Before You Pick Your Word for The Year

Think twice because the sh*t between you and it matters

Picking a word for the year is dangersome! So dangersome that since 2016 I’ve posted this article in some form or other! Consider yourself warned…

Here comes the word for 2024 frenzy. Social media posts are cropping up and everyone is chattering about what their word is going to be for next year.

Pause. Really think this through. You pick a word that carries an energy because you think you want to live said energy. However, all the reasons you aren’t already Abundance, Peace, Creative, or Authentic (which BTW is the 2023 word of the year) come barreling through the door like people running for discounted laptops at Best Buy on Black Friday.

It can be madness for the unprepared! Once you say yes to that word, the gates of Hell rise up against you!

Think about this pattern: you practice mindfulness, begin to meditate, and then your world explodes. You don’t understand why doing something supposedly good for you feels as horrible as running out of toilet paper in a truck stop bathroom. You snarkily think those peaceful-looking people around you are actually on prescription drugs. Xanax anyone?

You start yoga only the teacher can’t explain why you’re on the mat crying or raging because he went through some yoga teacher training mill and frankly wishes you’d dry it up over there. Even worse, you’re too embarrassed to let anyone see and stuff everything back down where you think it belongs. This is because you read about yoga in a magazine, and no one told you about the emotional and spiritual bits.

You take a chakra class online, read The Secret, start declaring your Core Desired Feelings, use powerful essential oils (not that cheap shit from the drugstore either), and read more books, more books, and even more flipping books.

You notice life is getting worse by the minute, so you feel like a failure and drop it like it’s hot.

This cycle can go on for years because rather large pieces of information have been left out of many ancient and current methods designed to make achieving the things you want easier. Why do some people hook up with a method and this cycle doesn’t happen? I have no idea, honey bunny. I’m talking to those of you who try, try, and try, and things only get worse. If life is peachy for you, I’m not sure how you found this page to begin with. Stop reading and go enjoy life!

For the rest of you, you ain’t got enough of your Soul down deep in your body. Your nervous system is tuned out, numb, stuckity-stuck.

Sounds like more woo garbage, but I’m telling you that the saying you’re a soul having a physical human experience does seem to be true. The thing is, we don’t know that we get to control to some degree how much awareness of Soul we’re allowing into our consciousness. We’re certainly not working with Soul or getting trained in how to access it, to be aware of the signature of our energy vs. everyone else, and what to do about feeling those differences and setting healthy boundaries. 

Without Soul or Essence or Presence, whatever you want to call it, you aren’t aware that when you:

• do a vision board or envisioning exercise

• reach and try to embody for the feeling place of your desire

• learn to communicate with the subtle energies of your projects

• set a goal of any kind

• or worst of all pick ONE WORD for the whole year

The Universe says “Whoopie! Fuck yeah! She’s finally reaching for what she deserves and has denied! Hey Bob, scramble the guides, angels, all her dead, animal guides, and Devas. She’s ready!”

Annnddd…here comes the shit.

There’s whole lotta shit between you and it.

We don’t pick a goal or choose a way we want to feel that we feel already. We reach for something we want and intuitively know we deserve. We reach for what we don’t have but know is True.

This means that everything unlike itself has to be cleared away as you begin bringing more awareness of your Soul into your body.

You are opening your awareness to intuition at a far greater level than you’ve ever experienced since childhood and holy hell honey bunnies, shit gets real, real fast. You are not being punished, tested, or judged as undeserving. Your nervous system is waking up and it can be painful af!

Your Shadow comes up for you to see it. Unprocessed Shadow shows up as multiple conflicts, fights with those close to you, sudden flares of hot green jealousy, and tendencies to blame everyone for everything, not recognizing the world stage is showing you: You.

Showing you the parts you have discarded, rejected, and disowned in the form of bounced checks, traffic jams, and really shitty timing such as having no warning that you have to drop everything and go get a mortgage after you already spent a ton on Christmas.

Welcoming those disowned parts is a critical part of obtaining your goal.

To welcome them requires you FEEL.
To feel requires you to wake up to what your nervous system’s capacity for consciousness is.
To wake up to your nervous system requires you to slow down, ask questions, listen for answers, i.e., put the damn phone down and meditate.

Increasing energy flows in your body can make you feel weird, ants in the pants-y, itchy, and strange. You aren’t used to feeling intense sensations in your lower body energy centers, and it’s hard to stay present until they shift. You may find old memories and pains arising or feel like you have the flu. If you have significant trauma or can’t seem to find a way to adjust to these new energies a therapist trained in trauma or a highly skilled coach may be necessary to guide you through.

Emotional Freedom Techniques, Havening, dancing, box breathing, shaking, reading some books on the nervous system (but not too many because that keeps you in your head), and warm Epsom salt baths, can all help. Remember that you aren’t doing those things to eliminate the emotion but to make space for it to be there AS IS!

You adapt quickly when you accept the truth and intense sensations of your emotions. Adapting to the feel of energies moving in your body is the largest part of obtaining your goal.

You must visit an in-between place between the time you pick that word and the time when you can embody all the characteristics of it. It is a place of Shadows and conflict and struggle, yet if you stay with the practice you just started, it moves right on through. Scattered puzzle pieces form a beautiful picture. Unhealed becomes healthy. Light and Dark find balance, and the razor’s edge is easier to stand on.

It’s a significant issue with me that more people aren’t telling you these things and how important it is that you KEEP GOING. Yes, you may need to take a break from your personal work, but seriously, more than a day or so, and you can fall back asleep so fast you won’t even realize it’s happening.

You’ll wake up head first in a box of Krispy Kremes and wonder where the last six months went. Or is that just me?

Having lost your momentum, you feel like a failure, again, and decide these things don’t work for you. You become more embittered with every new Facebook ad you see promising 5 or 7 or 3 easy steps.

Let me set you straight: there are these many easy steps to long-lasting sustainable change – ZERO! None! Every step has varying degrees of difficulty.

There is no shortcut, no bypass, no easy way out. The methods are simple, but they have to be practiced every damn day. This is why the gutsy and brave keep coming back over and over. They fall off the horse, dust their asses off and climb right back on because they understand there is order in Chaos, freedom to be had, and dreams to see come true when you stay present long enough.

It hurts, it’s harder than you ever think it will be and it is the answer to every single issue you’re struggling to resolve. Every. Single. One.

You are not a failure, you are not incompetent, and you most assuredly can learn these things.

Think about it. How long have you struggled to solve things repeatedly, suffered mighty agony, and created only more pain and poverty? A lot, which means you have grit, tenacity, and the ability to try again! The only issue is your rudders are steering you in ineffective directions as you sail the Sea of Self-Sabotage.

You can, prepared with knowledge and practice, steer your boat in a new direction into fresh new uncharted waters.

How many years does it take to set a goal and deal with processing through the shit between you and it? I don’t know but I can tell you it cycles through pain and glory, sorrow and soaring joy.

The more you become familiar with the unfamiliar and comfortable with the uncomfortable, the easier it gets to navigate emotional waters skillfully.

This lack of knowledge and understanding is why you cry on the yoga mat, don’t get results with the Law of Attraction, and avoid meditation or Core Desired Feeling work. You ain’t got no awareness of Soul in your body, and you know you’re supposed to have all that and more.

This growth cycle is as predictable as cats tearing up the furniture and dogs throwing up on your favorite sweater. It happens, you’ll love the overall results in time and owe it to yourself to keep going!

Where are you at in your cycle of growth?
How much awareness of your Soul can you be present to in your body?
How long do you stick with the discomfort of change before running for the hills?

So go on and pick your word. Then prepare for the racetrack flag to drop and all those limitations to start racing toward you! It’s ok - you got this, and if you need help with the money parts of this kind of transformation you know where to find me!

XO,

LMW

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