One Word… Happy
It was late December, sitting on my deck in the late afternoon sun – admiring the view, listening to the birds – when I realised I had actually achieved success with my 2014 Focus word, “Abundance”.
Maybe not so much in the financial sense, although that had at least made a turnaround during the year. But in pretty much everything else, I was blessed with abundance.
- Christmas had brought an (over) abundance of good food and cool stuff.
- The library had provided a year’s worth of brain food – anything I could ever wish for.
- I had received an abundance of friendship, support and opportunity through my business networking groups (Motivating Mum, She Will Shine and The Happiness Hunter).
- There was an abundance of client work for the New Year, once I was ready to get back into it.
- My little family had provided an abundance of cuddles and laughs and good times. We’d even had an abundance of holidays throughout the year!
- My home provided an abundance of comfort and joy, nestled amongst a garden abundantly producing herbs and beetroot and co-dependent carrots. An abundance of eggs will soon rock up from our gorgeous chookies, who have already provided us with an abundance of entertainment. Not to mention the abundance of nature – the trees, flowers, birds, butterflies, frogs, bats, dragonflies, mosquitoes – that is right here at our doorstep.
All in all, my life was pretty darn ABUNDANT!
As I sat there, I also realised that the word “abundance”, like “success” has largely been hijacked – to be associated only with money – and that it deserved a much broader definition. Sure, money is part of it, but it is not the most important part.
To come to that understanding, by the simple task of focusing on the one word for the year – researching and reading, highlighting, exploring, actively pursuing, meditating – really did feel like success. To be grateful for all this, meant that I had also benefited from the previous year’s Focus Word, “Grateful”. One word, building on another, to create a real shift in my life.
My, this Focus Word thing is powerful stuff!
So it was with some surprise that I discovered my 2015 Focus Word. It had been rocking around in my head (non-stop) for a few days in the form of Pharrell Williams’ song, “Happy”.
HAPPY – of course!
In many ways, it feels like “going for broke”! After all, isn’t happiness the ultimate goal – what we actually hope to achieve by choosing these words in the first place?
That won’t stop me from actively focusing on it though with more reading, researching, exploring and meditating. What you focus on grows, right?
And while I see this as my own personal focus, I also hope to pursue it on a broader scale too – to focus on helping others – to be happier people, happier clients, happier parents, happier kids, happier communities and hopefully, a happier world.
Wishing you a HAPPY 2015 everyone!
PS. Blogging is something I know makes me happy, so I am hoping to get back into in 2015… Hold me to that, OK!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6Sxv-sUYtM
I’ve never done the ‘one word’ thing until now but it sounds like you made a huge success out of yours. I hope to hear how your year of HAPPY goes 🙂
I won’t promise it’s an easy thing to do! There have been some big life lessons along the way, I can assure you. Best of luck with your One Word thing too.