Sometimes I think the best advice we get comes to us days or even years before we are ready to hear it. In my case the advice came so long ago that I can’t remember where I got it.

“The only thing stopping us from achieving anything, is our propensity to answer every question with “no”, or “why”, instead of with a simple YES.

In ‘09 I was living outside of NYC, working in the photo industry. My marriage hit a brick-wall and we both said, YES to letting it go. That was a limb for me to go out on. My ex said, “go make art, and figure out what you wanted to do next”. (I’d left all my teaching gigs jobs in Philly, to move to be married).

The next big YES. I moved to a small town in the Adirondacks to figure out what and who I really wanted to be. Keene Valley has 200-yr-round residents. I made art, did new things like waitressing and housekeeping. I taught yoga, photo and even taught some people how to train their dogs. But the passion just wasn’t there.

I realized that I had get back to the world-at-large if I wanted more than mountains, a handful of people to talk to, and a crazy-quilt of jobs. I took stock of what I liked about the place, and knew that I needed to trade hiding in the outdoors, for a life in the “real world”. I even made a pro/con spreadsheet to figure it out.

After years of planning and considering possible paths the real change took place within 7 days when I decided to say, YES to one key element and let the rest fall into place.I found my calling as a life coach when several friends pointed out that that was what I’d actually been doing for 90% of my working life. So I said yes, completed my certification and registration through the ICF and embarked on the path that brought me to Asheville.

On the way to Asheville, I took a 4-yr. “overnight” in New Hampshire to expand my coaching business, and teach yoga and meditation for a large hospital system. I also developed a stress-reduction program for layers and found myself flying to NYC to give workshops in glass towers in sparkling midtown Manhattan. It was all amazing business-wise but I had zero life/work balance. So I knew it wasn’t the place for me to land quite yet.

So I go out on another limb, and say YES to a move to Asheville, NC and I have not one whiff o