For the last two years I have published/written about a word that I have chosen to be be my ‘guiding word’ for that coming year. I have done this instead of making a New Year’s resolution and prefer it to be honest.

My word for 2007 was Organisation. This word stood me in great stead that year as we moved  house and I was busier than ever with various bits and pieces. A whole year of working with that word helped enormously to really look at areas of my life and work that were slipping through the net organisationally and I found great systems that were easy to follow and didn’t leave me feeling like too much of a pedant, just a bit more chilled and relaxed because I knew where I was with everything!

My word for 2008 was Focus. At no other time in my life have I seen a word become a living embodiment of all that is going on around me like this one did. Granted most of the action took place from September onwards and I’ll reveal more at a later date but this word, coupled with a few AWESOME books, has seen my own life turned on its head. And whats more I don’t feel like it’s all skyrocketing out of control. It’s all “meant to be” and seems like a lot of fun.

So, my word for 2009?

Calm.

Not calmness or calming just calm. As Robert and I stare down the barrel of a year that holds promise, adventures and I’m sure some hectic times, I need to find a still, small space inside my life and heart that keeps me on the right track.
Like the other words I have chosen previously I expect I’ll end up meditating on it and breathing it into my life until it becomes a part of me.

The best way I can illustrate this word and what it means to me is by posting Rudyard Kipling’s poem ‘If’. May I wish you all a wonderful New Year full of bravery, adventures and stories to tell at the end of it. I’d also love to hear from you if you decide on a word of the year for yourselves.

IF you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream – and not make dreams your master;
If you can think – and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ‘em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
‘ Or walk with Kings – nor lose the common touch,
if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And – which is more – you’ll be a Man, my son!