Year of the Proactive Yes

[Music]

[Applause]

yes

say it with me yes

how does that feel empowering

uncomfortable does it feel strange to

say yes when you’re not sure what you’re

saying yes to

a year ago i had this distinct feeling

that i should be saying yes

more as emil said

i’m a performer i’m a teacher i’ve had a

long career

and a successful career i’ve said yes a

lot

but last year at this time i was getting

a lot of

those questions you probably know the

ones

have you ever thought about directing

have you considered composing

don’t you think you’d be pretty good at

writing would you ever think about

starting your own company yes of course

i had thought

about directing composing writing

starting my own company

but i hadn’t pursued them but now i’m

getting all of these questions and it’s

making me wonder

so i decide the next 12 months

are going to be my year of the proactive

yes

why proactive well i wasn’t just going

to say yes

to opportunities if they presented

themselves i was actually going to

seek out and invite the invitations i

was actually

daring the universe to challenge me

not to be reckless but to be brave

of course i thought that those

challenges would come within my field

two weeks later my year of the proactive

yes was off and

running i had already said yes to

directing a show

it was mounting in four months so no

time to lose

auditions band cast crew

design dramaturgy schedule rehearsals on

and on and on

so many new yeses it was

empowering and uncomfortable

but this was my year of the proactive

yes a couple months

in i needed an emotive alexa voice for

the show and i couldn’t find anybody to

do the coding for me so a friend said

well you’re smart you could figure out

how to code that couldn’t you

okay i have never actually had a

computer class in my entire life so

did i think i could code uh no

did i code yes

three days later somehow i had figured

out

how to create this voice it was amazing

i thought this is surely what my year is

all about this project is a huge

bundle of yes

one week before opening covet hit

my university shut down and so did the

show

so did my theater industry so did my

church services

places where i had sung every week for

years were no longer meeting okay no no

no

no no no this is not the way this is

supposed to go right this is my year of

the proactive yes

these were my avenues for yes what am i

gonna do now

like most people i was pretty defeated

feeling a little discouraged

well with all my students at home

i shifted my teaching to online as we

all did

probably many of us hadn’t done it

before but we had to learn right

yes i missed singing in church

so i started singing hymns on facebook i

called it the pandemic hymn sing

i would arrange my own tunes and

somebody said to me i didn’t know you

composed

oh yes

this was my new track i kept it up

until may 26th

i woke up to the news of george floyd

and my neighborhood

imploded i live in minneapolis

on lake street three blocks from the

third police precinct

above an aldi i watched the protests

and then the riots looting and fires

surround my building i did not sleep for

three days

but i was not going to leave so

i stopped streaming songs and i started

streaming

the unrest

one more yes by the wayside

friday may 29th i get a call from mother

jones magazine

we’ve seen your videos online could you

do an interview

yes

the next day in order to save our

building from looting

one of my neighbors has the idea to go

downstairs and paint positive messages

on the plywood covering our aldi windows

he says can you get the word out i say

yes i hop onto social media i say come

join us painting for peace i grab my art

supplies and run downstairs

people are already stopping to watch can

i paint

yes grab a brush can i paint yes

come on in a third a fourth a fifth yes

yes yes people were coming

we were getting everyone to paint i was

stopping the bicyclists

i can get anyone to paint

i get a phone call from mother jones

magazine

we loved your interview can we publish

it as a national article

yes back to painting

more people come more people come i’d

love to bring my sister will you be out

here tomorrow

yes no

the day we started they shut us down

we thought we had permission they

thought we didn’t

one more yes pulled off the rails

the next day i find out that one of my

neighbors has this idea to raise some

funds to bring a food truck into the

neighborhood

and i say well i’ve got some contacts in

that industry

he says oh do you want to handle that

yes

so the following morning on monday i’m

downstairs looking for a place in our

parking lot

for the food truck and i happened to

meet david wellington

of wellington management who built

and owns aldi foods and the entire

surrounding highlake shopping center

he’s seen the art on the aldi windows he

loves it

i say yeah we got shut down

he says

you tell whoever shut you down that you

have my permission to paint on

any of the plywood on this entire city

block

and if he has a problem with it he can

talk to me

yes i thank david

and i tell him about the food truck

we’ve got coming in he says well maybe

wellington can partner with you

uh yes meanwhile i have two emails

waiting for me upstairs

one from a stranger who has seen paint

our piece on facebook

she says could you use any volunteers

yes the second from the editor of

inspire magazine

a local quarterly could you write an

article for our fall issue

about your neighborhood and your

initiatives

yes next

day my church says should we do a

donation drive for highlake initiatives

yes another church calls me the same day

from florida

to say we watched your pandemic him sing

and we kept following your other streams

would you be willing

to record a song for us in florida as a

prayer for peace

for our nation we’d love you to sing let

there be peace on earth and let it begin

with me oh yes

i recorded the song outside in front of

the burned out high lake shopping center

with blackhawks flying overhead and the

paint our piece murals behind me

it was very cool when i came in that

night my neighbors said was that you we

heard singing outside

yes the next day was our food truck

initiative

so we made signs we pulled people off

the street we had music we danced we

said

anybody who can please pay it forward

those of you who can’t please come

enjoy a meal on us

150 people showed up to eat

can we really have this for free

yes people talked

people shared they grieved they

processed

they laughed they thanked us

in those three hours people shared more

than a meal they shared community

it was beautiful

so we still have money in the kitty

should we do another one

yes two days later i get a call

from the owner of a building a half mile

away the coliseum it has also burned

she has seen paint our piece and wonders

would i facilitate a paint

on their plywood yes

while we’re out painting these days

other business

owners come up and say would you paint

on our plywood

yes great do you have a website

june 10th we have three facebook pages

high lake initiatives common table south

and paint our peace by the end of the

month

800 community members of all ages

and skin colors have painted over 5

000 square feet of art with five written

languages

39 volunteers have offered their time

two truckloads of supplies

have been dropped off three professional

photographers have documented the art

and our facebook and instagram pages

have a lot of likes yes

meanwhile the food truck initiative is

still going on

i’m bringing in about a truck a week and

every week people ask will you be out

here again next week

if we can get the donations yes

service organizations say can we set up

on site with you

yes what if we got peace coffee here as

the weather gets colder

yes to date

common table south has hosted 23 lunches

served 2 500 pesos meals

and driven 25 000 of revenue

to a diverse variety of our small

local businesses and when i’m asked if

we’ll keep going into the winter my

answer is if i have

anything to say about it yes

and remember inspire magazine

they published my article along with a

four-page

full-color photo spread and

they asked me to write again for their

spring issue

note cards and face masks are being

printed

with our art to raise money to roll back

into the community

we have 75 boards in storage

ready for future display or auction and

as many boards are still

up on those buildings reminding people

every day

that when there was destruction our

neighborhood came together

to build each other up and when we were

in despair

we came together to give each other hope

and since i’ve been asked high lake

initiatives is looking into becoming

a non-profit as we continue to partner

with new organizations

and come up come up with new ideas

to build our community

i did say that i was willing to start a

company didn’t i

yes now

if high lake initiatives never does

anything else

if that musical never gets mounted if i

never sing another hymn

if none of that art gets seen this year

has been an incredible success

because it has been

a lot of yes

and that was my year

that was my challenge that was my

word whether it was empowering or

uncomfortable i stuck with it

because i chose it

so my question to you is

what word will you choose

and whatever that is stick with it

commit to your chosen challenge find out

what’s on the far

end it may surprise you

for me 11 months

into my year i got an email asking if i

would be a speaker

at a tedx conference at minnetonka high

school

on the anniversary of choosing my word

my answer

thank you