Connection - Word for the Year
At the beginning of each year, I have a practice of choosing a word that will guide me throughout the coming year. It’s like a theme for the year. I find this a helpful way to focus myself on things that are important to me.
Many people I work with also find that choosing a word helps them notice patterns they might otherwise miss. It’s a cool way to frame the year, stay aligned with personal values and make progress on something that is important to us.
This year my word is CONNECTION.
Why Connection?
Because connection shows up everywhere in my life right now – sometimes very clearly, and sometimes in subtle or uncomfortable ways.
Children
I’m a parent of young adult children. It’s a transition that has it’s challenges. I am proud of who they are and want them to live their “best lives”, yet there’s a part of me that just wants to hold them tight, protect them and keep them close.
The challenge is to find that balance of creating a new relationship between adults. I need to continually explore new ways to stay in touch, express caring, provide support and encouragement in ways that also acknowledges who they are, what they have achieved, their values and importantly isn’t too “smothering” and also isn’t too distant.
Many parents of adult children recognize this tension, even if we don’t always talk about it. I’d like to explore ways that will help me get better at that.
Partner
Even couples who have a long term stable relationship can benefit from improving connection. With busy professional responsibilities and full lives and a busy household – it is easy to get out of touch, take each other for granted, make assumptions and drift into old/stale patterns. Even strong, stable relationships can slowly shift into efficiency and habit if we don’t notice what’s happening.
Friends and Extended Family
Adult life can quietly dismantle the structures that once made connection effortless. I personally have family that has dispersed all over the world. How can I best stay in touch with them, even if it’s online or on the phone or by text for the most part?
I have the same issue with friends – people I grew up with or got to know well as an adult. None of us live in the same place as we once did. What are the best ways to maintain these relationships? And what about making new friends?
As an adult it can feel hard to make new friends, and unless you still live where you grew up, it can feel lonely and isolated. We also all seem to have busy lives that are fully booked and hectic – often with professional or personal responsibilities. In many places there are limited opportunities to meet new people and/or to solidify those relationships into friendships. But there are ways…..
Community & the World
A loneliness epidemic has been announced – with most of us increasingly living inside, staying at home, connecting predominately online. More ways to stay connected than any time in history – yet most people report feeling more lonely and isolated that ever before in history.
Despite more ways to stay in touch than ever, many people describe feeling unseen, untethered, and alone.
