I’m not a huge fan of New Year resolutions. Don’t get me wrong – I make goals all the time. But forcing myself to make a resolution just because it’s January has never been a very effective way to motivate myself. I’d prefer to make goals that I truly want to achieve when I am ready to work on them.

Instead of resolutions, last year I chose three words that I wanted to guide me through 2014. For example, instead of making a goal to get in shape or run a certain race, I chose the word “strength.” Choosing words or themes help carry me through the year without getting bogged down – like when I stopped running shortly after the start of the year due to health problems.

For 2014, I chose strength, release, and complex as my three words. Check out how it went here.

The three words I chose for 2015 are:

Blossom
Toward the end of 2014, a few friends mentioned to me (on separate occasions) how I seemed to be blossoming after going through some really tough times. After the second person mentioned it to me, I knew that was going to be one of my words for 2015. This past year held a lot of hard times. But I feel like the hard times were grounding me and will be what allows me to blossom and continue to grow in 2015: to blossom is to flourish.

Love
When I think about what my life should look like, it’s easy to get overwhelmed. There are so many things to do and so many things I need to improve. Keeping love as an overarching theme helps keep my priorities in check and allows me to make better decisions about where to spend my energy. And although my spiritual journey has had a lot of ups and downs over the past few years, I am learning that if I just focus on love (loving God, loving others, and loving myself), things will naturally start to sort out. I am in the ever continual process of learning to love myself, despite all of my shortcomings and insecurities, as well as learning how to better love those around me.

Fearless
“Be fearless” has become my personal mantra, and it’s something I want to adhere to even more in 2015. This year contains a lot of fresh starts and unknowns. I have no idea where this year will take me – and I’m okay with that. I want to be fearless in life, relationships, adventures, work, service, goal setting, dreams, and whatever else may come my way. I want to take risks, and not settle for the “just okay.” I want to be fearless. I think Virgil said it best: “Fortune sides with him who dares.”