One Word For The Year 2012

It's 1:18 in the morning, after my Monday, and I have three more days to go. My Tuesday is going to be a 14 hour day. I should be asleep.

Problem is, I'm a night person. I do all my best thinking after work.

Brene Brown is a hero of mine. She set upon me a challenge in a recent blog post: Choose one word for the year. Unknowingly, last year I had chosen Vulnerable, like I have done for years. Vulnerable is a hard lesson to learn for someone like me, and no doubt, it's a life long challenge.

But this year is different. This year I decided to go with something else. For the first time in a long time, in fact, maybe as long as I can remember, I am healthy, and more importantly happy, and was through the entire holiday season. This is not the norm. It started in November. And This year, I went into New Year's with an attitude of peace, and joy, and love, and happiness.

When I read the post by Brene, and subsequent posts by some other people, I decided I needed to figure out what my word was. I've tossed around a few, and I think "happy" is really MY word for this year. I've already had to make a couple of really hard decisions, that are pretty hard to stick to considering my free and impulsive nature, but the thing is, those choices were based on what was going to make me happy, not in the moment, but in the long run. And the universe is conspiring to keep those decisions solid. I can't argue with that. I mean, it's pretty hard to fight the universe.

So what does happy mean for me? Well, I think it means taking care of myself. Doing things as if I deserve the things I want (Note: Deserving something is different than feeling entitled to it.). It means being brutally honest with people about who I am, what I want, what I like, what I can offer, what I can't, and what I don't like. It means being ok with it when I trip, or when I pause, or when I take a step or two backwards. It means being courageous in certain ways I'm not used to. It means being patient in ways I'm not used to. It means admitting how bad I am at certain things, to myself and others, laughing about it, and continuing to try in spite of it. (It's funny how certain friends can encourage you in ways they don't even realize. I have a friend who's been saying "We're real bad at this" for the last few months in a joking way, but still kind of serious. It makes it easier to admit it when it's true.) I've always been so good at loving the awkwardness and missteps of other people, or loving them through their awkward and graceless moments, and yet I've always been so hard on myself for the same things. I want to love my missteps, trip ups, and awkwardness as much as I love other people's. I think that is key to my happiness.

Big important thing about happiness: It means setting boundaries that are good for me, and adhering to them.

So many things are tied up in this thing with boundaries: boundaries with my money (now that I have it, I'm prone to giving it away) boundaries with my time, my energy, my heart. I'm very intentionally making choices that are basically forcing me to be conscious about these things. Tonight I'm obviously violating a boundary with my time and energy by staying up far too late to write this, but it's been on my mind all day.

The final thing about this post: Last year I read a book that helped me tremendously in my vulnerability quest, and it was given to me by a friend. It made me cry. Hard. And it expanded my world and my wisdom. This year I have a book I need to read to. It's called The Happiness Project by Gretchen Ruben. I've been avoiding it like the plague since I heard about it. I can't really tell you why, but I think it's time. It's sitting on the shelf in the staff housing. I start reading it in the afternoon. I'm nervous, and I'm not going to lie, I'm still resisting it a little. I'll do a full book report when I'm done. Ok, maybe just a quick summary. And with that, the rain has stopped and I must go sleep.