Word of the Year Preview

My husband thinks I’m a little bit of a big nerd, because I’m designing my own planner/daily calendar for next year. I started with November 2010, which I’ve already printed out. I’m hoping to catch some of the kinks this month and next, so it’ll be just right by January. I haven’t designed a whole lot into it other than the basics (days, months, weeks, etc.) plus those little extras that I can’t find in a store-bought planner (goals, chores, to-do and project lists, etc) which caused me to undertake this project to being with.

Anyway, as I’ve been laying my planner out, I’ve been pondering what else to do with it. Design it? Make it pretty and girly? Do I want to use colors, or just black and white? What do I want to commit to looking at pretty much every day for an entire year? 

I remembered the idea of choosing a “word of the year” to focus on, rather than making resolutions in January, etc. My word for 2010 was Balance. To be honest, I didn’t do much with it this year. I thought about it occasionally. I wanted to become a more balanced person, and have less of an all-or-nothing attitude towards life (because when I’m faced with all-or-nothing, I tend to pick Nothing). I think I’m a few steps advanced in this journey, even though I wasn’t all that intentional with it, and thankfully I still have two months to work on it, right? ;)

Part of me wants to pick Balance again, because I think it’s important, and because I haven’t achieved it. But let’s be serious—I won’t ever achieve balance in this life. I’ll get better at it, but I’ll never get there 100%. So, instead of dwelling on my “failure” and trying to get a mulligan, I’m going to allow myself to move on to a new word for next year.

Is it too early to be thinking about all of this? I don’t think so. I have two months to get my planner ironed out and two months to work on picking my word, too!

Last year’s word: Balance

This year’s options:

• abide
• abundance (acknowledge the abundance in my life, not the abundance I “want”)
• Adore
• Appreciate
• Awe
• Be
• Beloved
• Blessed
• Breathe
• Calm
• Compassion
• Create
• Creativity
• Delight
• Discover
• Embrace
• Enjoy
• Flourish
• Grace
• Gracious
• growth
• Journey
• Joy
• Observe
• Possibilities
• Presence
• Refine
• Relish
• Satisfaction
• Savor
• Simplify
• Thoughtful
• Thrive
• Wholehearted
• Wonder

I think I know the one I want to go with, but I want to give it time to simmer and settle.

A little background: I read about this concept all over the internet, but the conversation Ali Edwards held on her blog was the one that really impelled me to explore my own “One Little Word.” She has a great list of words her readers contributed here.  

So. Has anyone else chosen a Word of the Year in place of, or in addition to, New Year’s Resolutions? What was it? What will you choose for next year?