This is what I am carrying through the second half of the year: Yes, and.
Yes to deep strategic work and yes to bold, creative energy. Yes to quiet mornings and yes to late night bursts of creativity. Yes to the desert and yes to the city. I don’t have to choose. Neither do you. We’ve been taught to think in binaries. Pick a lane. Choose one thing. Commit to a single path.
But…what if we started thinking bigger? What if we ignored the voices who told us that our decision had to be an “either / or” and instead embraced the “yes, and” in more situations?
If you’re holding onto a dream that feels impossible right now, stop obsessing over the “how.” For real. The truth is, the path rarely looks the way you think it will. The more rigidly you define what success has to look like, the harder it is to see the solutions right in front of you. Stay open to all avenues. The answer might come from a conversation you weren’t planning to have, a connection you didn’t expect or a version of the dream you hadn’t considered.
Trust the timing. A year ago, being bi-coastal felt like an impossible pipe dream. This week, I’m living it. Not because I figured it all out, but because I stayed open long enough for the solution to appear. I struggled for two decades to find a way to make my dream a reality and told my best friend about my big idea on a whim at 6:30 one morning. It turned out, she wanted the same thing. She didn’t think I was crazy; instead, we got to work and pooled our resources together to make it happen.
A few things that caught my attention in New York this week:
1. YELLOW CABS & UBERS: Old icons and new technology sharing the same streets. The city holds both. / 2. BODEGAS: Chaos and order working together. Everything is competing for attention in a limited amount of space, yet the system works. / 3. THE SKYLINE: The contrast of shapes, textures and eras stretch on for miles. There’s an endless mix of visual interest.
The city is a living lesson in yes, and. This is a challenge to staying open and to building brands and lives that hold the tension of both. More of this is possible for all of us; we just have to be willing to stay open and brave enough to ask for what we really want. Often, it’s closer within our reach than we realize.
Bottom line: Never let “either/or” thinking or the limiting beliefs of others block out what is actually possible for you. —Shauna
