12.8.25 // 2025's Perspective

2025: "Perspective"
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I've been choosing a word of the year since 2015, and usually by the time December rolls around, I’m already sprinting toward the next one. I’m quick to look forward, brainstorm, build something new, and in that rush, I rarely pause long enough to notice how the word itself unfolded, how it lived in me. How the universe tried, loudly, softly, or through sheer coincidence... to show me what I claimed I wanted to learn.
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Maybe I’m connecting dots that only exist in my own mind, but isn’t that the entire point? Isn’t that exactly what "perspective" is?!
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This year, "perspective" felt everywhere...
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And perspective did not arrive neatly wrapped. It came disguised as change: jobs (plural), environments, expectations, friendships, even the story I told myself about who I should be by now. I practiced keeping my mouth closed a little longer than was comfortable, letting others lead, letting silence stretch itself across the room like something I didn’t need to fill.
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I made space for friends to tell me what they saw, for books that weren’t my usual nonfiction or fantasy escapes (the real world is heavy enough, I don't often invite more of it in). I finally did The Artist’s Way and discovered that creativity is sometimes less about making something and more about meeting yourself.
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As I look toward 2026, I can see the next word starting to take shape in my mind, but I’m in no rush to claim it. "Perspective" earned its space this year. It pushed me into uncomfortable rooms, asked me to sit with questions longer than I wanted, and stretched me. It didn’t hand me answers, but it widened my lens, which, while I thought was the intention when I chose the word in December 2024, unfolded into a far greater opportunity for clarity than I could’ve imagined.