In the 2008 Jim Carrey movie, Yes Man, Jim
plays a man whose life is at a dead end, and
so he enrolls in a personal development course
with a single premise: say yes to things.
Inevitably he takes it well out of context
and simply decides to say yes to every single
opportunity and question that comes his way,
leading him to a personal transformation,
a surprise romance, and a fulfilling life.
We here at The Infographics got really bored-
I mean, we did some diligent research and
wanted to find out just how transforming the
power of Yes really was, so once more we let
your favorite lab rat out of his cage and
tasked him with one job: say yes to everything
for an entire week.
Day 1: So I'm guessing that somebody over
at Infographics got nostalgic for the 2000s
and watched Yes Man, then decided, “Hey
that'd be cool to force somebody to do in
the real world”, and here I am.
I watched the movie before this challenge
started, and here's the thing- the movie is
based on a script, where the writers can shape
the story to make the consequences of Jim
Carrey's saying yes to everything be whatever
they want it to be.
Jim Carrey ends up with a brand new life and
a wonderful relationship with the beautiful
Zooey Deschanel, in the real world me saying
yes to everything could very well end up with
me becoming a drug mule for the Mexican Mafia.
Morseso than any challenge, this one I feel
has the real potential to get me in serious
trouble, and stupid me is of course, going
to do it.
Rules are simple: say yes to every opportunity
and every offer that comes my way.
Live my life like a positive, life-affirming
zen master for a whole week, and say yes to
the universe.
This is my week to Live, Laugh, Love, like
a mid-twenties college grad going through
her first of multiple existential crisis.
By the way, I just realized that with this
challenge I'll officially have lived out the
plot of two Jim Carrey movies- can you guess
which one is the other?
Day 3: First seventy two hours down, and what
a mess things have been.
I didn't tell the girlfriend about the challenge,
because there is no one who could handle the
responsibility of me being able to say only
yes worse than her.
I don't even want to think what kind of terrible,
ridiculous things she would rope me into doing
if she knew I could only say yes to her every
wish and desire.
For example, she's been wanting to do this
murder mystery dinner party thing with another
couple, and these two are the absolute worst.
They are both over dramatic to the extreme
and have to be in charge of everything all
the time- honestly, I have no idea why she's
friends with them, but an evening with them
is like pulling your teeth out with a pair
of pliers.
Oh, and they love to engage in extreme PDA
at the drop of a hat.
No thank you, I told her that I don't mind
doing murder mystery dinner party, but absolutely
not with them, and have been refusing an invitation
just about every other week.
NOT HAPPENING.
So, my first day was relatively uneventful,
at least until the girlfriend got home.
They just built a brand new Veggie Grill down
the street from us, and for those of you who
don't know, it's a vegetarian restaurant where
they serve only vegetables.
She's been eyeballing it ever since they started
construction and every time she brought it
up I managed to sidestep the conversation,
but this time she asked again and I dutifully
said, “Yes.”
I swear I physically winced as the words left
my mouth and she just kind of sat there for
a moment and said, “Wow, really, just like
that?”
And I silently nodded while screaming inside,
and off to Veggie Grill we went.
Honestly, it's not that bad, their fake chicken
nuggets even tasted kind of alright, but it's
always just so... heartbreakingly disappointing
to not be eating the real thing.
And it never fills me up.
Ok, so day two was a little weird.
This time we went to the grocery store together
and she suggested we pick up several things
that made me cringe hard.
Things with labels like “all organic”
and “pro-biotic”.
“This apricot, spinach and cardboard juice
would be really healthy for you, you should
pick that up instead of some soda.”, she
said, and “Yes, dear.”
I dutifully replied.
“Why don't you try this quinoa based cocoa-free,
sugar-free chocolate made out of recycled
organic fish bones and sadness instead of
that Kit Kat bar?”
“Yes, sure.”
“We should get some of this healthy ice
cream instead of that oreo cookies and cream.
It's made out of kale, goat milk, himalayan
sea salt and depression.”
“Yes, sounds great.”
On and on it went, and now my kitchen is full
of food that for all intents and purposes,
is pretty much inedible.
Don't get me wrong, I know junk food is, well,
junk, but there has always existed a balance
between her and I, she gets to health nazi
half of our diet, and I get to stay sane by
occasionally indulging the other half of the
time.
Now that balance is destroyed, and I'm going
to enjoy exactly zero of my meals for the
next week.
Thanks, Infographics.
That however wasn't the weirdness of the day.
The weirdness would come at checkout time.
I always take a reusable bag or two with me
when we go shopping, it's environmentally
friendly and in California they also charge
for plastic bags in an attempt to deter you
from using them and throwing them away so
they end up in the ocean and murder sea turtles.
So I had the two reusable bags with me, and
I very clearly was ready to put our groceries
inside of them, when the checkout girl asked
me, “Would you like plastic bags for these?”.
I immediately said yes, because you know,
I'm an idiot who chose this as a career, and
then had to very stupidly take my plastic-bagged
groceries while holding my reusable bags in
my hand.
The girlfriend wasn't paying attention when
it happened, but when she turned around she
gave me a very stern 'wtf' look, and I just
shrugged my shoulders and said maybe we can
use them for trash bags.
Then we walked out of the store, and if she
didn't suspect something was up before, she
definitely did now.
Predictably as soon as we walked out of the
store we got stopped by a guy with a clipboard-
you know the type.
I typically outmaneuver these petitioners
like an NFL running back on his way to scoring
a game-winning touchdown, but this guy was
inhuman, he practically teleported in front
of us and there was no avoiding him.
He wanted us to sign to show our support against
the federal government forcing California
to lower its gas mileage standards for vehicles.
Dutifully, I said yes.
The girlfriend's eyes narrowed at this point-
she knows I go out of my way to not show public
support for any specific causes, preferring
to keep my support private.
I don't like groups, and I don't like lining
myself up ideologically in public with any
specific groups- it's too easy to get caught
up in values that aren't your own, or to have
the group show values that you disagree with
but now suddenly everyone thinks you identify
with.
You just can't control a group, or how they'll
make you look.
No thank you.
Something was up, she no doubt thought to
herself.
Then though, the petitioner dropped a bomb,
and I honestly think I hate this man now with
all the fury of a thousand suns.
“Would you like to join us in a protest
downtown in a few days?”
WHY YES I'D LOVE TO ABSOLUTELY 100% DO EXACTLY
THAT- I growled through clenched teeth.
Unaware of how close to death this man had
just come, or of the fiery furnace of wrath
burning inside me at the moment, he excitedly
took my phone number down so their coordinator
could call me with details later in the week.
And voila, just like that I'd now be protesting
in public on one of my days off, as part of
a group.
Fan-freaking-tastic.
When we got to the car, the girlfriend grinned
from ear to ear.
“You can't say no,'' she said, a very disturbingly
conniving smile spreading across her face.
I explained that it would be more accurate
to say that I had to say yes to everything
for another five days, and I swear I saw the
devil in her eyes as she no doubt hatched
a thousand schemes and plots, practically
giddy with excitement over what she could
get me to do now.
Day 7:
Ok.
Challenge over.
Never repeating again.
In Yes Man, Jim Carrey had his life turned
around and got the girl all by saying yes
to life.
In my real life I've been blackmailed into
every possible concession the girlfriend could
get out of me and was once more, very publicly
humiliated.
Let me start at the beginning.
It didn't take long for the girlfriend to
start abusing her power to make me say yes
to everything.
Back rub?
Yes.
Foot rub?
Yes.
Fetch a glass of ice water?
Yes.
I'm tired, can you take the dog out again?
Yes.
Predictably, I basically became a slave- although
to her credit she only abused it in this fashion
for the first day, and I suppose I can't blame
her too much for it.
I mean imagine you could get someone to do
your whim for a whole week, if anything I'm
impressed by her restraint.
However, she inevitably remembered that she
could now get me to go to every social engagement
I have fought her tooth and nail on since
forever, so guess who got to go to a baby
shower and then a birthday party for the 8
year old son of one of her friends this week?
I don't really do children.
It's only been recently that I've warmed up
to the idea of having one of our own one day,
and to be honest deep down inside I love the
thought of having a child with her.
But other people's kids... oh god no.
Anything but that.
I'm weird and awkward around children.
I once had to text three different friends
asking them how do you introduce yourself
to a ten year old- do you just like, give
them a handshake or something?
So I got to sit through a birthday party full
of screaming children whom I had no idea how
to properly interact with.
Like I know nothing about children- do they
even know how to tell faces apart yet at eight
years old?
Then there was the baby shower, where I had
to sit quietly with the two other husbands/boyfriends
who got roped into going while the women all
'oohed' and 'aahed' at various baby-related
gifts.
I didn't even know what gift we should bring,
I suggested a blender because I'm not entirely
sure how baby food works, and the girlfriend
just shook her head and dragged me shopping
for Baby Bjorns.
The real prize of the week though, and I knew-
just knew- that this would happen, which is
why I didn't tell the girlfriend about the
challenge in the first place...
I bet most of you can guess.
Yep, murder mystery dinner with Mr. and Mrs.
overly-dramatic-super-bossy-very-publicly-inappropriate-PDA.
Oh and it was period themed so of course we
had to wear costumes and act the part.
Which Mr. and Mrs. overly-dramatic absolutely
loved.
So the way it worked was like this: we showed
up, randomly pulled roles out of a hat, and
then got dressed in our period appropriate
costumes.
I got the role of an army officer, which was
kind of on-the-nose to be honest, but the
girlfriend got the role of mistress, and I
could not stop laughing when she read it aloud.
I proceeded to call her 'wench' for the evening
and my arms are bruised badly from all the
times she punched me for calling her wench-
as some of you know, she boxes regularly,
so she's got a nasty jab.
Mr. and Mrs. overly-dramatic though, well
he pulled police chief, and she got aspiring
starlet.
Already I could tell the evening was going
to be the single most painful, unbearable
experience in human history.
So you're supposed to sit for dinner while
they serve you different courses, and right
from the get-go Mr. and Mrs. Drama would steadfastly
refuse to acknowledge you unless you addressed
them by their fictional character names.
Oh, and they demanded we go around the table
and make up backstories for our character
and introduce ourselves.
Except they would insist on making helpful
and very forceful 'suggestions' to every single
person's backstory, you know, little notes
to enhance the 'immersion'.
I honestly think I shattered a molar from
grinding my teeth.
It was barely ten minutes into the evening
and already they were trying to control everybody's
experience.
There's an unwritten rule about these old-timey
murder mystery dinner events where everyone
for some reason puts on a british accent-
the moment you think murder mystery, everyone
thinks british.
It's really weird.
So naturally I put on the most awful australian
accent I could manage, explained that I was
an officer from 'down undah', and called everyone
mate- except the girlfriend whom I referred
to exclusively as wench, receiving a swift
punch in the arm in return every time.
To make a very painful and long story short,
halfway through the first course the lights
go out and everything is pitch black, there's
a fake gunshot and someone screams, and when
the lights come back up the lord of the manor
is dead from a gunshot wound.
Then you're supposed to figure out who did
it because secretly when you drew for characters,
your slip says if you were the murderer or
not.
And you get a prop gun to hide.
I'm sure with any other group of people, it
could've been a blast, but right from the
start Mr. and Mrs. drama took charge- and
of course they did, he did pull chief of police
after all.
Then we spent about an hour with those two
going back and forth grilling people's backstories
and randomly making out with each other for
no reason in front of us- all while I tried
to just eat my food.
After struggling to make it to dessert- seriously,
they serve you so damn slowly at these things-
I finally announced that since the lord of
the manor had previously been an officer in
the navy, and as the only officer from Her
Majesty's royal navy, I was officially declaring
the investigation a matter of national security,
and then blamed the wench- who punched me
for calling her that- and charged her with
murder.
She protested, as did the rest of the room,
and I told them that this was 19th century
Britain- apparently- and as a military officer
I could literally blame anyone who wasn't
noble with no evidence and nobody would dare
question me.
I then said I needed to take the wench- punched
me again- for a very private and intense search
to find the murder weapon on her person, no
matter where it may be hidden- to which she
punched me again, this time for being gross.
Turns out though, she really was the killer.
Of course it took a half hour of back and
forth with Mr. and Mrs. Drama boss dictating
the whole thing, when they should've just
let me strip search my wench girlfriend in
the first place.
If that wasn't enough, the next day I had
to show up at the protest I had promised to
attend.
And guess what- the organizers had only gotten
like half a dozen people to show up, so I
got to march around downtown Los Angeles holding
a sign up with five other people chanting
random slogans.
In life, and especially in a relationship,
it's important to compromise and say yes sometimes
to things you don't want to do.
It makes other people happy when you agree
to things they want to do or they like to
do even if you don't like or want to do those
things.
Compromise is basically the secret to a happy
friendship, or a happy relationship.
This week though, I did enough compromising
to last me the next several years, and if
anyone comes up to me when I'm exiting the
store with a petition in hand, I'm karate-chopping
them in the face and running away before they
can recover.
Think you could say only yes for a whole week?
What other challenges do you want to see your
favorite guinea pig undertake?
Let us know in the comments!
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