a word you can live inside

Dear Reader,

New Year’s Day has a strange quality to it. The calendar flips and even if nothing in your life has changed overnight, the day still carries a sense of possibility. There’s often a desire for us to start clean, to choose well, to step into the year with a little more intention than you did before.

One way to meet this moment, without trying to force it, is to choose one word you want to live inside this year and treat it like a lens you keep returning to. Something that helps you notice what matters when life gets chaotic. It does not have to be impressive, or public, or perfectly defined. The best word usually feels steady when you say it. It gives you a little more room to breathe. It can point you toward the person you want to be in conversations, in your work, in your home, and in your own head.

Once you have the word, you can keep the practice small on purpose. You do not have to map out the whole year. You can ask a simpler question in ordinary moments. What might this word look like today, in its smallest form, in a day that is imperfect and a little messy. When the action stays small, it becomes easier to practice without turning it into a performance.

If you are feeling the urge to reinvent yourself right now, you are not alone. That urge makes sense. New Year’s has a way of shining a spotlight on all the places we want to grow and all the places we feel behind. A word can help with that, simply because it gives you something to come back to when you drift, without needing to make it dramatic or harsh.

Find your word today. Then stop there. Let that be enough for January 1.

Happy New Year!

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the unnecessary choice

Dear Reader,

Christmas can be tender. It can also be a lot.

Even on a good Christmas, there can be an undercurrent of trying to get everything just right. We want people to feel loved, and we want the day to carry meaning. We want to hold onto what’s special, too, and sometimes all of that becomes pressure, especially if you’re the one carrying the invisible details.

So here is a softer way to practice intentionality today. Look for one choice you can make that isn’t required of you, but is kind to you. Something small that reminds you that you’re allowed to exist inside the day, not just manage it. Maybe it’s sitting down for a few minutes before moving on to the next thing. Maybe it’s stepping outside for air. Maybe it’s letting yourself enjoy one moment without reaching for the next one.

These small choices matter because they bring you back. They help the day feel less like something you have to perform and more like something you can receive. They make room for what’s here, even when it’s mixed. Even when joy and grief are sitting at the same table. Even when you miss someone. Even when your heart feels both full and tired.

If you want a simple practice for Christmas Day, choose one unnecessary act of gentleness and do it slowly. Let it be quiet. Let it be yours. Sometimes that is enough to bring you back to the heart of the day.

Merry Christmas and God bless,

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the yes you don’t need to earn

Dear Reader,

A lot of people say they want to be more creative, but what they’re really describing is a wish to feel more free. Creativity gets difficult the moment we demand it make sense. When every idea has to be useful, polished, or defensible, we stop making things and start auditioning instead.

Somewhere along the way, many of us learned that permission comes after proof. We earn our way into things by being good at them, productive with them, or praised for them. Creativity doesn’t work that way. It asks for the kind of yes that comes first, before the result is impressive.

This is often where people get stuck. They wait until they have more time, confidence, or clarity that it will be worth it. But creativity is not a reward for being ready. It’s a practice of becoming ready through doing.

The shift is subtle but powerful: choosing to create as an act of permission rather than performance. Letting yourself write the paragraph that no one will read. Sketch the thing that looks wrong at first. Cook without needing it to be impressive. Start the project without deciding what it will become. When the pressure to be excellent loosens, something else has room to appear: play, curiosity, aliveness.

The yes you don’t need to earn is honest. It’s the recognition that making something, even poorly, even privately, is part of being human. And the more often you allow that yes, the more natural it becomes to trust your own creative life again.

Yours in the journey,

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focused attention

Dear Reader,

So many of us live our days with an attention that never truly lands. We answer a message while half listening to someone speak, scroll while we eat, think about work while standing in the shower. The mind moves quickly, but very little feels truly touched by us. At the end of those days, it can be hard to remember what actually happened, only that we were busy inside all of it.

Focused attention is one way of stepping out of that blur. It is the decision, even for a short stretch of time, to let one thing be the thing you are with. Long enough that your mind, body, and presence are in roughly the same place. In those moments, life becomes meeting what is here, right now.

You do not need long stretches of silence to practice this. You can pick a single conversation, a single task, a single walk, and decide that, for this small window, your attention belongs here. When the mind wanders, as it will, you notice that and come back without scolding yourself. Over time, these small returns begin to change the feeling of your days. Life feels a little less like something that is happening around you, and more like something you are actually inside of.

Yours in the journey,

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clear enough to move

Dear Reader,

Many of us make decisions as if each one has to carry our whole life. We stall, gather more opinions, and hold the choice so tightly that it begins to hold us. Simplifying a decision is not about lowering the stakes. It is about choosing a frame that fits the moment, so you can move without pretending you know everything.

A helpful first move is to sort what kind of choice you are facing. Some decisions set direction. Others simply express the direction you have already chosen. Direction-setting choices may need more time, another conversation, or one more piece of information. Expression choices usually need a boundary: a time limit, a budget, or a brief list of what matters most right now. Naming the kind of decision you are in reduces the fog.

Reversibility also clarifies the path. If a choice can be revised without heavy cost, set a small interval and test it. Pick the option that teaches you the most with the least risk. If a choice is harder to unwind, return to your values and one concrete criterion. Ask what you are protecting, and which option protects it better. Perfection is not required; alignment is.

Your body can offer useful data here. Imagine saying yes and notice what happens in you. Imagine saying no and do the same. You are not looking for comfort, only for steadiness. If both options feel workable, choose the smaller step and give it a clean trial. Decide for the next hour, the next week, or the next season, rather than for forever.

The goal is not to make flawless choices. It is to create decisions that are clear enough to move, honest about what you know, and kind to the person who has to live with them. When you practice deciding this way, the day stops deciding you first.

Yours in the journey,

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