In ancient times, wise men and women fled out into the desert to find a place where they could be fully present to the divine 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 3, 2025 and you are automatically entered for the prize drawing (prizes listed below).
Join our Give Me a Word Self-Study Retreat for guidance and inspiration.
This retreat is designed to help you contemplate what holiness is birthing within your soul. Each day there will be a different practice offered to inspire, challenge, and support you in listening for the word that wants to be spoken to your heart.
The practices are not about resolutions or goal setting, they are not about achieving more in the new year or accomplishing tasks or goals. They are about listening for what is calling to you in a particular season of life. They ask us to trust a greater wisdom at work in the world than our own egos.
Through this retreat, you will be invited to release your thinking mind and enter into a space of receiving.
Learn more here. Use code GMAW20 to take 20% off through December 31st.
WIN A PRIZE – RANDOM DRAWING GIVEAWAY ENTER BY JANUARY 5th!
- One person wins a space in the mini-retreat Holding Paradox: A Retreat with St. Brigid led by Simon de Voil
- Two people win a space in our upcoming A Midwinter God retreat
- Two people win a space each in their choice of Self-Study retreats
- Three people win a Dancing Monk Medallion
Please share your word with us in the comments below
(and it would be wonderful if you included a sentence about what it means for you)
Subscribe to the Abbey of the Arts newsletter to receive ongoing inspiration in your in-box. You can choose daily, weekly, or monthly. Share the love with others and invite them to participate. Then stay tuned – on January 12th we will announce the prize winners!
201 Responses
Apricity
The warmth of the sun on a cold wintry day. I came across the word accidentally but while thinking about a bio I needed to write I was drawn to the sense of brilliance it communicates in a cold, dark, season. Then the poem echoed the sentiment.
“May we become this light for others,
to be a promise of radiance emerging
from every place that feels cold and dark.”
“Be Well”- a mantra for physical renewal became
“Be A Well” – filled with God’s graces upon which others can draw. May I be filled with God’s blessings to share with others in this New Year.
GRACE (INHALE)
GRATITUDE (EXHALE)
This “breath mantra” came to me last year in an embodied way. In my 2024 year-end blog, I found myself writing about gratitude. I’ve taken this to mean it’s worth another year’s focus, together with grace. Goodness knows it’s worthy of a lifetime’s focus and attention.
Kindest regards…
Release.
I want to release the things that are standing in the way of my ability to cultivate space for what is life-giving.
Release.
This winter I want to release the things that are standing in the way of my ability to cultivate space for what is life-giving.
Resourcery
The magic of collaboration and co-creation.
Recollection
Recollection has been showing up in readings, conversation and prayer. It’s an old word from my childhood when my older relatives would “recollect” as they told stories from their lives.
It was a place to gather up memories and tell them as stories. But it is also a re-collection of the bits and pieces of myself left along the way that are calling to be reunited with my now 70 year old self. So, the word becomes a journey of restoration for 2025.
The word that would not let me go was “Behold” and it comes from a phrase used often as we enter prayer with scripture in the spiritual exercises of Ignatius. “Behold God beholding you in love.”
Presence
Simplify.