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Hello Lovelies, and welcome back to the blog. Today I am letting you in on my focus word for 2021.
If you’ve been here a while, you know I’m big on goal setting. For the past few years, I’ve been choosing a single word to represent the type of things I want to hone in on and cultivate in my own life. Essentially, you choose one word, phrase, or song, and use that to focus your intentions throughout the entire year. I call this my focus word, and it has helped shape and define my path.
Why do this? Well, if you’re trying to make a decision on something, you have your focus word to guide you. For instance, I chose FOCUS as my focus word the first year, because I was all over the place with multiple unfinished writing projects and I wanted to zero in on one project and work on it exclusively to get it done and off my plate. When the single project got hard and I wanted to quit and pursue some shiny new idea, I remembered my focus word and made a decision not to pursue the new thing.
Using a focus word can also help you shape your goal setting. You direct your attention from that one single word. Say you use Healthy as your focus word for the year. It could mean any number of things to different people. If your mental health is in decline, maybe you make this your year to do some research, reach out to a close friend and tell them about your struggles, and go seek professional help. Maybe you establish healthy boundaries with your friends, family, coworkers, and with your electronics. If your physical health isn’t great, maybe you do as many pushups or crunches as you can while you’re waiting for your coffee brew in the morning, and maybe you stop eating junk food after dinner, and maybe you take up a dance class or go to the gym.
You can build in small habits that lead to big change. Is five minutes of running in place waiting for your coffee to brew or your computer to boot life changing? No. But is it more physical activity than you are doing now? It might be. Is drinking a glass of water after dinner life changing? Not really, But if it helps you curb that craving for sweets one night just before bed and you sleep better as a result, then you’ve already succeeded.
You can use small changes to lead to bigger ones. Habits stack on one another. 5 minutes of exercise in the morning isn’t huge on it’s own, but it ends up being 35 minutes a week. In a year, you exercise for 1820 minutes, or roughly 30 hours. And that’s if you only do the 5 minutes a day. All you have to do is show up for 5 minutes.
We talked last week about doing the ONE thing that will make everything else easier in your life. I can’t tell you what that one thing is for you, that one domino that will make all the others fall into place. So I encourage you to take some time and really think about it. Boil it down to it’s barest essential parts. What is one thing that you know you need to do that will make your life better?
My word this year is ENERGY.
I want to do everything in my life with energy.
They say that breaking into the publishing business from the slush pile is really hard work. It is a ton of keeping your head down, showing up, doing the thing, over and over and over again. It is a lot of gatekeeping and networking and trying to be seen in an ocean full of other fish. For the last few years, I’ve done that. I have taught myself all the things I’ve thus far needed to learn, I’ve kept reaching out and trying to finish my manuscript with little to no writerly support. And now that I have a system for writing novels, the writing part has become almost mundane to me, where it used to be the best thing I could be doing was to draft.
So this year, I want to bring my energy back to the table. I want to spend the year writing draft after draft in a series of YA/Paranormal books. I want to feel like I can love the writing process again instead of hating everything I write all the time without end. I want to just write and trust the process and trust myself.
I also want to bring energy to my work life and my personal life. I won’t go into detail about how the word applies for me there, but suffice it to say that I’ve been able to set goals that revolve around my energy in every aspect of my life. Instead of having twenty vague ideas about what I want to achieve, how much weight I should lose, how much writing I need to do in a year, etc. I can focus in on bringing my energy to the table in new and different ways. The same goal, different ways to achieve it.
So tell me what you think of my focus word for 2021! Do you choose a focus word every year, and if so, I’d love to hear your word for this year! What is one thing you could do for yourself this year that, if you achieved it, would have impact on the most areas of your life? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
Hello Lovelies, and welcome back to the blog. Today I am letting you in on my focus word for 2021.
If you’ve been here a while, you know I’m big on goal setting. For the past few years, I’ve been choosing a single word to represent the type of things I want to hone in on and cultivate in my own life. Essentially, you choose one word, phrase, or song, and use that to focus your intentions throughout the entire year. I call this my focus word, and it has helped shape and define my path.
Why do this? Well, if you’re trying to make a decision on something, you have your focus word to guide you. For instance, I chose FOCUS as my focus word the first year, because I was all over the place with multiple unfinished writing projects and I wanted to zero in on one project and work on it exclusively to get it done and off my plate. When the single project got hard and I wanted to quit and pursue some shiny new idea, I remembered my focus word and made a decision not to pursue the new thing.
Using a focus word can also help you shape your goal setting. You direct your attention from that one single word. Say you use Healthy as your focus word for the year. It could mean any number of things to different people. If your mental health is in decline, maybe you make this your year to do some research, reach out to a close friend and tell them about your struggles, and go seek professional help. Maybe you establish healthy boundaries with your friends, family, coworkers, and with your electronics. If your physical health isn’t great, maybe you do as many pushups or crunches as you can while you’re waiting for your coffee brew in the morning, and maybe you stop eating junk food after dinner, and maybe you take up a dance class or go to the gym.
You can build in small habits that lead to big change. Is five minutes of running in place waiting for your coffee to brew or your computer to boot life changing? No. But is it more physical activity than you are doing now? It might be. Is drinking a glass of water after dinner life changing? Not really, But if it helps you curb that craving for sweets one night just before bed and you sleep better as a result, then you’ve already succeeded.
You can use small changes to lead to bigger ones. Habits stack on one another. 5 minutes of exercise in the morning isn’t huge on it’s own, but it ends up being 35 minutes a week. In a year, you exercise for 1820 minutes, or roughly 30 hours. And that’s if you only do the 5 minutes a day. All you have to do is show up for 5 minutes.
We talked last week about doing the ONE thing that will make everything else easier in your life. I can’t tell you what that one thing is for you, that one domino that will make all the others fall into place. So I encourage you to take some time and really think about it. Boil it down to it’s barest essential parts. What is one thing that you know you need to do that will make your life better?
My word this year is ENERGY.
I want to do everything in my life with energy.
They say that breaking into the publishing business from the slush pile is really hard work. It is a ton of keeping your head down, showing up, doing the thing, over and over and over again. It is a lot of gatekeeping and networking and trying to be seen in an ocean full of other fish. For the last few years, I’ve done that. I have taught myself all the things I’ve thus far needed to learn, I’ve kept reaching out and trying to finish my manuscript with little to no writerly support. And now that I have a system for writing novels, the writing part has become almost mundane to me, where it used to be the best thing I could be doing was to draft.
So this year, I want to bring my energy back to the table. I want to spend the year writing draft after draft in a series of YA/Paranormal books. I want to feel like I can love the writing process again instead of hating everything I write all the time without end. I want to just write and trust the process and trust myself.
I also want to bring energy to my work life and my personal life. I won’t go into detail about how the word applies for me there, but suffice it to say that I’ve been able to set goals that revolve around my energy in every aspect of my life. Instead of having twenty vague ideas about what I want to achieve, how much weight I should lose, how much writing I need to do in a year, etc. I can focus in on bringing my energy to the table in new and different ways. The same goal, different ways to achieve it.
So tell me what you think of my focus word for 2021! Do you choose a focus word every year, and if so, I’d love to hear your word for this year! What is one thing you could do for yourself this year that, if you achieved it, would have impact on the most areas of your life? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
