One Word. Encapsulate the year in one word. Explain why you’re choosing that word. Now, imagine it’s one year from today, what would you like the word to be that captures 2020 for you?

From years past: 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011 and 2010

The one word that captures this year:

Resilience

Last year, I had hoped the word would be Comfort. Interestingly, my initial thought of the word was acceptance. But I wanted acceptance of the way things were and how I was able to work with it.

And because of the work that I had been doing at my current job—building a Resilience program through building inner strength, practicing mindfulness, regulating emotions, and carrying thoughts…it had to be this word.

It’s the idea of bouncing back in the face of tough times. Maybe it’s because of all these behavioral things that I have seen. And not just looking at others, but thinking about how it might apply to myself. In college, I was constantly devastated thinking that the world was against me. Fridays were always unlucky. People were mean. And it’s not that I still think that things are bad. They are bad. But I work with it and they don’t trouble me into a constant dark place.

I used to let other people’s anger or disappointment get to me. That it says something about me. But I have built some of kind of inner strength to know when people say something about me…that it’s not about me. Of course, I have known about this for more than a decade. But I think that I have truly embodied it.

All people can be like children in a tantrum. I can be too.

Next year, I hope that maybe…with this resilience, I would seek gratitude. Gratitude for myself. Gratitude that I carried all of this forward.