Several weeks ago, I received an invitation to a Tea Party.  About a dozen women were invited to watch the Royal Wedding (replay.)  While optional, we were encouraged to dress as if we were attending the actual wedding, complete with hat/fascinator.

I can’t remember a time in my life when I would have even considered accepting such an invitation.  I never felt I had the time to partake in what I considered frivolities. Before I had the chance to RSVP, however, I watched Oprah interview Shonda Rhimes about her book; “Year of Yes.”  Shonda told of how she passed up many opportunities to do things for various reasons.  She came to the realization that “no” was her standard answer, even for things that she easily could have done.  When she became aware of this, she decided that, for a whole year, she would try saying “yes” as often as possible.  This opened her up to new possibilities and experiences.

Initially, when I received the tea party invitation, my mind conjured up many reasons why attending a tea party on a Saturday afternoon wasn’t a good idea.  Most of these reasons circled around work to be done… housework, laundry, and all the catch-up chores that are usually waiting for me.  Then I heard Shonda and got to thinking about her commitment.  Mind you, I’m not the one who made that commitment, but it did give me pause to think about my own automatic “no” responses.

In my mind’s eye, I tried a “yes” on for size.  Besides rescheduling my work to other time slots, what else is keeping me from attending this tea party? I interrogated myself.  Taking the time to figure out what to wear and coming up with an appropriate hat!  I grumbled. That was more time or energy than I was interested in investing.  Since this was actually a large part of my not wanting to accept the invitation, I asked myself, Would my answer become a “yes” if I could pull something together in, say… a half hour?  Would that be acceptable?  Yes! I decided I was willing to devote that much time, but probably not a whole lot more.

I looked around my craft supplies to see what I could put together quickly.  The colors I found there actually determined which dress I would wear. With florist wire, tulle and silk flowers that I already had on hand, I fashioned the hat in twenty minutes, selected the dress and other accessories in another ten.  There!  Now I could attend the tea party without any more fuss.

The day arrived and I was dressed and ready in short order, pleased at how expediently I had pulled this off!  I drove the half hour to my friend’s house. As I pulled into the driveway, I immediately became concerned.  It was curiously absent of any cars.  Huh!  That’s funny! …oh, they probably all walked over because most of them live in the neighborhood, I thought to myself.

As I reached for the large salad platter I had made, my friend drove in and said, “Well, hello!  What are you doing here?!  My heart sank, “This is n-not the right weekend for the Royal Wedding tea party is it?!   With a smirk on her face, she replied, Prince Harry and Meghan are getting married next weekend.  Duh!  Of course!

I was so focused on getting everything ready smoothly, that even though I had written the correct date in my planner, my brain somehow separated the tea party from the actual wedding!  I had totally lost sight of the date and showed up a week ahead of time!  Ugh! The next time I say “yes” to an invitation, I will pay more attention to the actual date!  All was not lost, though, as I was very prepared for the actual day this weekend.

I also came away with a valuable lesson or two.  So much of my life is routine and I don’t often pause to consider a different way of doing things.  I’ve become a creature of habit.  While I’m not quite ready to say “yes” to everything that comes my way in the coming year, I am committing to giving thoughtful consideration to all requests…especially, those that initially elicit a negative response from me.  I’ve discovered that the key is in asking myself what would need to change in order for an initial “no” to be turned into a “yes.”  Without a doubt, that little change, will expand my world to include new possibilities and experiences.

~Zanne

InSearchOfAuthenticity.com

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