My word for 2025

I've always kind of felt a 'word for the year' to be another New Year's cliche - a marketing ploy that coaches etc. use to get people engaged so they'll commit to even more communication. It's fun, it's easy, and what does it hurt? It works on me, after all. In previous years, when I saw a little "what's your word for the year" call to action online, I usually paused to spend at least a few seconds mulling the thought.

But, let'ss face it. Anytime I've chosen a 'word of the year' by the time it comes around to choosing the next one 12 months later, I've forgotten the last one. So much for impact!

So this year, I found myself rolling my eyes and scrolling on by when I saw online-product coaches prompting readers for their 'word of the year for 2025.' Although for the purposes of this blog post, I did ask ChatGPT it's AI suggestions:

Resilience – For staying strong and adaptable through challenges.
Simplify – Focus on what truly matters by decluttering your life.
Intentional – Live with purpose and focus.
Bold – Step out of your comfort zone and take risks.

..Blah, blah, blah.

That doesn't mean that I'm not using the New Year as my excuse to get shit done. After all, see? I'm blogging. But after 5 surprising years on the fringes of digital marketing, I've become very skeptical of so called self-help suggestions that are really just marketing hooks (IMO)

Until, as I was reviewing my 'gotta do if I wanna be' and rephasing my 'I wanna be' thoughts into "I am' affirmations, a word of the year suddenly stamped itself on my brain as I was writing down phone numbers for businesses, goverment agencies, and financial institutions I need to call to wrap up loose ends.

ENOUGH.

Not "I am enough."
Not a big, round fulfilling "enough."
More like "Enough of this shit"

I'm not going to go on a blogging rant about what I'm fed up on, but I am going to plop this here so that throughout the year, as I squash a few ridiculous connections, or solidify a few good habits, I can reveal that I've put this or that thing behind me. None of these are earth shaking, which is why it's important to just say ENOUGH!

If you've got a word of the year, I'd love to hear it. However, if you are rolling your eyes and moving onto better things, I'll absolutely send you a virtual high five.

New Year, New Cliché

It's hard to write on New Year's Day without resorting to some cliche about new beginnings or new resolutions. After all, every year we get older we hear the same things over and over again, so yeah, since I started paying attention at about age 5 (my parents would bring home party hats and noise makers that they'd pass over to us kids) that would be 57 years of the same old platitudes.

Nonetheless that "new start" vibes are hard to shake after all that time. The higher the expectations you place on 'starting over,' the further you fall when you don't meet those expectations. Which is why I'm aiming for a lot of little 1% changes this year. Day by day, month by month.

I had to do some bigger 10% changes yesterday, getting all the cats on AdoptAPet.com after giving up on Petfinder when it kept giving error notices everytime I tried to add a photo. Of course, as soon as all of my cats were added, Petfinder started working again. But, too late. I'm too tired to re-add them all to Petfinder this week. And I've already gotten some inquiries via AdoptAPet. Now my 1% will be improving their bios a bit each day, and maybe adding one each day or so to PF. We'll see.

Today's 1% is writing this blog post. Any blog post. A blog post a day will help keep the lonelies away, once I've gained a little traction again, and follow up by reading my friends' blog posts, too. There are still a few old-time bloggers out there, doing it to stay in touch, rather than to sell, sell, sell.

Here's to incremental changes in 2025!