SHARE YOUR WORD FOR 2017
In ancient times, wise men and women fled out into the desert to find a place where they could be fully present to God and to their own inner struggles at work within them. The desert became a place to enter into the refiner’s fire and be stripped down to one’s holy essence. The desert was a threshold place where you emerged different than when you entered.
Many people followed these ammas and abbas, seeking their wisdom and guidance for a meaningful life. One tradition was to ask for a word – this word or phrase would be something on which to ponder for many days, weeks, months, sometimes a whole lifetime. This practice is connected to lectio divina, where we approach the sacred texts with the same request – “give me a word” we ask – something to nourish me, challenge me, a word I can wrestle with and grow into. The word which chooses us has the potential to transform us.
What is your word for the year ahead? A word which contains within it a seed of invitation to cross a new threshold in your life?
Share your word in the comments section below by January 6, 2017 and you are automatically entered for the prize drawing (prizes listed below).
A FREE 12-DAY ONLINE MINI-RETREAT TO HELP YOUR WORD CHOOSE YOU. . .
As in past years, I am offering all Abbey newsletter subscribers a gift: a free 12-day online mini-retreat with a suggested practice for each day to help your word choose you and to deepen into your word once it has found you. Even if you participated last year, you are more than welcome to register again.
Subscribe to our email newsletter and you will receive a link to start your mini-retreat today. Your information will never be shared or sold. (If you are already subscribed to the newsletter, look for the link in the Sunday email).
WIN A PRIZE – RANDOM DRAWING GIVEAWAY ON JANUARY 6TH!
We are delighted to offer some wonderful gifts from the Abbey:
- One space in our upcoming New Year’s online retreat – Spiraling Inward: Seven Celtic Spiritual Practices
- One signed copy each of Illuminating the Way, Soul of a Pilgrim, Eyes of the Heart, The Artist’s Rule, and Water, Wind, Earth, and Fire.
- One space in our online program Sacred Seasons: A Yearlong Journey through the Celtic Wheel of the Year
- 4 people will win their choice of our self-study online retreats
So please share your word (and it would be wonderful to include a sentence about what it means for you) with us below.
Subscribe to the Abbey newsletter to receive ongoing inspiration in your in-box. Share the love with others and invite them to participate. Then stay tuned – on January 6th we will announce the prize winners!
316 Responses
My word is ESTABLISHED. Something I am going to be, I believe, in God’s ways and timings, after a long desert existence.
My word is simplify. For 2017 I will be holding an intention to simplify and declutter every part of my life, so I may make room to focus on what really matters and so I may hear the hints and whispers of the Beloved more clearly when He calls.
Detach. To allow for what is beyond what currently is. To detach from the current dance, and embrace a new way.
RELISH!
Relish each moment I have on this wonderful planet & in this wonderous life, with my amazing family, with my awesome friends, with my unique and much-needed gifts the Divine chose to honor me with. Relish every moment as if it were my last & best. Relish my ability to feel all emotions & release them out into the Universe. Relish!
Wait. For what life has in store for me next.
Brave. I need to be brave enough to be present, to be kind to others and myself, to be who I was meant to be.
Begin. One step at a time, “even if you cannot see the entire staircase.” Unless I begin, I will not complete (whatever goal I have – fitness, spirituality, creativity). This past month I have been inspired by Julia Cameron’s book “It’s Never Too Late to Begin Again.” So, I simply must begin the next phase of my journey, which begins now,
Restoration. After a difficult 2016, I’m looking forward to a year of quiet healing and restoration.
My word came clearly to me this morning: FREEDOM. . . as I move into my 70th year I realize that the only things that prevent me from opening the gates to joy completely are my very own subtle restrictions and beliefs around responsibility, duty and relationship. I want to cross that threshold where freedom invites me to be free of those patterns and to open me to endless possibility at my age to explore and develop a new me who is not bound by anything other than love and compassion. I feel freer already not yet even really knowing what it is I’m seeing but yet feeling a powerful emergence of something within and I trust I will be shown the way.
I spent 2016 doing major “releasing,” so my word for 2017 is INTEGRATE. May it be just as powerful as release was this year.