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My wife shared a social post with me the other day that stuck with me more than I expected.

It was a small reminder about life, and about something most of us are constantly chasing, happiness, joy, the “good side” of life. We set goals, we build ambitions, and somewhere along the way, we start to believe that the path toward those things should be relatively smooth. We imagine a fairly straight line between where we are and where we want to go.

But of course, that’s never how it actually unfolds.

Life rarely moves in straight lines. There are unexpected setbacks, disappointments, and moments where things don’t go the way we thought they would. And when those moments show up, they tend to throw people off balance. Frustration creeps in. We question whether we’re on the right path. Sometimes we start fighting against what’s happening instead of learning how to move with it.

The idea that caught my attention in the post was incredibly simple. Whenever something happened that didn’t go as expected, the response was just three words:

“Yes, of course.”

Not in a sarcastic way. Not in a defeated way. But as a quiet acknowledgment that this, too, is part of the journey.

When we hold tightly to how things “should” unfold, we end up creating a lot of unnecessary resistance in our lives. Much of the anger and disappointment we experience comes from the gap between our expectations and reality. We think we are being taken off track when something unexpected happens, when in truth, those moments are often the path itself.

I remember experiencing this constantly when I was competing. My emotional state was completely tied to outcomes. If I won a big match, I felt like I was on top of the world. Everything seemed to fall into place. But if I lost, it felt like everything was collapsing. My mood, my confidence, even my sense of identity would swing dramatically from one extreme to the other.

Living that way is exhausting. It turns life into a constant roller coaster, and you start playing not to lose.

It wasn’t until later in my career that I started to see how the best players in the world handled these moments differently. Of course, they wanted to win. Of course, they cared deeply about the result. But when things didn’t go their way, they didn’t spiral the same way younger athletes often do. They were able to absorb the loss, process it, and return to the work without losing their center.

In many ways, they had mastered that quiet mindset of “yes, of course.”

Yes, of course there will be setbacks.

Yes, of course things won’t always go according to plan.

Yes, of course the journey will include moments you didn’t expect.

Accepting that reality doesn’t make someone passive. In fact, it often makes them stronger. When you stop fighting the natural turbulence of life, you free up an enormous amount of energy to actually move forward.

We still pursue our passions. We still work hard. We still care deeply about the outcome. But we stop believing that the path has to look a certain way in order for us to get there, and we surrender.

And sometimes, the path unfolding in front of us leads somewhere far better than what we originally imagined.

The challenge is simply learning how to trust the process enough to walk it.

Sometimes the most powerful shift we can make is surprisingly small.

When life throws something unexpected in front of us, instead of resisting it, we simply pause, take a breath, and say:

Yes, of course.

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