LIVE 2009

*I apologize, I wrote about this on my other blog, so most of this will be a bit of a repeat, but it bears repeating as I'll be mentioning it over the coming months!

I love the start of a new year, the chance to start fresh with a new beginning. This year is likely to be filled with new things as we look forward to Ella's birth. I recently stumbled across an idea of Alie Edwards on her blog--the idea that she calls One Little Word. She explains that "the idea behind the one little word concept is to give yourself something to focus on throughout the year." In her newsletter back in January 2007 she wrote, "A single word can be a powerful thing. It can be the ripple in the pond that changes everything. It can be sharp and biting or rich and soft and slow." She went on to challenge her readers to identify a single word that sums up what you want for yourself in 2009. She explained that the word "can be something tangible or intangible. It could be a thought or a feeling or an emotion. It can be singular or plural. The key is to find something that has personal meaning for you." As I look forward into 2009 this idea really resonates with me.

My word for 2009? LIVE.

verb {intr.}
-to be alive; exist
-to maintain or support one's existence; provide for oneself

verb {trans.}
-to go through, to experience or enjoy life to the full

adjective
-full of life, energy or activity
-vivid or bright, as color

I find this word appropriate as we look forward to welcoming new life into our family this month. I love the quote by Henry David Thoreau:

"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms, and, if it proved to be mean, why then to get the whole and genuine meanness of it, and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by experience ..."

I like the concept of focusing on being more deliberate about the way we live life, not just passively being carried along by the currents. Albert Einstein said, "There are only two ways to live your life. One is that nothing is a miracle and the other is that everything is a miracle."

So here's to 2009--to living life deliberately and not passively, to welcoming new life, to nurturing life . . . to experiencing the miraculous.