One Little Word January 2013

Reading Cate's post in Life behind the Purple Door, I was reminded about Ali Edward's delightful Big Picture Class; One Little Word. I first found this class in 2011 and chose for my first word PLAY. Coming from a serious family, playfulness is often a challenge for me. Ali's course gives you a monthly prompt to think about your word in different ways that bring your word into focus each month. I managed to keep up with the activities until the latter part of the year. I do confess to noticing I never quite got to December.

When I wrote my post about my 2013 intentions, two things happened, I really thought that I hadn't chosen a word for 2012 and I had difficulty choosing between Relinquish, Embrace and Create for 2013.

This morning I was looking for a notebook and found an entry from last January saying that my chosen word for 2012 was FOCUS. Wow! I sure lost sight of that word very quickly last year.

Doing Ali's course helped me keep my One Little Word in focus in 2011 so I have decided to sign up again for 2013. I have spent all morning (in the hairdresser while my roots were changed from grey to brown again) brainstorming about my three words and I decided that my One Little Word for 2013 is EMBRACE.

Ali's first task is to find 12 intentions around your word; one for each month of the year. She used her example of her word OPEN to identify such things as Open-Heart, Open Door etc so I found myself totally stumped with EMBRACE.

Luckily I had to sit with colour on my hair for a whole hour, and slowly little by little I let go my preconceptions (and was very thankful I wasn't doing Relinquish) and found an inspiring list of 12 Intentions that I now need to turn into a pretty scrapbook page.

Here are my 12 EMBRACE intentions for 2013

 1. EMBRACE creativity

• Make quilts, write regularly and with purpose, blog often, take photographs daily

2. EMBRACE connection

• Enjoy and create space & time with family, friends, fellow bloggers and class participants

3. EMBRACE less

• Shop wisely, declutter and shed weight

4. EMBRACE stillness

• Enjoy moments of solitude, slow down enough to take great photos and even meditate regularly

5. EMBRACE structure

• Get back into a daily exercise routine, return to meal planning and food journalling, redesign my office/creating space

6. EMBRACE flow

• Reduce  micro-managing, invite spontaneity and remember to breathe

7. EMBRACE challenge

• Say yes more often and when the going gets tough, (breathe and) try again

8. EMBRACE opportunity

• Stay alert to the possibility of new opportunities especially things that are outside my comfort zone

9. EMBRACE forgiveness

• Respond with compassion to my mistakes and the failings of others. Acknowledge and allow imperfection in all of us.

10. EMBRACE learning

• Learn, practice and test new skills. Make time to implement not just learn

11. EMBRACE independence

• Giving my 22 year old son the space to become independent and learning (myself) how to create a life that is more separate from my husband / ex-business partner and co-owner now we have sold the business.

12.  EMBRACE life

• Less whingeing, more gratitude. Less angst, more kindness.

Well here's cheers to a wonderful 2013. Leave a link in the comments if you are doing OLW and would like to share the journey. I'd love to see what you are doing.