Say Yes to Now…Really?
Photo by Jill Esplin.
I'm happy to report I'm back from a fantastic, fun, and freeing visit to Italy. It was all the things. I shared a little about it here, if you'd like to see.
I wanted an unforgettable experience where memories would be made and last forever—and that is what I got. Just not entirely in the way I imagined.
Before we left, I had t-shirts made (see below) for everyone celebrating with us. They said:
Trust Life.
Say yes to now.
Little did I know how timely that message would be.
Turns out, my husband Vince—who spent many months planning every element of this adventure for me and our guests—was sick the entire time. We initially thought heat stroke. But when his symptoms persisted week after week, we suspected something else. That's when news of a cyclospora outbreak surfaced. He'd visited Ohio the week before we left, and we think that's what he was dealing with the whole journey.
Poor guy.
This wasn't what he wanted. It wasn't what I wanted. It wasn't what anyone wanted. And yet—hand to heart—Trust Life. Say yes to now. became something we practiced over and over again, in real time, for an entire month.
That was part of the magic.
I don't know why he was ill. And I've built enough grounding inside of myself to trust that life knows what it's doing—even when I don't. So I got to see my own growth in real time on this trip.
In the past, I would've gotten caught up in:
trying to manage his experience and "make" him feel better—making sure he was hydrating, resting, researching remedies constantly, getting him to see a doctor, feeling hurt when he refused to go
being the "good" wife and putting on a show of how much I had it all together
believing the trip was ruined
assuming everyone was having less fun or no fun at all
believing that I was being punished because I did something wrong
judging this whole adventure as a failure
And underneath all of that: disappointment, fear, frustration, and more.
Don't get me wrong—each of these surfaced in their own way. The difference was I didn't resist them when they showed up. I saw them for what they were: thoughts, stories, feelings. And I let them move through.
Instead of getting stuck in one, I would say: Yes, a desire to manage Vince's experience is here. It's safe to feel that. (And I did.) What else is here?
That question opened me up to feeling more than the one thing. The one thing could be there—but it wasn't all there was.
And let me tell you... there was so much love, joy, connection, beauty, sweetness, and care present alongside everything else. I felt genuinely buoyed by the love, support, and encouragement of our cherished people. There's something so clarifying about the energy of love when you let yourself actually receive it.
Saying yes to now wasn't just saying yes to Vince being sick. It was saying yes to every little moment—the fear, sadness, concern, disappointment, desire to control, look good, hold it together—as each one became conscious. Feeling it fully, and finding out it wasn't fatal.
Of course I resisted sometimes. And I didn't hold that back either—which actually helped it move through as well.
Being present to our experience and not pushing it away seems to be all that's needed to remember who we truly are. The stories can't stand up to the light of presence. I find that comforting. Simple in concept—and deeply directional.
That's what Trust Life actually means. Not blind optimism. Not pretending everything is fine. But a genuine, practiced willingness to say yes to what is—and discover that underneath that, you are whole. Intact. Untouched. And that the very experience you wished away may be exactly what life sent for your evolution.
This is the simplicity and the heart of true transformational work—which I'll be doing with a small group of people in just a few weeks.
The Gift of the Open Heart: A Weekend of Receiving — August 28–30, 2026 in Granada Hills, CA — is three days of in-person immersive exploration: how to meet what's here, how to say yes to now even when now isn't what you planned, and how to discover what opens on the other side of genuine presence.
A few spots remain.
If this is calling to you, I'd love to have you there.
⟶ Learn more and reserve your spot at here.
With loving,
Amber
PS: This may be the last gathering I host at my Granada Hills retreat center. We're potentially moving out of state in the fall. So, if you've been on the fence, that information feels like something worth knowing.
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