a speaker who never showed up.
Disheartened by my first two Yes experiences, I decided that they had to be flukes, that the next time would surely be better so against my better judgement I agreed to baby sit my friend’s children. I am not a child person. I say this with no shame or remorse just absolute honesty. I want children, I love children, but I am not a child person because they don’t like me. That evening baby sitting three hyper active, sugar pumped under- ten boys, was almost enough to make me reconsider the idea having children. After dealing with the noise, fights, cleaning up and re- cleaning up I dragged my physically and emotionally tired self back home and gave up.
I think that somewhere in the back of my mind I expected to be better off for my ‘Yes’ experience just as Jim Carey was at the end of the movie. I expected that saying yes would open me up to new beneficial experiences, instead I just got a new understanding of all the things I already knew. One, that I am not cut out for active membership in organisations that do not stimulate me mentally. Two, that seminars are a complete waste of time if the speaker doesn’t show up( obviously), and three, that I’ll like my children because they are mine but looking after other people’s children is pushing the limit. The lesson of my entire Yes experience? Life is not a movie and if you think it is then you are in for a very disappointing life.
