Anne here, teetering on the brink of the new year.
I have to say I’m quite glad to be leaving 2025 behind. I had so many technical problems last year and the cumulation of them really threw me off balance. Amazon froze me for months and I couldn’t find anyone to help me — and it was all a result of my credit card being hacked (for the second time this year.) Then the email company my server dumped us on turned out to be useless — half my emails blocked and they took weeks to respond. And MadMimi, the company I used to send out my personal blog and newsletter, closed and in the process of migrating to a new company I lost a third of my newsletter subscribers and almost half of my blog followers.
For a while there it seemed as though I couldn’t do anything without having tech hassles. It was so frustrating and disheartening.
BUT a new year is coming, I’m fairly sure my tech problems are solved (fingers crossed), and I’m feeling much more positive! So I’m sitting down to make a bit of a plan for 2025. Not a hard-and-fast one — more a visualization of what I want to do.
Among the author groups I belong to, there are two smallish private author groups where members choose a word to inspire them for the next year. First we reflect on the previous year, and articulate what we want to achieve/feel/be inspired by. Then we choose a word, and explain what we mean by the choice. It’s remarkably inspiring.
With the smallest of my groups, the one with people I actually get to see once a year when we go on a writing retreat, I make little WORD bracelets or dangles. They’re very simple and cheap — elastic thread, colorful little wooden beads and letter beads spelling out each person’s word for the year. Some people like bracelets and they slip them on to write, or when they want to be reminded of their word. Others prefer “dangles” that they hang somewhere where they’ll read the word every day. I haven’t decided on my word yet, but I have a list of possibles.
What about you? What parts of 2024 are you glad to leave behind? And if you could choose a word for you for 2025, what might it be?
Happy New Year, Anne! In addition to (fingers crossed) solving your technical issues, you’re also ending the year with a terrific new book – I spent yesterday with The Secret Daughter and loved it, so thank you for making my year end a real pleasure!
2024 has been tough for my entire family, with major medical issues and the political situation affecting many, but going through it made me appreciate anew the support I get from my circle of women friends, so my word for 2025 is GRATITUDE. I need to acknowledge it, express it, and treasure it.
I am grateful, too, for all the pleasure the Word Wenches and this blog’s followers have given me through the year – the books you’ve published and recommended, the interesting posts, and the insights provided by the comments have all enriched my life, and I wish you all the very best in 2025.
Constance
I agree with everything you wrote in your post.
Gratitude. A great word for the year and one I think I may have to keep reminding myself to acknowledge as the year unfolds.
Happy New Year to everyone.
Thanks Alison. Yes, I agree that focusing on Gratitude is a good habit for all of us to develop. I think it helps to rebalance all the negative stuff, that all too easily drags us down. Happy New Year.
Thanks so much, Constance. I’m so pleased you enjoyed The Secret Daughter. As for a word for this year, I think GRATITUDE is an excellent one — it’s all too easy to focus on the bad things, and remembering things you’re grateful for balances that. And yes, women friends are to be celebrated. I love this: ” GRATITUDE. I need to acknowledge it, express it, and treasure it.”
All the very best for 2025 to you and yours.
Sorry you’ve had such a tough time Anne ….. for some reason it reminded me of Cromwell cancelling Christmas! 😟
I heartily agree with the above comments and my word is DISCOVERY. In 2025 I will be looking to discover new authors and new understanding of the cosmos …… as well as catching up with some Wench audios. 🙂
Thanks, Quantum — if I could have blamed Cromwell, I would have! But a lot of my difficulty was in only getting bots to complain to, and even when I got “help desk” actual people, it turned out that they had no power to fix things — just report my problem. Which then got ignored.
I love your word. DISCOVERY is such a lovely adventurous word, and there are so many new avenues to explore. Best of luck with it — and thanks for being a Wordwench friend. All the best for 2025 to you and yours.
Yikes! I would have gone nuts dealing with those tech issues Anne. We are probably all susceptible to that so I just keep my fingers crossed. Just reported yesterday about a big data breach at the US Treasury Dept. As for my word, well, I always have Hope but I think this year it will be Strength. It’s needed for dealing with everything life throws your way no matter what.
Thanks, Jeanne — I don’t know about nuts, but I was Very Grumpy and Frustrated!
STRENGTH is a good word. I do think in the coming months we’ll all need it, and Hope as a general attitude is vital, I think. All the very best for 2025.
Well, drats, Anne. I regret that 2024 was such a challenging year for you tech wise and hope that 2025 will be far more satisfying.
I’m not a very introspective person so choosing a word of the year is challenging (hmmm, that word again). I do like all those that have been mentioned thus far — GRATITUDE, DISCOVERY, and STRENGTH. Perhaps my word can be DITTO!
Thanks, Karen — I’m just glad 2024 is over. Right now I’m trying to plan things for a better 2025.
I’m chuckling at your word “Ditto” — trouble is, you need to drag the others along with you do you have something to ditto. I saw a photo on FD last week, of two houses. One was a mass of twinkling Christmas lights, the house next door just had a single line of lights that read DITTO. Made me laugh.
A continued benevolent outcome for all technical aspects of your life, Anne.
I always enjoy the now, and going forward from there. I like the word authenticity in all ways from me as I leave 2024 and celebrate 2025.
Thanks, Patricia — I hope my tech woes are behind me. Authenticity is a terrific word for 2025. Enjoy.
Life will improve. Because you are too good a person to deal with tech junk for very long..
And cause I said so.
Take care and enjoy 2025. No where to go but up.
Thanks, Annette. I hope you’re right. I h0pe 2025 is good to you as well.
Happy New Year, Anne, and to all of the Wenches and bloggers!
I’m stuck thinking about words such as “Possibilities,” “Adventure,” and “Determination.” Of course, “Possibilities” can go either way! I think that I should zero in on “Determination,” as there are things that I really need to accomplish, such as cleaning out closets and the basement, all of which I keep putting off. Who knows what I will find that was stored away years ago? The attempts might really be an “Adventure!”
Patricia, I love the sound of ADVENTURE for you. And Determination is good, too. I can support you on the value of decluttering — I pursue that goal in fits and starts, and one day will conquer it! This week I’m planning to go through my clothes and ditch the ones I no longer wear. If they’re in good shape they’ll go to the op-shop (charity shop — it’s short for Opportunity Shop), otherwise it’s the bin for them,
Oh, Anne, so sorry to near about your tech woes! So frustrating and aggravating. So glad you were able to get them sorted! Here’s hoping for a better year ahead!
Gratitude/gratefulness seems to cover a lot of territory for me. Good books to read, good friends to spend time with, a lovely, comfortable, home and community to live in, a wonderful, cozy library that not only bas books to read but fun, interesting programs to attend and so much more…..
And thank you for the wonderful, interesting blog that you all provide.
All the best for 2025! 👍👍😊
Thanks so much, Jane — I hope those tech woes are behind me, too.
I love “Gratitude/gratefulness” as a word to focus on. I think it helps to balance all the negative stuff we can get bombarded with , and reminds us that even small things to be grateful for are to be celebrated.
All the best for 2025
I posted on FB on 12/31/23 that “I wish when I wake up tomorrow that it is 2025” and 2024 proved to be the year of all the misgivings I thought would come to pass. Thankfully, it is now in the past and there is hope at the start of any new endeavor that things will get better or be better. Probably not but one can always hope!
My word for 2025 is KINDNESS. We need to be kinder towards each other. We can agree to disagree politely, find our common ground and go from there.
Also I wish to Anne all good tech Karma in 2025 as balance to the bad Karma of 2024.
Mary I really hope you’re right about leaving the bad things behind us, and for the good tech Karma wishes. I think we’re going to have to battle to make that true, however.
“My word for 2025 is KINDNESS. We need to be kinder towards each other. We can agree to disagree politely, find our common ground and go from there.”
I totally agree with you, there, Mary. Kindness is such an undervalued thing, but so very important. All the best to you for 2025.
I’m halfway through The Secret Daughter, and all I can say is I hope the tech troubles are behind you. Technology was supposed to improve our lives, not displace humans, but things seem to be trending in that direction. People are forgetting to learn to do things themselves because they always have a phone handy to look things up or do the math for them. Fortunately you still have to be able to read to use a phone, but still it astonishes me that there are people now who can’t read or write handwritten material. I wonder what the future holds for writers. There will always be a desire to tell and hear stories, but what medium will they be told in? I look back at the 20th century now and it seems a golden age; there were *always* new books available. So if we want to worry about something, we can worry about that 🙂
Happy New Year, I hope your troubles are behind you, and you have no further tech angst 🙂
Thank you, Janice, and I hope you’re right about my tech troubles. Part of the difficulties I had was because most of the so-called “help” departments are bots, and it’s almost impossible to talk to a real person. Add to that large companies like Amazon do have real people, but as I found, they can’t actually do anything except report your problem. I discovered that on my 7th phone call to amazon (US) when I’d just begun to explain and the person on the phone cut me off saying he’d spoken to me before, and he apologised that it had been going on so long, and explained that they could do nothing, only forward the info to some other department. So I think the golden age of help desk real people is behind us.
I hope you enjoyed The Secret Daughter. All the very best for 2025, and thank you for being a wordwenches friend for so many years.