profile

Hi there. I'm Steve.

The "Yes And" Rule

Published 12 days ago • 2 min read

To view this email as a webpage, click here​

A few years back, I attended my friend Nick’s blowout 40th birthday party.

As part of the celebration, he hired an improv comic, and we all had to participate in learning improv comedy.

(I just felt the collective shiver of all the introverts reading this newsletter).

We started tossing out fun scenarios and scenes to participate in, and we learned about the most important rule of Improv:
​
“Yes and.”

Two simple words, and the foundation for all of improv comedy:

Whenever somebody comes up with a scene, sentence, or situation, the ONLY acceptable response is: “yes and”

  • Yes: Acceptance! I accept and acknowledge that whatever the situation is, no matter how absurd, to be true.
  • And: build! Like a tennis match, after your improv partner hits the ball to you, your job is to hit it back! Building on the situation or scene.

For example, if your improv partner says, “I’m a space pirate” your response could be:

  • “Yes, and I'm the space police, you’re under arrest!”
  • “Yes, and I’m a first mate looking for a new crew, this is perfect!”
  • “Yes, and my name is Captain Hook, welcome to Pirates Anonymous.”

The “yes and” rule is so crucial, because there’s nothing worse than a bad improv partner!

Kind of like Liam Neeson in this short sketch with Ricky Gervais, (I laugh every time):

The Yes And Rule for Life

As a former overachieving “gifted child” who has quite the negative inner critic, I’ve worked hard on incorporating “yes and” into my life.

The “yes” part is built around acceptance, which is something I’ve spent the past two years working to embrace.

Check out my past essays on Acceptance and Wabi Sabi for more.

It’s the “and” part I’ve focused on lately.

As Dr. Kristen Neff points out on in her book Self-compassion, life is complex and so are humans:

“Judgment defines people as bad versus good and tries to capture their essential nature with simplistic labels.
​
Discriminating wisdom recognizes complexity and ambiguity.”

Nothing is ever as simple as it seems. Things are never as good or bad as our brains think they are either.

So despite the voice in our heads that wants to judge everything in black-or-white, yes-or-no, good-or-bad terms… We must remember that life is a beautifully complicated mess.

Author F. Scott Fitzgerald once said:

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.
​
One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise.

This is my task for you today.

Is there a part of your life that feels black-or-white, and instead could use a bit of complexity?

Nothing is as simple as it seems.

Life is hard, and change is hard. AND you’re a good person who’s trying.

Which means there’s hope. And hope is the warrior emotion.

Also, please go watch that Liam Neeson skit.

You’re welcome.

-Steve

​

PS: Need guidance and accountability to reach your fitness goals? Nerd Fitness has helped 10,000+ humans over the last 8 years with 1-on-1 online fitness coaching. Click here for more details.

Level Up Enterprises Inc. - 1831 12th Ave S. Unit 271, Nashville, TN 37203
​Unsubscribe · Preferences​

Hi there. I'm Steve.

I founded Nerd Fitness way back in 2009. Wherever you are coming from, I’m glad you are here. Every week, I send out a short email that’s guaranteed to make you live a tiny bit better, think a little deeper, and overcome the obstacles that get in the way.

Read more from Hi there. I'm Steve.

To view this email as a webpage, click here On December 19th, 2001, The Fellowship of the Ring hit theaters and nerd culture was forever changed. If you’re like me, you associate these movies with the holidays and are about to rewatch all three films (extended editions obviously). I was rewatching the Fellowship recently, and I had a funny thought. While they’re in the Mines of Moria, Gandalf is reading the final entry in the Book of Mazarbul, the diary of Balin and his fellow dwarves and...

5 days ago • 3 min read

To view this email as a webpage, click here I’m a huge Stephen King fan. I’ve read the whole Dark Tower Series, It, The Shining, Doctor Sleep, and my favorite movie ever is based on his novella, Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption. So, at the behest of multiple friends who told me it’s their favorite book, I finally started reading 11/22/63. Here’s the head-exploding premise: On November 22, 1963, three shots rang out in Dallas, President Kennedy died, and the world changed. What if...

26 days ago • 3 min read

To view this email as a webpage, click here Last December, I sheepishly admitted there was a huge hole in my Nerd cred. I grew up drawing cartoons, took AP art in high school, and was always fascinated by hand-drawn animation… But I had never seen a single second of any Studio Ghibli cartoon! Studio Ghibli is the Japanese equivalent of Disney, with Hayao Miyazaki as the Japanese Walt: the studio has won multiple Academy Awards for their beautifully hand-drawn animated films, and Miyazaki has...

about 1 month ago • 4 min read