Lindsay Kolasa

YES and NO are deeply spiritual words.  They don’t seem like much, but just think about what they can do by speaking them!

They can begin and end pretty much anything.  They can allow or not allow.  They can open or close something.  They can connect or disconnect, affirm or not affirm…

If you begin to think about life as the flow of energy it begins to make sense how these words hold such power.  Like the banks of a river that allow the water to flow through its form, our simple Yes’s and No’s, shape the flow of the energy of our life.

Every moment of every day we decide where we wish for our life energy to flow.  Our awareness…  Our thoughts…  Our emotions…  Our habits…  All are greatly affected by the Yes’s and No’s we speak and assume throughout the day.

Think of No ~ not as negative ~ but as this statement:  “I do not wish for my energy to flow in that direction.  It does not feel right.”  When you say no, you hold energy.

Think of Yes ~ not as positive ~ but as this statement:  “I do wish for my energy to flow in that direction.  It does feel right.”  When you say yes, you let energy flow.

This kind of exercise allows you to build up your intuition.  You begin to sense where your energy wishes to flow.  You can make a regular practice of asking yourself, your body-heart-mind, what feels right or appropriate.

Why do this?  Your life energy nourishes and serves your soul journey or soul path in this life.  You need life energy to make your way through challenges and joys and sorrows.

Consider that each of us are born with a packet of things to do in this lifetime.  Each of us has a life purpose.  Our life is about fulfilling this in our unique way.

It’s not so much about being the greatest or best or whatever.  It’s about being a master of our own soul journey.  Finding the humility to listen to the whispers and yearnings of our soul and follow through with Yes’s and No’s to stay on track with our soul journey is the great spiritual task.

Some questions to contemplate:

What do you allow into your life and where do you set your boundaries?

Do you say YES when you really mean NO?

And, are you saying NO to the things that could actually assist you on your life journey?

Can we realize that there is a soul SICKNESS that forms when we say NO to that which is good for us and YES to that which is bad for us?

How do we begin to shift the flow of energy so that we begin to align with our highest frequency and vibration?

How do we learn to fiercely protect and deeply nourish the preciousness of life in and around us?

And, how does all of this affect culture and society?  Are we all silently saying YES to things that are ‘business-as-usual’ in our communities because we don’t think we can change anything for the better? Do we blame others ~ family members, friends, politicians, ‘the system’, history, etc ~ so that we suppress the possibility that we can create a different way of life?

Just do me a favor friends. PLEASE enjoy saying NO to the things that do not LIGHT YOU UP from the inside. This will give you SPACE and a chance to really say YES when the right things rolls along.

And, some of us ~ who are empathic or sensitive ~ need to get used to disappointing others. Because more sensitive people can feel that brief disappointment from the other, it’s hard to say NO. However, when you say YES for the sake of NOT feeling the discomfort, you are ultimately not only harming yourself ~ you are harming others as well.

If we rush around saying YES, we undermine our richness, our fullness, and our ability to be PRESENT with our true self and the BIGGER yes’s.

Believe me, I’m still refining this as well.  Saying Yes and No is an art form and it takes time.

One last thing…

While staying at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, CA in 2009, I participated in a great exercise that changed me forever.  As you may or may not know, Esalen Institute is the birth-place of Gestalt Therapy that uses a lot of group process-oriented therapy techniques.

I learned the joy of saying NO in one of the exercises.

The teacher instructed our group to form two lines and face each other.  I was facing a man that made me slightly uncomfortable for some reason.

Our task?  To say NO until we wanted to say YES.

I remember starting to bark “NO” at the man across from me, just about two feet away.  He said NO, but very mildly.

He soon began to say yes as if he was smelling a flower.

However, I was *just* beginning to enjoy my NOs!  I got louder and louder, saying NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO.

The exercise ended.  All I wanted to say was NO.

It felt SO good to say NO and realize that everything would be just fine.

I felt energized by the word.  I felt enthralled by the line being drawn in the sand.  I felt the container of that word, the sharpness and exactness.

Ultimately, I knew that flowers would grow at its edges…that creativity would emerge from its steadfastness.  I felt grounded, as well as the newborn growth of a YES in my belly.

It would know when it wished to be born.