Sunday Reflection: One good word for 2024

Happy New Year, friends!

A symbol of 2024's word of the year

Every year since 2003, I've tried to keep a special Word of the Year in mind, a touchstone of sorts to hold me steady when life becomes challenging. My word for 2023 was Appreciation, and there definitely was lots to appreciate. (Don't worry, though I'm picking a new word, I'll continue with the Monday Music Appreciation posts I started in 2023 just because I love to share music here!)

It's interesting to look back on my words of the year -- moodled here since 2017 -- and other words before that can be found in letters between myself and Cathy, my best friend (we've been keeping each others' letters since we were 10 years old, so there is a record of words in New Year's letters if we go back and look). 

Just for fun, these have been my words for the last seven years:

2023 Appreciation

2022 Light

2021 Unity

2020 Community (which was an interesting choice because Covid-19 meant we all had to isolate!)

2019 Blessing

2018 Me (a year to rediscover my personal way of being after full-time motherhood)

2017 Tenderness

And in years before that, Freedom, Joy, Balance, Trust, Hope, and I don't remember what all!

2023 was a very difficult year in my books. I just deleted a long paragraph about its challenges because I'm sure most of us had enough of our own -- we don't need to read anyone else's!

Of course, there were good things, too. Friendships. My dream job at the Winspear Centre for Music. The garden my family planted for me when I broke my foot, and which really produced. My mom and dad's lovely new condo. A trip to Vancouver Island, and visits with special friends out there. Rafting on the Athabasca River near Jasper with favourite folks from Belgium. Calgary coffee breaks on our trips south to be with Lee's dad. His new apartment, and the fact that he's not spending this winter alone. Time with my sisters and parents. The first trip to Jasper with our kids in 6 years, and pubbing with them (they're all of age now)! 

Like most years, 2023 was a mixed bag. The good thing is that I've become better at handling life's ups and downs thanks to a 14-week online Wisdom School program through the Centre for Action and Contemplation. It helped me to let go of unhealthy expectations (mostly, ever in progress!) and live out of an undivided heart, to be more "grounded" -- though it's going to take the rest of my life to grow into the way of wisdom. 

The Centre for Action and Contemplation and a few recent experiences have helped me to decide on my Word of the Year for 2024. RESILIENCE is also the CAC's focus for 2024, and it's something that I suspect we human beings will need more and more as our world continues to face so many challenges. 

Resilience means not giving up, moving forward with compassion and determination even when things get difficult or seem impossible. Resilience comes from working together to improve creation's situation in whatever ways we can. Resilience arises when we remember that we are not alone.

What's your word of the year? Or your focus for 2024?

I rediscovered a Psalm Prayer from 2016, one that I will be praying as I try to live into the kind of resilience that our planet needs right now. 

A New Year's Psalm

We praise you, 
O Creator,
for new beginnings -- 
fresh footprintless fields with unplanned paths,
clear calendars and unwritten words,
unperceived passages that we will discover in the year ahead.

We thank you for the year that has passed

with its many challenges, 
loves and losses, 
ups and downs.

We offer you our struggles and sorrows 
from the last twelve months
and ask that you bless us and heal us as needed.

We are grateful for the joys

and the moments that set our hearts to singing!

We invite you to become our home
in the twelve months ahead,
our joy and strength.

In all the twists and turns of life 

that we cannot foresee,
be our refuge.

 

In the days to come,
bring your justice and peace into our world through our actions.

Make us mindful of the difference we can make 

as individuals -- and collectively.

Help us to love as you love, without reserve.

Please be gracious to us and bless us
so that we may also bless those you send into our lives,
especially those most in need of blessing.

Align our hearts with yours in the year ahead, 
O Lover of all,
and bless your world 

with the kind of peace that is found in love.

We exult and rejoice in your presence with us
and trust in your goodness to us.

Let your face shine on us 

and on all of your creation in this New Year,

for you are our courage and our resilience.

From the rising of the sun to its setting
and all the moments in between
we praise you,
Creator of life.

+Amen.

2023 Word of the Year

Those who follow these moodlings know that I like to choose a word at the beginning of every year as something of a theme on which to focus as the months hurry past. 

In rereading last year's moodling about my Word of the Year, I had to chuckle. I lost that thread of inspiration at about the time the dark days moved back into the light, and my friend Garth returned not long after. I did enjoy most of my Partylite candles, however!

Having reached the end of 2022 and having to go back through my moodlings to remember the word I chose last January, I had to ask myself: is there really any point to choosing a Word of the Year? 

Answer: of course there is -- I just need to be more intentional about actually remembering it (though I sometimes find it challenging to remember what happened the day before yesterday, already!) And 2023's Word of the Year is one I'm determined to remember.

Ready?

APPRECIATION. That's what I want to focus on this year.

Why?

Well, because in the past year, as I've gotten more and more involved in the ministry of presence for folks in the inner city, I've seen a lot of dark stuff. It's become too easy to feel sad and angry about the fact that there are humanitarian crises across the river or down our local ravine, never mind hidden in some of the poorly-maintained rental units within walking distance of my own comfy home. 

I bumped into a neighbour this morning and we got to talking about the 49,000 people struggling with core housing need in Edmonton, and when I mentioned how we need all levels of government to step up and work together to build a lot more affordable housing, she laughed and said, "yeah, right."

Housing is only one issue. I'm sure you can think of a dozen others. The problem is that it's just too easy to get cynical when faced with so many challenges and the seeming lack of political will to solve problems. I feel that cynicism in myself, too. So that's why I decided to focus on Appreciation (many thanks to my friend Jim for his New Year's reflection). 

And just in the nick of time, too. This morning when we arrived downtown to hand out socks, gloves and other winterwear, this is what greeted us.

They had come to dismantle the tarp/tent homes of people in the neighbourhood. Quinn (standing on the corner, shaking his head) captured it well when he said, "This is too crazy. They take it down now, and tonight it will be back because these people have nowhere else to go." People were dragging their belongings out of their shelters and piling them up wherever they could, just waiting for the cops and workers to "clean up" and leave. 

There's nothing like destabilizing the only stability people have had for the last couple of weeks in this chilly winter weather.

But we've seen this many times, and because we couldn't do anything about the inhumanity of the situation (other than being active members of the Edmonton Coalition on Housing and Homelessness and standing witness as the team from Inner City Pastoral Ministry), we focused on the people who came to our little table for the winterwear donations given to us by kind and generous people -- and we also witnessed the kindness and generosity of community members to each other even as their homes were being taken apart.

One fellow sat amid his pile of belongings on an ancient blanket-covered chair, cracking jokes (to lift peoples' spirits?) He pulled a rubber band out of a garbage bag and announced that he'd found ten thousand dollars in it, then asked a passer-by, "Would you like this rubber band that held all that money?" He was non-stop with his wisecracks.

One young woman came to our necessities table and asked for ladies' briefs, quietly telling me that she was having her "lady time." I dug around under the mens' socks and found the last two for her. She was tucking them into her pocket as another girl arrived, saying, "I'd really like a fresh pair of underwear if you have it." I told her she'd just missed the last two, but of course, the young woman who had just received them dug into her pocket and gave one to the girl who'd asked. Just like that.

People look out for each other all the time, and I appreciate that. Sometimes I even remember to say so.

But not as often as I should.

So my 2023 Word of the Year is chosen to remind me to voice my appreciation in situations where I find myself marveling at the beauty, goodness and truth of this world, and the kindness and goodness of human beings. Especially those who receive more complaints than pats on the back, those who are often overlooked. 

And I need not only to voice appreciation, but to properly appreciate. To really look at, listen to, smell, taste, touch and reflect upon life rather than just letting it pass me by. And to do things to show my appreciation, to make others aware of things, creation, and people worth appreciating whenever possible.

What's your word or focus for 2023?

What's the good word for 2021?

Happy New Year! Those who have been following these moodlings for a while probably remember that every New Year, rather than making a bunch of New Year's Resolutions, I choose a word to focus on for the 365 days ahead. 

I have to chuckle a little when I look back at the word for 2020. One year ago, I picked the word COMMUNITY, because certain struggles and challenges in 2019 made me withdraw too much from some of the people I love, and I needed to reach out and include them more fully in my life rather than quietly indulging in my own pity party. I also wrote that

if we want to continue as a human race, we need to put our divisions behind us and become COMMUNITY when it comes to world peace, caring for our environment, eliminating poverty, working for the rights of the marginalized, and the list goes on... There are so many issues that have to be tackled by good people who care, and though we all have different pet concerns, perhaps we can agree that the common good of ALL, no matter the stripe, is what we need to work toward. Because really, our divisions are just our fears being given too much credit.

Dog walking view, January 2, 2021

I launched myself into 2020 with optimism and the desire to connect with others. I set up a full schedule for ecumenical prayer in different churches in the city, put together some lovely recipes for baking with my friends at L'Arche, and found a wonderful job with some marvelous people involving a lot of really great music (one of my passions). But after only 8 shifts at the Winspear Centre for Music, COVID shut everything down. Concerts, baking, ecumenical prayer. Everything except my daily dog-walking routine, a community of me and Shadow-dog! (Thank heavens for my husband and daughter being here, too, or I probably wouldn't be laughing at my 2020 choice for word of the year. They were a pretty great little community, most days!)

Community has also been something a lot of us find at a certain physical distance or online if we are fortunate. After the initial lockdown was eased somewhat, in person opportunities (with masks) became a possibility. I managed to join the Sunday Community of Emmanuel at the Bissell Centre, and felt like I had come home in so many ways, even though physical distancing and COVID protocols (taking temperatures, hand sanitizing, providing bagged snacks instead of lunch, masking, and wiping everything down with bleach) were in play... until November/December, when case numbers took off and doors closed again.

I suppose I could try a do over with COMMUNITY as the word of the year. But in this time where we must stay apart for the sake of our health system and the vulnerable people in our midst, I've decided that instead of physically distanced community, I want to use 2021 to focus simply on UNITY, especially after the storming of the Capitol Building in Washington DC yesterday.

In my understanding, UNITY doesn't mean that we all need to think the same, act the same, love the same, have the same skin tone, believe in God the same, or hold the same political views. Rather, it means that we are conscious that, although there are many things we disagree on, we can work together for the good of all. Unity asks us to set down our hurt and anger and outrage and try to understand others in a way that invites them to work with us toward the beauty, goodness, and truth that we are all created equal, and the reality that really, we are all one family that needs to come together, not just for our own personal good, but for the good of our earth, especially post-COVID, whenever that time comes.

So my word of 2021, my meditation mantra, is UNITY. In my morning prayer, I am asking God of many names to unite our hearts daily. And I hereby vow to unite with others who desire to make the world a better place in whatever way I can. Maybe by writing letters. Signing petitions. Telling jokes. Smiling at other dog-walkers from that physical distance. Participating in Zoom meetings. Planning for a positive future even in the midst of this strange time. Wearing my mask for the sake of the vulnerable. You get the drift.

What's your word of the year?

2020 Word of the Year

Happy New Year, friends!

It's been a few weeks since I moodled online (though I'm always internally moodling about various things as I go through my days). I enjoyed a long Christmas/New Year moodling break, and will have a story or two that arises from it. But for this first post of 2020, I think it's fitting to announce my Word of the Year for 2020.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmA2_h_Xgro

And 2020's word of the year is...

COMMUNITY!

I have many reasons for picking this word. The main one is that, though my 2019 year of Blessing was full of so many beautiful and blessed moments, there were also many challenges in which I felt very much alone. Toward the end of the year, though, I realized the importance of reaching out for support and companionship as I dealt with my challenges. I'm still struggling in many ways, but I've decided that rather than clamming up and toughing it out, I need to be more open and invite my family, friends, and perhaps some other different forms of community to struggle along with me when I'm feeling overwhelmed.

Another thing that's on my mind as we begin this New Year is the state of our world. We are so divided, whether it be politically or ideologically -- East vs. West, USA vs. Iran, environmentalists vs. big oil, conservatives vs. liberals, settlers vs. Indigenous, cis-gendered vs. LGBTQ2S+, Boomers vs. Milennials, Christians vs. Muslims vs. Jews --  name any issue and there's probably a divide in it. 

But if we want to continue as a human race, we need to put our divisions behind us and become COMMUNITY when it comes to world peace, caring for our environment, eliminating poverty, working for the rights of the marginalized, and the list goes on... There are so many issues that have to be tackled by good people who care, and though we all have different pet concerns, perhaps we can agree that the common good of ALL, no matter the stripe, is what we need to work toward. Because really, our divisions are just our fears being given too much credit.

I think I'll end this little announcement of my Word of the Year with one of my favourite little pieces by Australian Michael Leunig. (I hope he and his loved ones are safe from those wildfires... another climate crisis we need to address as a world community... ) I know I've moodled this before, but it bears repeating as we start into a decade where we must work together for the sake of our species and ALL the others. I love Michael's image of everyone in their own sad little boxes. That's kind of where I've been, but I'm done with being stuck in my own little box, and I hope you are with me on that. We CAN make this year, this decade, a Happy one if we break down the mostly cardboard walls that divide us, if we choose community.

If you have your own Word of the Year and are willing to share it, I'd love to hear about it in the comments below. Happy New Year, and New Decade!

Word of the Year, 2019 Edition

It's been a good Christmas break, more or less, and here we are, a week into 2019 with nary a moodling yet! Though I haven't been online much, the musing and doodling that I call moodling has been ongoing, at least in my head. For readers who have been with me a while, you know that one of my first tasks in a New Year, moodling-wise, is to choose a Word of the Year, one that becomes a touchstone to keep me on track. I've heard some people call it "setting an intention."

The word for 2017 was Tenderness, a word that reminded me to be gentle with myself and others.

Last year's word was Me, and my Me year was really important because it allowed me to give myself permission to just be who I am, with less stressing over not measuring up to my own and others' standards when I was struggling with various happenings in my life. For my Me year, I wrote more than the usual number of letters to my best friend, committed to meditation and a more regular Tai chi practice, and looked after myself in other ways (like visiting a favourite coffee shop and reading a book for an hour -- unheard of!)

For 2019, I want to reach for Blessing, to cultivate the awareness that, though our planet and many of its peoples are struggling, there is still much beauty, grace, goodness and truth if we only look for it and nurture it. So for me, 2019's word of the year is Blessing. Accepting the earth's blessings wherever I can find and celebrate them, counting my blessings, being patient with things that don't feel like blessing, and working to turn struggles into blessings -- while being blessing in whatever way I can for the people who cross my path.

I have a few plans in this regard, not New Year's resolutions, exactly, but ideas of projects and dreams that I want to work on in 2019. I'll keep you posted as to how this year of Blessing pans out.

Stay tuned!

Update #1 -- Little things for ME

It seems to me that I promised to report back on how the word of the year for 2018, Me, is being used to help my best friend, Cathy, and me focus on what we often neglect...

"Me" too easily gets pushed to the margins of life when too many other things are going on. It's natural to put ourselves last when the people around us are in need.

So what am I doing for me in 2018? Well, I've been reading some pretty enjoyable books, including Love and Other Consolation Prizes by Jamie Ford, The Book of Fires by Jane Borodale, A Trick of the Light by Louise Penny, and The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley (these last two are Canadian mystery writers -- if you've never read them, I recommend them!)

I'm almost finished crocheting a blanket. There's something satisfying about completing a tangible and tactile project like that.

I've seen a couple of good movies, The Greatest Showman, which I've already moodled about, and The Darkest Hour (about Winston Churchill's first month as Prime Minister during WWII).

I've been more consistent with my practice of morning meditation.

I've listened to a podcast or two from one of my favourite places on earth, Taizé.

I've been to one coffee house (where I got to sing with my daughter and her friend) and a few coffee shops just to read and have some ME time while waiting for another daughter who has weekly appointments.

The Muttart Conservatory was a good place for me to be on a chilly winter afternoon, admiring the Lunar New Year Pavilion for the year of the Dog with my daughter.

Speaking of dogs, I've taken them on long walks, which is good for my health, too.

I've spent a fair bit of time writing emails to dear friends, and indulging my creative spirit with these moodlings.

And I've played Words with Friends (online scrabble) for an entire evening without guilt.

Really, I'm not doing anything much different -- but when I am intentionally doing these things with the idea that they're good for my mental health, I'm giving myself permission to really enjoy them rather than feeling like I should be doing other things. It's a shift in consciousness -- that it's okay to relax and indulge in the little things that make me happy. Life is challenging enough without feeling guilty about my small pleasures.

Cathy's ME year is turning out to be more challenging than mine, as she just lost her dad to an unexpectedly short recurrence of cancer. But we will carve out a little bit of ME time in the midst of sorrow when Lee and I drive to Saturday's memorial service. On Sunday evening, Cathy and I are planning to enjoy a bottle of wine and each other's company, chatting and crying and laughing and maybe even singing together. There's usually some singing!

I'm learning that time for ME doesn't have to be extraordinary. It just has to be noticed in the muddle of ordinary life.

What are you doing for you this year?

The word of the year, 2018 edition

Moodlings followers who have been reading here for a while know that my best friend and I have a ritual of picking a theme word to focus on each year. Past words have included Freedom, Joy, Balance, Tenderness, and many more -- I think we started the practice of a Word of the Year in about 2003. I wish I had kept a list of our words over the years -- that would be 15 now! Actually, I suspect many of them are included in the handwritten letters we still write now and then and have saved over the years. Our friendship was founded on snail mail from the time we were ten, and we tend to discuss the really important things in our relationship via pen and ink.

Our word of the year for 2017 was Tenderness, and with hindsight, Cathy and I see that it was an essential word for both of us. We are both TWOs on the Enneagram, the kind of people who constantly put our own needs last, doing everything that we think other people need us to do before tending to ourselves, sometimes out of a "need to be needed." The word Tenderness came up in our conversations and letters over the past year when we were stressed or tired and not looking after ourselves. "Be tender with yourself," one or the other of us would say, and the comfort in that suggestion carried the day.

2017 was a very challenging year for me. Part of my tenderness toward myself recently was seeking out a counselor, a lovely woman who helped me to realize that my inner critic was dominating my thinking and making my life miserable. You know (or maybe you don't) -- that little voice in your head that is always saying, "You should do more!" "You should have said this instead," "you should have done it that way," or "you really don't know what you're doing!"

Constantly second-guessing myself in the many roles I play -- Mom, Wife, Sister, Daughter, Employee, and Friend -- took a huge emotional toll on me, to the point that I felt as though I was about to fall apart. And if anyone made a critical comment, my private tears were endless. But my counselor invited me to talk back to my critic, to stand up for myself and announce loudly, "I'm doing my best! And if that's not good enough for you, too effing bad!" Turns out, it's a much better tactic than allowing the inner critic to run me down and completely destroy my self-worth.

Cathy had her own struggles this year, a lot of them with the scheduling of her days and a lack of time for herself. She has a tendency to fill her daily life with more than it can actually hold, leaving her tired and out of sorts because she's left with no time to do the things that really make her happy.

So (drum roll please)...

Cathy and I have decided that it's time to look after our own needs, before all the other demands placed upon us completely wear us down... in effect, to "put on your personal oxygen mask before trying to assist others" so that we don't find ourselves incapacitated by our own inability to breathe!

In discussing it, we've both commented that having "Me" as word of the year rankles and feels too self-centred in many ways, but that fact alone tells us that we're on to something -- that perhaps it's time to celebrate Me a little more, to do something for Me every week. We don't want to end up like my favourite saint, Francis of Assisi, who reached the end of his life lamenting that he hadn't been kinder to "Brother Ass" -- as he referred to his own physical self.

How about you? Do you need some Me time? A year to celebrate yourself a little? If you've been giving yourself the short end of the stick for too long, join us. We're not going overboard; we're just making certain that in looking out for others, we also look out for the Me that goes hard for the sake of everyone else. And every so often in the next 362 days, I'll report on some of our Me year projects and activities. Stay tuned.

A year for tenderness

My best friend and I have had a tradition of picking a word at the beginning of each New Year, a word that we want to focus on for the 12 months to come. Usually the words are tied to our hopes and dreams, or to personal attributes that we want to work on.

2016's word was Trust, and it turned out to be a year in which I had to do lot of work on my trust in God. There were a lot of times when it was hard to see Her and Him working in the details of my life and the lives of those around me. It required a real effort on my part to let go of my own ego (a never-ending battle) and really listen to the people in my life so that I could love them better.

And though it was a very difficult year in many regards, I reaped many benefits, including the commitment to more regular centering prayer and a greater openness to possibilities even in situations that seem negative. God is in charge, and I think my trust in His and Her goodness and mercy increased in 2016. Even so, it was a tough year that broke me and some of the people around me in unexpected ways. Being brought to our knees by circumstances beyond our control is humbling and, to be frank, exhausting. I don't think I've ever cried as much as I did in 2016, angry, sad, and happy tears, but perhaps that just means I'm getting softer as I age!

When I was in Taizé in October, I brought home a postcard of the Madonna of Tenderness, above, written by Frère Eric, and she is posted near my desk. See how tender the Mother and Child are to each other? His little hand wrapped around her neck, caressing her cheek behind the veil, her cheek against his? If we could all feel the tenderness of mother for child and child for mother more often in our lives, this world would be a much different, more hopeful place.

And so, my word for 2017 is tenderness. I need a little more tenderness in my life. I need to be more tender toward the people around me, and I also need them to be tender toward me. I want to see the world become a place where tenderness and forgiveness and acceptance is chosen ahead of blaming and anger and apathy, where we can all find the peaceful places in our hearts and open them wider instead of becoming overprotective of what we think is ours. I want to remember that all the abundance of goodness, beauty and truth that we have has been given to us by our Tender God, our God who tends us and is attentive to us, our God who is more generous and loving than we can imagine.

That's my word, and I'm sticking to it.

If you were to pick a word for the year, what would you choose?

The word of the year is...

My most faithful friend (the one who has been with me since grade one) and I have a ritual that we follow sometime around the beginning of each year. No, not making New Year's Resolutions -- I've never been very good at them -- but picking a word that we hope will shape the year ahead. Sometimes the words are a wish for the year, other times, they reflect something of the struggles we've been facing and how we intend to overcome them.

For example, at the end of 2009 we were both feeling helpless and hopeless over the lack of progress against Climate Change at Copenhagen, and our government's lack of care for our environment. I was getting really depressed about the fact that, though I do my darndest to live lightly on our earth, our politicians are still fixed on monetary issues and give handouts to big business so the stock markets go up, rather than invest in really important things -- like the health of the planet that sustains us all.

After some moaning and complaining about the state of the earth, Cathy and I picked the word Hope for 2010, a bold and daring word at a time when having Hope for our planet felt next to impossible in a lot of ways. Hope became our challenge. We started pointing out to each other the positives that we noticed... the number of people we met who were starting to wake up to the climate crisis... the hockey player who payed for his carbon emissions... the media outlets who gave climate change issues a lot of coverage...  groups like Sierra Club and the David Suzuki Foundation and all their followers and all the good things they were doing... organizations like Kiva, helping the poorest of the poor... local food initiatives... recycling projects... cooperative living groups... and so many more. Over time, Hope bloomed in both of us. I think it's safe to say we ended 2010 with more Hope than when we started.

Once we had Hope, we decided to keep it going by rejoicing in the good and enjoying Joy in 2011, wherever we found it. We didn't talk about Joy as much as we did about Hope, because we didn't need to, I think. (I've been trying to remember other words of the year... one was Freedom (from rumination about frustration), but my middle aged brain isn't forthcoming with any others -- Cathy, can you help?)

So what's this year's word? Well, now that we have Hope and Joy under our belts, we're shifting gears again. Cathy, a palliative care nurse, has just finished a much-needed and highly-prized 3-month sabbatical break from work and is starting back at part-time hospice home-care, and part-time parish nursing. As for me, I've been struggling with dizziness for two months, working only half of my part-time position at L'Arche, and trying to keep up with my responsibilities at home.

So what better word than (drum roll please....) Balance.

It would be wonderful to regain my sense of Balance in the physical, literal sense... and it would be fantastic to live 2012 in a balanced way... working enough to give a sense of purpose, and resting enough to feel healthy, eating wisely (Cathy's inspiring me more and more toward vegetarianism), getting exercise, connecting with nature through our gardens, spending time with loved ones, and doing those extra things that fill life with meaning and Hope and Joy and all those words from years gone by.

Balance. Yes. We like it. It's our word of the year!

What's your word of the year for 2012?