As a participant in the #inspiringmoms network, I was invited to choose my Word of The Year to guide me through 2013.  Apparently the purpose of choosing a Word Of The Year  is to inspire one to live in a more intentional way.   My initial response was that I could not possibly choose just one word!  That might mean my word of the year should be focus…but  as friends who know me can attest, I am not very good at paring things down….as one friend once described me, I tend more to “take big chunks out of life”.   At a restaurant if I see two things on the menu I equally desire, I will try to get someone to split them with me so that I don’t have to choose just one.   To choose one Word to guide me through the whole next Year proved a daunting challenge to me.   The good news is that I also love a good personal challenge.  I did turn to help from Christine Kane, who has actually written a free guide to  download and use as your word of the year discovery tool.   Honestly I thought I’d just come up with a word, (o.k., I was going to cheat and come up with three but apparently she’s on to me) and write my blog post about my word of the year. After reading her guide (Turns out I’m not the first one to try to sneak in more than one word) I see that I need to spend a bit more time coming up with My Word.  Her philosophy is that typical New Years Resolutions so often fail because they are usually based on specific actions, as opposed to a way of living, a guiding premise.   I am still trying to loose the same 10 pounds my resolution was to loose 10 years ago, so at least in my case she is right!  She decided a word to guide your year would be a better course, and since new years resolutions have not quite worked out for me in the past, I figure why not!? Of course the first thing I knew is that my ONE word I would choose would not be wasted on those ten pounds that have come and gone and yet never dictated my actual level of happiness. Read the rest of this entry →