Happy New Year, friends! As has been my tradition for the last few years, I am choosing this day . . . the first day of the year . . . to share my One Little Word for you.

And my word is open.

This word first came to me back in the early fall. I was doing a guided meditation and was visualizing a box that was just for me and in that box was a gift. The gift I found was the word open. It just floated right up from that box like a helium balloon.

I immediately dismissed it. I decided it was too early to choose a word for the next year. I decided I didn’t really like that word anyway. I decided that my visualization was just about that moment and not about anything more than that.

You know where this is going, right? The word open just kept coming back to me. And honestly, the more I resisted it the more it persisted. I finally gave in the other day when I read something about how resisting a word can be just as important as instantly embracing a word.

So here I am with the word open. Still feeling pretty uncomfortable with it but also knowing that being uncomfortable is actually good for me because that’s when I have breakthroughs. That’s when I grow. That’s when I find new ways of doing things.

That’s when I open up.

 

I simply can’t let the year come to an end without acknowledging and reflecting on my journey with my 2019 One Little Word: story.

I’m pretty sure I say this every year but it was the perfect word for me for the last 12 months. I feel like I truly connected with it on a daily basis, thinking about what I did and did not want to include in my story, whether that meant experiences or people or just the thoughts in my head. I used it to go back and work through some childhood trauma, I used it to reconnect with the idea of blogging and how much it helps me to share my story with all of you, I used it to remind myself to slow down and pay attention to my life.

In January, when I first wrote about this word, I asked:

what’s my story?

how do I tell my story?

what are the stories that impact my life?

Those questions are as relevant now as they were 366 days ago. They remain open ended because my story isn’t finished yet but I have learned so much about what my story is and how I want to tell it. As for that last question, the stories that impact my life are something I can’t always control and predict and that’s a difficult thing for me to accept. But here’s what I’ve learned this year: even when I can’t control my story, I can always choose how I respond to it.

Since I started choosing a word for the year my words have been: joy, grace, shine, peace, kind, and story. Of those words, joy and peace have truly stayed with me in a very meaningful way and I still reflect on them frequently. I am now adding story to that list because I know it will continue to guide me.

In order to know my story I have to listen to my life.  Just thinking about that seems scary. Why? Because listening to my life means slowing down and pausing and paying attention. It means not filling up quiet moments with music or television or podcasts. It means sitting and being still and acknowledging the thoughts that pop into my brain. Odds are, some of those thoughts are going to be uncomfortable. Odds are, some of those thoughts are going to make me mad or sad. Odds are, some of those thoughts are going to be about things I’m avoiding.

But it’s all okay because it’s all part of my story. And if I want to understand my story, if I want to claim my story and shape how it develops, then I have to pay attention to my life.

Here are some thoughts on the story of my life right now:

I am an imperfect person but I’m exactly who I am meant to be.

I have made huge strides in understanding how the things that happened to me as a child have impacted my life as a grown up. I recognize that those experiences have shaped me into the person I am and that sharing those stories with others is powerful because my story has the potential to change someone else’s story.

I want to find a way to help women understand their stories and then tell those stories to make their lives better. I’m working on what I think this looks like and how I can implement it and it’s at the top of my list for 2020.

I have the support of a loving husband in everything I do. I have caring friends who want to spend time with me. I have children and grandchildren who bring joy to my story every day.

I will keep working and growing and evolving because my story is not finished.

P.S. Kym is wrapping up our discussion of Just Mercy today and we’ve got a survey we’d love for you to take to help us plan the future of Read With Us.

 

I continue to work with my word, story, as I work on discovering my authentic self. I realize that sounds a bit . . . pretentious or perhaps just trendy but I truly feel like thinking about my story has helped me to realize not just the things that have made me who I am but also understand that I have the power to let those things go. Because, really, the things that have happened to me are just . . . stories now. I’m not still going through the trauma of those things, at this point they truly are just stories of things that happened once upon a time.

In trying to work through this and heal some of those things, the other day I did a meditation exercise where I envisioned my current self going back to my previous selves and offering comfort and assurance that all would be ok. It sounds a little silly in the telling of it but in the moment it felt pretty powerful. I visited the little girl who saw constant fights between her brother and stepfather. I put my arms around her and told her that it would get better. I  visited the teenage girl who sat up in bed the night the police came to the door with the news of her brother’s motorcycle accident. I knelt by the side of that bed and told her she would survive this news. I whispered in the ear of the young bride who was walking down the aisle, sure she was making a mistake, that choosing love is never a mistake even when it results in hurt and divorce. I put my head on the shoulder of the 31 year old who was standing at the grave of her oldest brother, afraid to leave him there in the cold, and told her he would always be with her. I watched her be led away from the grave by her soon to be husband, Dale, and saw him comfort her in the way she had always wanted but had never gotten before then. I saw the 32 year old who had just lost her mom crying and unable to get out of bed. I told her that it was okay to lean in to her feelings of grief, that they wouldn’t consume and destroy her, and that accepting them was the only way to get through them and come out on the other side. When I felt like I had visited all of those former Caroles, the ones who were hurt and disappointed and scared, I pictured my current self gathering them all in my arms and showing them my life as it is now. Showing them the love I found with Dale, the family that surrounds me, the home that gives me shelter and comfort, the friends and community and support that I experience every day, and I said it’s okay because this is what we have now. I said you are safe and you are loved and those things that happened are in the past.

Did it make the pain go away? Did it dissolve the trauma and grief? Of course not. But did it help? Did it feel like healing? Absolutely. My story is made up of all of the moments of my life, including the traumatic ones, but the good ones and the love, oh the love, it overpowers them all.

 

 

So I sort of dropped the ball on updating you on my journey with the word story. I haven’t done a monthly update since May. Whoops. I’m going to call this one my Summer Update and consider us caught up. Mmmmkay?

Here’s the thing with this year’s word (it’s story, in case you forgot) . . . my journey with it keeps changing. I think that’s a good thing because it means I’m growing and evolving but it’s also very different than how I’ve related to my words in years past. With joy and grace and shine I could just focus on the word and how it showed up in my life and how I could get more of it but with story it’s more about me asking myself on a daily basis: what do I want my story to be? And conversely, what do I not want my story to be?

I’d say for the first half of the year I focused on lot on what my story was . . . on the things that happened to me to get me to where I am, on the life vows I made during childhood that had a lot to do with not being enough . . . not smart enough, not pretty enough, certainly not thin enough, and not worthy enough to stay with because eventually everyone I love either leaves me or dies – especially those somebodies that are men. You don’t need all the gory details and I’m not looking for sympathy but I’ll just say there was some traumatic and violent stuff that I saw on a regular basis when I was a kid and because of it my fall back position is I’m going to hurt you before you get the chance to hurt me.

I’m at the point where I’m releasing those vows (this is hard work, friends) and trying hard to see that those vows don’t serve me anymore. I am not powerless when it comes to love or behavior or money, I control so much of how those things play out in my life. I’m not at the whim of someone buying cigarettes when we actually can’t pay for oil to heat our house. I don’t have to make homemade bows for my Christmas presents because that’s what my mother did. I don’t have to believe that I’m not pretty but it’s okay because I have a good personality just because that’s what my grandmother told me when I was 8. I have the power to make all the choices about how I spend my time, my talent, and my money.  I feel like Dorothy at the end of The Wizard of Oz:  I’ve had the power all along, I just didn’t know it.

Now that my year with the word story is more than half over I’m trying to focus on what comes next for my story, what my next chapter might be. I’ve had some big ideas floating around in my head for the last few months. Ideas that have been pretty scattered but are finally starting to sort themselves into categories and identifiable goals and ways to expand my life. Ideas about teaching people how to use essential oils. Ideas about crafting products for some extra cash for my family. Ideas about consulting work to help empower women. I think that last one is my favorite and could be a terrific long term goal since I’m really starting to think about what comes next for me when I retire. Yes, it’s still probably 6 years away, give or take, but it’s not too early to start laying the ground work for that part of my story.

And that’s where I am on my journey with my One Little Word right now. A little more focused. A bit less scared. A lot more vulnerable. And most definitely excited.