One Little Word 2016

Thank to Two Writing Teachers for creating this space to share our stories.  Read other slices or write your own and share here. 

A new year.  A new word.  A new story.

Last week I tweeted how choosing a one little word is almost as serious as naming a child. Much thought goes into choosing this word which will guide my new year.  I love reading everyone's stories of how their OLW found them.

Here is my story in three parts.

Part one:  

In December I challenged myself to write a haiku a day.  Writing every day opened my eyes.  I captured life in snippets of syllables and learned that life appears differently when looking at it through the lens of a poem.  

Small things appear big and big things appear small.

If you look at my blog posts, a time span of about six days is void of poems.  That was the time when I was held hostage by the chaos of life and school.  I was not taking the time to see the snippets, and I realized how much I missed it.  I began wondering if I was missing the opportunity to see and live life because I was so wrapped up the chaos.

Part Two:  

During this time I also was pondering my one little word.  I narrowed my list to two words, but felt one was tugging a little harder than the other.  I began looking for signs, quotes, or inspiration to see if this word was truly calling me.

It wasn't.

Everything I read about this word made me feel that I had to change me by adding something or taking something away.  It was do this and do that.  

I didn't want to change me.

I was discouraged, and I began looking for another word.

Part three:

I have a student writing group, and I started making an "I am..." idea prompt in my notebook.  As I was making this list:

a daughter

a sister

a wife

a mother

a teacher

a quilter

a reader

a Christian

I realized that some of these titles were who I am, but most were who I became. There is a difference.  

I decided to change my list to "I choose..." and my list started looking like this... 

to laugh

to cry

to believe in God

to be kind

to write

to read

to teach

to inspire

That is when I realized that my one word I had been thinking about was right all along.  All three of these events became an epiphany.

I don't have to change who I am.  

I get to choose who I am, and I choose to become me by living and capturing my life in snippets.  

In snippets that matter.

In snippets with intent.

My One Little Word for 2016:

Intent

{ion}

{ional}

{ionally}