Review of Your Sacred Yes by Susie Larson

For the past year or two I have been working at de-busying my life and my concerns, in order to focus my energies and quiet my mind. This includes weeding out the unnecessary activities and commitments. I have a tendency to want to say “yes” when I am aware of a need that I can help with, or when I am directly or indirectly asked to help, but now I’m saying “maybe”, to give myself time to consider the impact it will have on my goals.

This book by Susie Larson, Your Sacred Yes, parallels the kind of thoughts and decisions I’ve been considering.

Now, maybe it would be simpler to just say “no” to certain requests for our time (even when the request comes from ourselves!).  However, Susie Larson looks at it a bit differently.  Considering our “yes’s” to be sacred, means to take time beforehand to prioritize what is most important in our lives, which is a valuable activity. “What do our yeses lead to?” she asks.

She cautions us against overcommitment and exhaustion, which can have surprising consequences. The solution, she says, is in trusting our loving God for wisdom and guidance, and understanding that more rests on his broad shoulders than ours. No, it is not our responsibility (or in our power) to fix the world and everyone in it. And our decisions are never going to have the approval of everyone else. The result of adjusting our schedules and attitudes this way is that our lives become more fruitful, calm, confident, joyful and content, and less competitive.

When I requested this book, I thought it would be something of a practical list of types of activities, volunteer work and even mindsets that we should gravitate toward or cultivate. I was partially right. Some chapters strayed off the main message and confused me, but I took a lot of notes nevertheless. There is a lot of excellent material written about the innate value of every single person as a creation of God.

I kept getting the feeling that the author was repeating herself, and perhaps this was because some messages need repeating. I prefer a simpler more logical, linear and focused style of reading, with less emotion and jargon, but many will no doubt appreciate the personable chatty style of this intelligent, accomplished radio talk show host, author and national speaker.

Each chapter ends with a prayer, several questions as personal reflections for the reader to contemplate and write about, a wise word (a quote), several questions for group discussion starters, and a “faith declaration” to help us remember what is true.

This is an energetic book filled with examples of people who have made good and bad choices, and includes the voices of many other wise leaders in the Christian faith. It contains an abundance of references to Biblical truths. I recommend it as one that can help explain our motivation to make commitments we don’t really want to make, and how to bring order and peace to our entire lives by trusting in the power of God, which comes to us through our faith in him.

[I received this book free from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.]