What’s Your Word?

“Words, like nature, half reveal and half conceal the soul within.” Alfred, Lord Tennyson

I don’t remember the year it all began. It probably began over a glass of wine or a broken heart. The two seem to be a perfect match for one another!

I do recall it was on the cusp of the 1990s. The end of 1989 foretold the excitement, challenges, and self-discovery that awaited me in the upcoming decade. I knew I wanted to enter and mark the 1990s decade with more introspection, self-awareness, and a willingness to challenge my fears.

One of the things I discovered about myself (a while ago) was that I am not very good at keeping New Year’s resolutions. Or, in some instances, even coming up with one! So, I decided to shorten the process by coming up with a WORD. One word that would define the year and establish a goal for myself. Selecting a word was never an in-depth decision making process. In fact, all the words have come to me when least expected. In fact, one year, it morphed into three words that have become, and still are, a mantra for me throughout the years…The words are calm, clear, and directed. I am calm, I am clear, I am directed.

Transformation

There are significant words that have been embedded in my memory. Significant to the point of altering the trajectory of my life. In the early 1990s, I was beginning to feel a change coming on. For as long as I can remember, I have always had a Seven Year attention span. Moving into the seventh year of a job, a romance, or even my style, I would begin to feel restless, like someone was nagging at me to do something different somewhere in my life. The word for that year did not come softly and quietly into my consciousness; it blew in in the middle of the night and woke me from a sound sleep. It maintained its velocity throughout the year and propelled me in directions I had never dreamt possible. The word…Transformation.

That particular year, I was in my fourteenth year in publishing. I spent my first seven years at the top teen magazine in the country and was moving into my seventh year at a ground-breaking women’s magazine. Why would I ever want to leave an exciting career in magazine advertising? The funny thing I’ve learned about these yearly words is their subtleness. The words begin to highlight what’s missing. It creates a subdued AHA moment, wrapped in self reflection. The small, nagging voice inside began to transform into a low frequency hum. Perhaps it was the remains of my morning meditations. Or, perhaps, a compass to my future.

Transformation is never easy. It’s normally associated with beginnings and endings. In other words, euphoria or woe is me. As my interior hum intensified, I found a low grade annoyance emerging in my day-to-day routine of appointments, phone calls, presentations and managing those around me. I remember driving alone in my car, slamming my hands on the wheel, and yelling, “What do you want from me?” I didn’t get an answer that day. It came later. In a most unusual way.

My answer came in the guise of an Angel — a gift from my boyfriend’s grown daughter. As this small, plain grey cement 7″ tall Angel lay in my hands, I had an epiphany. And out of nowhere, I asked her if she could paint it. If she could paint it, I could sell it. Within three months, I moved on from publishing and set about establishing a Home Decor Company in an industry I knew nothing about. I rented a small studio. I hired people to paint. And I began knocking on retail doors that sold home decor accessories. One of those doors was Nordstrom, and it was, indeed, a prosperous nock. I was catapulted into a new phase of my life that, for the next 25 years, would immerse me in design, creativity, and world travel. And, along the way, the boyfriend and I were married!

I have written numerous times about the people who have come into my life and guided me in a new or expanded direction. I feel my yearly words have been similar. One year, early on, my word was…Intuition. As this word ruminated inside me, I came to the realization that I had run my life on intuition. I spent that year exploring my “gut feelings” and learned to trust myself and my intuition. I learned a valuable lesson…Not to overthink and to stay out of my own way.

The Word…ReNew

Our words are in all of us. I don’t spend hours contemplating what my word should be. I’m open. I know intuitively that the word is already there. A week ago, I was sitting at my desk answering emails; I reached for a pen and wrote…RE-NEW. Just the word I needed to quell the low-frequency hum that was circling my interior landscape. There are times when we are in fear of being lost in the challenges of life. The overload of the day to day disrupts our normal compass, and we become emotionally bogged down. My default setting is basically a happy attitude, and my sense of humor has always been there to help me maintain in any given situation. I have felt, coming out of the last couple of years a heaviness that was unfamiliar. Renew is the perfect word for 2024.

I like this word. It’s hopeful. The first thought that came to me was I wanted to renew the lease on my Sense of Humor. Somehow, it’s lapsed and been replaced with a sense of heaviness. I seem to have misplaced a few other things. Like my silliness, long conversations with distant friends, and my ability to brush things off that don’t deserve more attention. I have been called out on my overly optimistic attitude, and I am very optimistic about the impact of this light, fresh, new word as it enters my life.

I hope that, if you have a word, you’ll share it with us. Or, perhaps a word will find you, and you can explore your interior landscape with a newly discovered curiosity.