andrewsikora.com

My brother works at a Half Priced Bookstore in the Chicago area and for Christmas this year I reaped the benefits of his job.  One of the benefits I received was my 4th book of the year called The Yes Man by Danny Wallace.

So here’s the whole concept of the book.  When Danny’s commute home gets messed up he finds himself on a bus sitting next to an elderly guy who asks him how his life is going.  Danny says that things have been kind of boring because he finds himself doing nothing, always staying in, not hanging out with friends much.  So the old guy on the bus says “say yes more.”

So that’s what Danny does.  He decides to say YES to everything for one day.  On that day he winds up winning $25,000 (and loosing it), volunteering to help a peace activism group, going out with friends, responding to a spam e-mail, and almost getting in a fight with a guy at a party for answering yes when the guy asks him “are you looking at my girlfriend?”.

After a pretty positive first experience he commits to a week of YESES and then a month and eventually into an entire year.  A ton of CRAZY stuff happens to the guy along the way (lots of trips, promotions, a new job working on TV, a girlfriend, hanging out with a crew of people who believe in UFO’s and what not, putting his phone number all over London, trying to help the son of a murdered sultan he received an e-mail from, and falling in love).  In most of the book Danny seems to be experiencing a much better life because of YES, but every now and then in looses it’s appeal.  He wonders if it’s the dumbest thing he could ever be doing and contemplates if he should finish it out.   It’s interesting to see a person wrestle with doubt on a pretty light hearted scale.

The best thing about this book is that it made me think about how often I say no and all the things that I could be missing by saying no.  When Ian, a friend of Danny’s, is trying to understand why he would do something like this Danny asks him what the best thing that ever happened to him was.  Ian said that meeting and falling in love with his girlfriend was the best thing that happened to him.  Danny asks how they met and then proves that Ian’s relationship with his girlfriend was a result of a series of yeses… but if he would have said no at any point along the journey he would never have found her.  It makes me wonder what I could be missing by saying no and it made me want to say yes more.

The Yes Man is not a classic by any means, but it was a fun easy read that just might inspire you to say yes more.