3 words for 2019

by | Jan 6, 2019 | News | 0 comments

Creating my Word for 2019

Have you ever picked a “word” for the year?

A few years ago, during a New Year’s Eve party, a friend asked me what my “Word” was for the New Year. I had never heard about this, and thought it sounded pretty awesome. I decided that my word would be “Abundance.”

I did kind of keep track of the word… it would float through my life, reappearing now and then… The next year I picked a word and completely forgot about it! This year will be different!

I’m a researcher by nature.

I wonder about a lot of topics, and I wondered about this whole process, of having a “word” for the year. I wondered if I truly could use a word as my “North Star” or my guiding light for 2019.

I asked some friends, in an online group that I’m part of, if anyone was doing a “Word” and if they would like to share.

The leader of this group, Denise Wakemen who runs the Marketing Trailblazers, shared that she chooses 3 words!

What? Three words? I was curious about 3 words, instead of one. This is where I start down the rabbit hole of researching. And yes, there is a resource list at the end of this post.

I found links to both techniques. For One Word: Pick One Word: http://myoneword.org/
And for picking 3 words: My 3 Words for 2019 by Chris Brogan: https://chrisbrogan.com/3words2019/

Not to get hung up in trying to figure out which  I wanted to do, one word or three words, I decided to start creating a list and see what happens. Looking at my list of 45 words I started thinking about what Danielle LaPorte is always asking – “How does it make you feel”? “How do you want to feel”?

Now, I have 45 words, I’m looking at how I feel when I look at each word, and I’m thinking

about how I want to feel… Amazing the different reactions I have to different awesome words!

Denise Wakeman wrote a great blog post: My Three Words – A Roadmap for 2019 https://denisewakeman.com/ which I read, and promptly asked her how she did the graphic! I was enthralled with her word cloud!

With all the words I had bouncing around in my head, I had to go and play with my list of words in WordArt.com!

Yep, I went down that rabbit hole of WordArt.com!

What I realized, as I playing, I kept changing the sizes of the words! I wanted some to be bigger, and some to be smaller. Some to be in the front and some to be part of the background. What an eye opening experience! The words that I thought I had picked where not at the top of my “make it bigger” list!

My 3 guiding words for 2019 are: Mastery, Simplify and Ritual/(Habit)

Mastery – the dictionary definition: a noun “1. comprehensive knowledge or skill in a subject or accomplishment”

Malcolm Gladwell has said that it takes at least 10,000 hours of practice to master your craft. A quick read on this topic: https://www.businessinsider.com/malcolm-gladwell-explains-the-10000-hour-rule-2014-6

What I think of when the word Mastery pops up for me, is learning something so well, that the skill is so deeply ingrained, that as Richard Bliss Brook instructs us “you could teach it without notes anytime.”

What does this look like in my life? How am I going to apply this? That question has always been a challenge for me. This year, I want to “do it” differently. To have a different outcome.

This year, each quarter I will pick 3 skills (I have a list for 2019) that I want to Master. And, will block the time to practice on my calendar. Yes, organization, simplifying!

Simplify

The dictionary: a verb. to “make (something) simpler or easier to do or understand”. To clarify.

This is a skill that I have taken to an art form is NOT doing things the “simple” way. Often, in my work flow, when I get frustrated, or can’t find something, I start looking for simpler, easier, more streamlined processes. I’m working on simplifying my life, my surroundings -yes, my office area needs de-cluttering so badly!

My biggest take-a-way, from Marie Kondo, the author of “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing” was “Choose those things that spark joy when you touch them.” Wow!

Simplify looks like having room to breathe. To welcome in, a depth to relationships and projects that I currently don’t feel like I can now… too much clutter in my head, my business, my office and home, to focus on any one thing for more than two seconds!

Does that sound familiar?

 

Ritual
The definition: a noun 1. “a religious or solemn ceremony consisting of a series of actions performed according to a prescribed order.” Or, as an adjective 1. “relating to or done as a religious or solemn rite. Their example was a “ritual burial”.

From Michael Hyatt, and his Full Focus Planner, (and their awesome Facebook page), I’m learning about having Daily Rituals (or habits). For example, creating a Workday Startup Ritual. What do I do first, to set myself up to have a productive and successful day?

Sometimes I can answer this question, and I have written down the ritual/habit.

Sometimes I don’t write it down, don’t review, and I don’t pivot when it’s not working. 

Ritual to me is with intention, creating a new habit, just one new habit, that I want to learn and instill. First, for me, it needs to be almost a ritual, a purposeful intention, a very special action.

Why take the time to write the Ritual down? Forbes blog post has a great explanation – basically it’s that by writing it down you are working on two different levels: 1. External storage – you have it somewhere that you can “see” it, being visually reminded, and 2. Encoding – wiring “it “into your brain.

Pulling it all together:

Mastery is the journey. At first, I thought this was the outcome, but it isn’t really. Practicing for 10,000 hours, or even 1,000, I will learn a lot about myself, and how to be a better leader.

To Simplify is creating a smooth journey, understanding that there are many bright and shiny objects to distract me, but that is not the journey that I’m on this year.

Ritual is about creating space/grace, to develop new habits/Rituals that will aid me on this journey, to Mastery. To being a better leader and a better person, wife, mother and human

The experience of: creating the word list, reading blog posts, putting the words into WordArt, and then writing up what it means to me, really helped me to craft my words for 2019.

Do you have a word for 2019? Three words?
We would really enjoy hearing about them, and your process in the comments below.

 

Resources:
Pick One Word: http://myoneword.org/
My 3 Words for 2019 by Chris Brogan: https://chrisbrogan.com/3words2019/
Natalie Sission Vblog: https://www.facebook.com/nataliesisson/videos/267214654147917/
Denise Wakeman- My Three Words – A Roadmap for 2019 https://denisewakeman.com/
Malcom Gladwell: : https://www.businessinsider.com/malcolm-gladwell-explains-the-10000-hour-rule-2014-6
Michael Hyatt Full focus planner: https://fullfocusplanner.com/?utm_source=direct&utm_medium=url
Marie Kondo, “the life-changing magic of tidying up” https://konmari.com/
Forbes Neuroscience Explains Why You Need to Write Down Your Goals If You Actually Want To Achieve Them. https://www.forbes.com/sites/markmurphy/2018/04/15/neuroscience-explains-why-you-need-to-write-down-your-goals-if-you-actually-want-to-achieve-them/#7d8794f77905
Danielle LaPorte – The Desire map: A guide to creating goals with soul. http://www.daniellelaporte.com/thedesiremap/

 

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