Word of the Year

Have you heard about the new fad going around about the Word of the Year? Choosing a word to represent you or your goals for the new year has become very popular lately. Did you choose one? If so, what did you choose, and why? I’d love to hear about it!

I decided to go ahead and choose a Word of the Year for 2017 and the word I chose was commitment, because I need to be more committed to many things in my life. For instance, I do a great job of working at my business, but I don’t do a great job of working on my business. I also make a lot of commitments that I end up breaking. Such as, “I will go to the gym 5 times this week”.  “I will not eat sugar this week”, etc.
What ended up happening, though, is every time I thought of my Word of the Year, commitment, it felt like such a burden! Commitment! Blah! Drudgery! Yuck! It was not very motivating.

So, I made a post on Facebook asking if my friends set New Years resolutions and how they went about accomplishing them. I got some great ideas and suggestions, a few of them listed below.

• Set daily goals and review them through out the day.  Use The Five Minute Journal: A Happier You in 5 Minutes a Day
• Daily gratitude lists, morning and night, and upfront goals
• Selecting a theme and using daily meditations on that theme to let life unfold naturally
• Making small goals and taking them like baby steps. Once one is completed, step it up a bit

My favorite idea though, was to use Jada Teta’s Totem Word exercise to find my Word of the Year.

The idea is to choose a Word of the Year that inspires you. Not a word to motivate you. What is the difference? And how do you choose the right word?

Jada says, “Motivation is borrowed, inspiration is not. Let me explain.

The definition of motivate is: “to provide someone with a motive for doing something”

The definition of inspire is: “to fill someone with the urge or ability to do something”

Can you see the difference? Motivation requires giving someone a reason to act. The definition seems to suggest the person being motivated has to be convinced to act, but does not do it of their own accord.

Inspiration implies the person has taken on the desire and internalized it. They are given both the urge and ability to act. It comes from within.”

I love this!

Using Jada’s exercise of looking at my heroes and what qualities they have that are most inspiring to me, I realized a great, inspirational word for me would be Radiance! Isn’t that more exciting? So instead of feeling like it’s so hard to commit to the things in life, I am feeling inspired to do the things that would bring about radiance!

I would definitely be more radiant if I went to the gym more often.  I would be more radiant if I ate less sugar and more healthy foods. I would be more radiant if I did the things I needed to do for my business, rather than feeling bad that I hadn’t. See what I’m talking about? Can you feel the difference in the energy?

So I’m working on being radiant! If you notice it in me, let me know! And let me know what your Word of the Year is so I can help you to reach your goals in whatever way I can. Especially if your goals include a healthier, happier body, I can definitely be of assistance to you!  With many massage modalities on hand, like Deep Tissue Massage, Trigger Point Therapy, Chi Nei Tsang, CranioSacral Therapy and Aromatherapy, I can help with many issues, including insomnia, depression, anxiety, neck and back pain, sciatica and many more.