The Word of the Year
Yearly Word: Have you ever considered selecting a ‘Word of the Year’?
Spoken & written words are powerful tools. They can help us to gain support from others or they can generate conflicts. Our word selection also has the power to influence our thoughts & mind-chatter.
Try picking one word that resonates with you and complements your 2025 Plan & Actions. Let this one word drive your year’s personal development plan & decision making.
Write the word down & display it so that you will see it every day. Then, make it a daily practice to think about your ‘word’ & to incorporate it into your every day actions.
My Past Word: In the beginning of 2023, I selected my ‘Word of the Year’. The word was ‘Simplicity’.
I wrote the word in my journal and thought I was off to a good start. In the beginning of the year, I thought about it from time to time. However, during my 2023 end of year reflections, I realized that I failed to routinely practice it & had eventually forgotten about it.
As ‘Simplicity’ still resonated with me, I selected it as my 2024 ‘Word of the Year’. However, this time I made it more visible & prominent in my daily thoughts, conversations, decisions, plans & actions.
Although I have not achieved my ideal image of a less complicated life, my ‘Word of the Year’ has helped to shift me in the direction that I want to be going.
Word Twine: Whether you have a Personal Development Plan, a Career Plan or no written plan to improve, a ‘Word of the Year’ can provide you with continuity to center your actions and define the traits that you want to strengthen.
With daily practice & visual reminders (e.g., Post-It Note, phone wallpaper), your ‘Word of the Year’ can become the strong twine that binds together everything that you do. From work & home assignments to hobbies & sports, a well thought out ‘Word of the Year’ will help you to adjust & re-align challenging thoughts & mind-chatter.
To get you started, below are some words to consider:
Glowing
Positivity
Social
Problem-Solver
Effortlessly
Your Word: So, how do you select a ‘Word of the Year’?
Schedule some thinking-time for yourself. During that time, create two written lists of single words. The words can be nouns, verbs, adjectives or adverbs.
The first list will contain words that make your everyday actions challenging. These are the words that pop into your head that stop you from achieving or completing your daily tasks and/or your goals. (e.g., Hard, Complicated, Undisciplined)
The second list will contain the words that make you smile, the traits that you want to enhance & the words that bring joy to your everyday. (e.g., Easy, Organized, Improving)
Then, either convert a word in the first list to a positive or pick a word from the second list.
Your chosen word should resonate with you and leave with an optimistic feeling.
Write that word in your journal, on an index card or desktop wallpaper. Just make sure that you can see it everyday and read it everyday.
Now, you have your own ‘Word of the Year’.
My New Word: Since ‘Simplicity’ has been embedded in my thinking & mind-chatter, I am ready to select a new word for 2025. This new word will help me with my personal 2025 Plan & Actions.
My new word is ‘Energy’.
Adding ‘Energy‘ to the development of my Mind, Body, Spirit, Social Network, Finances & Work will be the ‘Word Twine’ that will add joy to my actions & goal achievements. It also aligns nicely with my life’s purpose.
What’s going to be your ‘Word of the Year’?