In a word, Explore
"The soul should always stand ajar." Emily Dickinson
It’s the second week of January and I’m finding the space and time to reflect on 2016 and think about this New Year. I was blessed in 2016 and found ways to celebrate with tribe, family and alone during the holidays.
I took time and stepped back, slowed down and felt the pulse; heartbeat of the earth. I viewed its majesty with runs on trails in the forest and from the saddle. I looked up, out and on majestic open roads, valleys and vistas and fell in love (again) with the magic of trees, quiet spaces and cold winter mornings with the never-end of the wind on my face. I experienced the caress of water gliding across skin, lap after lap and envisioned the ocean, rivers, lakes and the first open water swim of the year. I shared time, space, food and laughter with family. I felt connection. I sat and drank coffee in solitude and walked the streets of one of the places I call home.
As I worked through the process of choosing a word for the year, something I’ve done the last several years, I spent time reflecting on my word for 2016. Trust. As many of you have read it was a deep dive and amazing journey in embracing and practicing trust - with self, others and the Universe. Bloody brutal at times if I'm honest. It was the first full year alone after a decades long partnership and the divorce that happens when the person you thought you’d spend your life with isn’t that person.
Trust was the perfect launch pad for 2017.
In the process of going through the process of finding a word to embody the coming year I realized that I my word is more of an expression; a way of being that has welled up from my soul to explore this new life and all it has to offer. It's a calling to take a deep dive into life as a single women. To explore what joy and happyness mean to and for me. To keep trusting the Universe and myself in the months and year ahead.
I hope that in this exploration I continue to move from a grounded sense of personal strength, wisdom, growth, compassion and empathy for self, others, community and this earth. That I begin to come from a state of being that is filled with strength, joy, curiosity, love and grace .