Every year around this time, I make a point to be still and listen to the heartbeat of my life. I’m listening for what wants to be born and what needs to die. I’m feeling into what wants to be celebrated and what needs to be forgiven. I’m listening for the things I cannot not do that somehow keep getting pushed off my “becoming” list in the pace of the everyday. I’m listening for the intention of my life.

My intention for this year is love, which bears defining so as to distinguish it from its many overused forms.

Love for me is connection even as it pulls me out my comfort zone and into the high-intensity light of being fully seen and known by others in my life and my work.

It’s consciously choosing gratitude over griping about my first world problems.

It’s living the question by knowing when to let go of the need for concrete answers.

It’s head thrown back, wide-open laughter that takes my breath away, and with it the illusion that I’m in control.

It’s acceptance that I will fuck it up, things will go sideways, I will unintentionally hurt you and feel hurt by you while having the grace to know even in our moments of misery how deserving I am, how worthy we all are.

It is being generous with my gifts, my expression, my contributions in a way that honours all that I’ve been given and have created and affirms the life in you and around us at the same time.

It’s celebrating the joy, messiness and magic of womanhood–body, mind, heart and soul–not as a way to separate myself from the wonderful men in my life but as a way to bring me closer to myself and as a result closer to each one of you.