At the beginning of January, a friend shared a link for generating a word to reflect on and live by for the year. Normally, I click on generators like this out of idle curiosity and not take them seriously. But after seeing several people mention their word of the year and how or why they chose it, I decided to follow through. II had been feeling lost, and needed something to give meaning and focus to my day to day, something to tie my year together.
I prayed before generating my word. My prayer was that the word would readily pertain to my life, and that I accept whatever the word ended up being. I hit the button and within a moment, a word - my word popped on the screen.
Courage.
I jotted it down, fairly satisfied with it. It didn't take long for me to reflect on ways I could see it come into play in our life. Expecting our third baby in three years had already drawn some unkind comments and more are bound to come when people find out we have three under three. It will take courage and kindness to defend our family and not be riled up by the rudeness of others.
Another area I knew I was being called to live out courage was in initiating coffee or play dates with others. As an introvert, initiating is not my forte, but I have been feeling the need to build up my community, and that will require stepping out of my comfort zone.
A third way I saw courage playing a role was in researching the Montessori Method and implementing the mindset in our home. What little I knew about it confirmed it would be amazing for our oldest (and myself), but it seemed complicated and a height of perfection I could not reach. I was afraid to start in case of failure to achieve the end goal. My own perfectionism was holding me back. It was going to take courage to push those doubts aside and step out with purpose and concentration.
These are the ways in which I predict my word of the year playing its part in our lives. I enjoy comfort and security in knowing where things will go or how they'll happen. Straying into the unknown scares me and so I stay where I am. But maybe this is the year to dive into new endeavors with confidence and courage. Nothing good comes from staying stagnant.
The word I received was Engage and I am an introvert as well so it was a good word for me to receive because I have a hard time as well initiating conversations and such with other people. So it is a good way for me to start getting out more and doing stuff with other people that I wouldn't normally do.
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