An End-of-the-Year Confession

A new year.  What a great time to reflect on the year past and make intentions about the year ahead.

One of the rituals I’ve done for the past several years is to choose a word of the year.  Resolutions feel heavy to me, like an obligation.  A word of the year, on the other hand, feels light yet significant.

It makes me think of doing spins in ballet.  When you do a series of spins, you pick a stationary object to focus on.  As you turn, you look at it as long as possible, then bring your head quickly around and focus on it again.  This helps you keep your balance and your bearings.

That’s how a word of the year works, too.  You keep your eye on it as you move through the year, coming back to it to help you keep your bearings and your balance.

If you’re not familiar with choosing a word of the year, be sure to check out Christine Kane’s Word of the Year Discovery Tool.  It’ll not only help you choose your word, but it’ll also guide you to spot areas where you might resist expanding with your word during the year – and ways you can move past them.

Last year, the word I chose kind of surprised me.  And I wasn’t really comfortable with it.  In fact, I didn’t tell many people what it was because it sounded, well, odd.  Like maybe even something I shouldn’t aspire to be.

But it felt really right.  It’s what my intuition said I should choose.

So I did.

I kept coming back to it all year, and it really helped me expand in ways I wanted to expand.

So here’s my confession.  My word of the year was “self-centered”.

What was your reaction when you first read that?  Mine when it popped into my head was, “Really?  Self-centered??  Yuck!”

I had images of conceited, haughty, and – you got it! – self-centered people who only cared about themselves and what was good for them.  I felt embarrassed that I had thought of it.

I resisted it and even chose a backup word, but it wouldn’t go away.

As I sat with it, I started getting a different sense of the word.  I felt a swirl of energy around me of building my business, relationships shifting and changing and new opportunities.  And in the midst of it all, I felt myself centered and grounded in ME.

And that’s exactly how the year has played out.

I’ve experienced lots of changes, lots of letting go and welcoming in.  And while there’ve been times of frustration, discomfort and even feeling scared, I’ve returned again and again to being centered in myself.

Being centered in myself has also developed the deeper meaning of being centered in my Self, my truth.  Being more in my heart than in my head.  I feel more connected to myself and my intuition, more clear about who I am and more rooted in my own center.

The truth is, I cherish this feeling of being self-centered.

As I open myself up to knowing what my word will be for 2014, I know that I’ll embrace it when it comes, trusting myself to know just what to focus on this year.

After all, I can be pretty self-centered these days.

What do you choose for YOUR word of the year?  Or what are some you’re trying on?  It’s always fun for me to hear people’s words and to see the person as that, so please share in the comments section below.