Lately, as I approach the new year, I’ve been selecting a theme I’d like to invoke for the coming year.

At last night’s solstice ritual we each selected a word, going round in circle sharing it and lighting a small candle that each woman took home with her to represent the birth of the light joined with that theme.

Last year my word was UNFURLING and my goodness, have I this year! I wrote: “Unfurling is the process of unfolding, of expanding, of growing outwardly from what is wrapped up tight within us.” In getting quiet and reflecting, I can see all the ways I’ve stretched up toward the sky this year.

And as I look toward 2016, the word that has come to me is WONDER. There is so much newness and unknown coming down the pike this year.

After 1/25/16 I really have no idea what my life will look life, when I pack up what’s left of my things and head to Santa Fe. It’s so strange to experience that cliff-like feeling of complete unknowingness. And my hope for myself is that each day I can wake up and experience the WONDER of whatever comes to me, finding that childlike sense of awe in the beauty that is this life.

I’d love to invite you to select and share your word for this year if you’d like…holding the seed of it close underneath the earth of the longest night, and bringing it into the dawn. (I took this photo recently at Lake Drummond in Virginia…wonder at its finest.)