Introducing my word of the year REFRESH
About a month ago I sat down to journal and this was the thought that kept coming to my mind,
I have a beautiful life, I just want to enjoy it.
Hello friends. I’m sorry it has been a minute since I last posted. I’m a spiller writer, meaning I write best when I’m spilling what is going on in my life onto the page.
However, this past season of my life has been one that I didn’t feel comfortable sharing. Towards the middle of last year, there was a series of events in my life that kicked off an intense season of inner reflection and growth.
All of that to say, I am dipping my feet back into my writing life. I’ve been busy this past month working with my writing group Ninja Writers. Shaunta Grimes launched a program called Fresh Start, and Ninja Writers offered me the chance to contribute my skills to help this group dream big and make a plan to meet their goals. So most of my time has been consumed with helping others dream and in return it has been extremely self rewarding.
One of my favorite exercises Shaunta has us do at the end of the year is to reflect on your goals and vision for the next year and come up with your word of the year. I am so excited about my word this year.
Last year my word was flourish and I feel like I did just that throughout the year. I flourished in all areas of my life.
Physically, I set out to have better energy, move more and overall just feel better about my physical body.
I cut out sugar and started going to the gym pool classes as much as possible. I’m happy to report that I lost 55 pounds! Words fail me for how amazing that feels. I have been in a slump of not losing weight for so many years now, so to see that number go down each time I stepped on the scale felt unreal.
Mentally, I wanted to address my mental health, I started therapy. Therapy was something I had put off for far too long.
How would I find a therapist that was right for me?
How to get started?
How will it work with my insurance?
Could I handle it?
Would it cause me to dig up stuff I couldn’t bury back down?
The big events towards the middle of last year had forced my hand. I had a choice: face all of my fears and finally take the leap into therapy or stay stagnant and where I was.
I leaped and I’m so happy that I did. Therapy has been so freeing. There are days when it’s extremely difficult, but I’m finally feeling more like myself again for the first time in a long time. As I had lost all the weight physically, I also lost the same amount of weight mentally.
So after making so much progress with my word of the year last year, I am beyond excited about my word this year, REFRESH.
I want to use this year to refresh myself physically, mentally and spiritually.
Physically, I want to use the momentum that I gained last year and start to tone and build strength in my body. I hope to do this by continuing with my pool classes and introducing more physically demanding exercise to my routine. I also want to do some strength training in my home gym, which I have not used since we moved in during the pandemic. ????????
Mentally, I want to continue to dig deep into my therapy and face some issues that I have pushed on the back-burner for way too long now. Also, I want to bring journaling back into my routine.
And spiritually, I want to find more ways to connect with the spiritual side of myself. I think I put this part of myself on a shelf for far too long. So I am going to seek new ways to find the spiritual balance that I am looking for.
How about you? Do you have a word for the year? I’d love to hear about it!
Thanks for reading. I promise I have some fun content coming soon!