Hi friends,

Welcome to January 3rd. If you didn’t notice, I am trying to be consistent and blog meaningful content for you every day this month. Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Speaking of “Consistent”, that was my Word of the year a couple of years ago and I didn’t stay consistent in a lot of ways. I’ve had several quite some time to think about the reason behind my lack of consistency and here is where I’ve landed: I wasn’t specific enough on what to apply this Word to and how to actually go about being consistent. What & How: that’s what you need to consider to truly apply your Word of the year to 2023.

Now, it doesn’t matter what your Word of the Year actually is, I am going to walk you through a few steps to clean up your thinking around your Word first, and then get into the details of the What and the How.

How to choose your Word?

1. Why do you want a Word as the “theme”, if you will, of your year? Get the Why down to a specific 1-2 sentences. This will mean something different for each person. A couple of years ago I chose “consistent” because I felt like I lacked inconsistency in my life. That was all the thought I gave the subject which is why the Word didn’t pan out. I’ll share with you at the end what my Word for the current year is, but stay with me for a bit. 🙂
2. How to do you feel when you think about this Word? This one is easy! What do you feel in your gut when you think of your Word? Do you feel happy, determined, excited, or confident? What are the feelings associated with your Word? Write down all the feelings and pick one that really lands with you.
3. What actions do your Word Prompt you to take? What does it want you to do? Let’s say your Word is: Joyful. The feeling mostly likely is Happy. Your actions might include laughing a lot, listening to happy/joy-filled content such as books, movies, music, etc. You might want to share your joy with others through Thank You cards, smiling at people on your walks or in the store, being extra patient and pleasant in a long line (The DMV, for example). Your actions might include getting to know a little better the people in your life that you don’t know as well. My point is, what are your actions inspired by your emotions that come to surface through your Word? Write all of these actions down. you don’t have to do them all, but write them down on paper. Taking ideas and thoughts out of your brain and onto a paper is a powerful thing to do. Give it a try.

How to apply your Word to your year?

1. Pick three areas of your life to which you are going to apply your Word. Listen, we get excited in the beginning and want to do everything all at once. The problem with this strategy is that we lose steam fast. We over commit ourselves to something we’ve never done before. This can lead to overwhelm, and you may eventually find yourself giving up on your Word before its March. That is why it’s better to pick specific areas (as few as possible, but 3 is a good number to stick with) such as work, family, friends, social media, your alone time, personal development, religious or any other areas of your life you feel your heart calling.
2. Fill out a page for each area of your life on the WHY and WHAT I share in the first part of this post. Let’s take Joyful in a work place: WHY do you want to be more joyful at work? WHAT are you going to do to do at work to be joyful? Be as specific as possible. Repeat this process of your Word for each area of your life.
3. Put it on your calendar weekly. Make it a part of your regular routine. Plan at least 2-3 ways you are going show Joy-fullness at your work place regularly. You got this!

I said I would share with you my Word for this year and it is: Stewardship. This Word just appeared before me one day and filled my heart. I knew it was from God. I am a steward of all that He’s blessed me with. When I think of this word, I am filled with awe and gratitude. The best way for me be a good steward of what’s been entrusted to me is to show my gratitude and take good care of it (including myself) with love.

Listen friend, I know this is a long post, but it’s from my heart. I hope that you can see value in this blog and apply it to your life. Take your time. You don’t need to have it figured out by tomorrow. Give yourself a couple of weeks or months, but no longer. Give yourself a deadline and take that deadline seriously. The best thing you can do for yourself is to get to December of 2023 and truly say that you LIVED your Word of the year.

You got this, friend!

Nilo