In November, I started to scrawl potential words for the year in my little idea notebook. They all felt really good, really close, but not like they were it.
And so I started thinking about what feeling they evoked in me, what my deepest desire was for my life RIGHT NOW and writing about that.
What I found was that what I most wanted right now in my life was a feeling of vitality, vibrance, radiance, connectedness, warmth. I didn’t want my life to be broader or to have more things in it, but I wanted it to have more energy. I wanted to feel more alive and to have an inner fire burning. I wanted to be lit from within—something that I have vibrantly been before, something that I warmly am right now, but I wanted that flame to be hotter. I miss the white hot nature of how I used to feel in life before I found myself in the middle place—that place where I am saddled with so much worry about the people for whom I am responsible in this life, that my wattage has dimmed. The worry is going to be there; that is just the nature of my life right now. But worry and wattage don’t have to be mutually exclusive. And that is what I was feeling called to in choosing my word for this year.
But what was the word? I still wasn’t any closer to finding it and was thinking of going with an old reliable one—a word that has been in Word of the Year Fight Club the last three years with my final selection. Maybe I would finally choose my constant word bridesmaid: Abundance. I mean how great of a word is that? Who doesn’t want a feeling of more abundance in their lives?
And then I got my sign.
Literally.
I was driving home from barre class and a good song came on the radio and I decided to take the long way home so I could hear it all. As I came up over some railroad tracks, I noticed one of those real estate signs you can have made with the word IGNITE on it and that was it. My word. I knew it in the flash that it took to drive by that sign.
ig·nite verb \ig-ˈnīt\
: to set (something) on fire : to cause (something) to burn
: to begin burning : to catch fire
: to give life or energy to (someone or something)
In 2015, I am choosing to be soulfully ignited.
~
Are you struggling with finding your word for the year?
Take a minute to really capture what it is you want your word to guide you into being or feeling. Write it all down. Make sure it makes your heart leap.
Now, it is time for Word for the Year Fight Club.
Write down the words you are considering. Look up their definitions. Look up their synonyms. See if something bubbles up clearly. If not, look for signs (literal or figurative). Talk about with a friend. Heck, leave a comment here. Let’s find your word for the year together. Because once you’ve got it, you get to welcome everything it wants to bring to you and who isn’t ready for that possibility?
