I’ve decided on my word for 2025: Possible.

There was a time when I felt that anything was possible.

At 29 years old, I almost died but didn’t. “I’m alive! I’m invincible! Anything is possible!”

At 33 years old, I completed my undergrad degree, summa cum laude with a 4.0 GPA. “Holy shit, I’m smart! I got my degree! It’s never too late! Anything is possible!”

At 34, my first company was growing like crazy. “85 lessons and 12 consultations on the books for this week! Locations in 2 states! 10 employees working for me! This is a real business! Anything is possible!”

But where there are peaks, there are valleys, and such was the case for me.

At 35 years old, my marriage ended.

At 36 years old, I closed my company.

At 41 years old, I declared bankruptcy.

It’s hard to pinpoint when I stopped believing that anything was possible.

To be fair, I’m not sure I ever did stop believing that anything was possible — I just stopped believing that anything was possible for me.

The divorce was a major ignition point for this.

After my marriage ended, I continued to experiment, create, and attempt to build. The problem was, in addition to feeling heartbroken and angry, I was also under-resourced and overextended. Underlying all that was the fact that I was living in what is known as a functional freeze state, brought on by the circumstances of the divorce. I was doing my best to survive and thrive, but over time, I became completely burnt out and ultimately stayed that way for a long, long, looooong time.

You can’t really create from burnout. So, over the years, I tried and failed at many well-intended endeavors. I also found it difficult to get the type of support I needed. This is how, I think, the belief that anything was possible for others but not for me started to congeal.

At the same time, though, I never quit on myself. Some inexhaustible, deep-down part of me still did think things were possible for me. I kept trying and tinkering, experimenting and pivoting. I collected a lot of wins. I cried a lot. I learned a whole lot more. I carried on and provided the best services I could, and I believe my work was impactful.

The irony is, and what I’m realizing right now in this actual moment as I’m typing this, is that: I was proving to myself that anything was possible for me the whole time.

For instance:

• With my ex-husband out of the way and me exclusively at the helm, my company had its best revenue year ever, reduced its costs, and even reported a tiny profit. “Holy shit, we’re doing it! Anything is possible!”

• I left singing lessons behind and successfully pivoted into an entirely new market, offering speaking and communication coaching. “Oh wow, I can follow my passions and instincts and still get work! Anything is possible!”

• That bankruptcy, which I thought would ruin me, actually put me on the path to financial recovery and strength and helped rebuild my confidence. “Ermahgod, my credit score shot up 100 points! Anything is possible!”

Here’s the thing, though: When you’re living in burnout and functional freeze, while you can acknowledge your wins, you can’t truly absorb them fully into your body or your lived experience. It’s never enough. You’re never enough. Nothing is ever safe. You’re always waiting for the fallout or the failure. You’re always on guard.

It’s pretty exhausting, tbh, and it perpetuates the burnout. Round and round you go.

At least, that’s how it was for me.

The hard truth is that you’ve got to find a way to get to the root cause of your shit and heal it, or else you start to feel like I did: perpetually stuck.

Now, please hear me when I say that I don’t believe that moving to a new place will solve a person’s problems.

At the same time, it’s also true that a person cannot address their problems or delve into deep healing if they are living within an environment or situation that requires all of their time and energy to be spent ‘just getting by.’ For me, moving out of the San Francisco Bay Area and back to Upstate New York provided me with the material conditions of safety that have allowed me the space needed to do some major healing and growth — i.e., the cost of living is significantly lower here, and my family and many friends are close by.

I’ve spent every moment of the past 4 1/2 years healing my trauma, releasing fear, rebuilding my sense of self, and laying the foundation for a confidence cultivated through deeper self-awareness and more conscious communication. 2024 alone was a year of immense transformation for me, for which I am unbelievably grateful.

I’ve mentioned all of that before, so forgive me for repeating myself, but it’s a fundamental part of how I got to the word possible.

It sounds incredibly cliché, but I feel like I’ve been waking up from a deep slumber. Or like I rubbed my eyes and can see more clearly. Choose whatever metaphor that describes for you the feeling of:

“Oh wow, I’m actually here now. I don’t know where I was, but I’m here now.”

It’s an absolutely amazing feeling. It’s also the kind of feeling that you don’t realize wasn’t there until it returns. At first, it’s confusing and a little hard to trust. And until you get used to it, it’s actually kind of hard to be with — it’s very raw and overwhelming to the senses. It’s both an emotional and physical experience.

It’s interesting how much effort and practice it takes to get comfortable with the idea of feeling comfortable, or good, or present.

Discomfort and disconnection are easy — especially when that’s been the default setting for so long.

Relief…joy…safety…aliveness. Oof. Absolutely brutal.

At first!

The amazing part is, that once you get used to it, you realize that this is the place from which you can live the life you want and create the world you seek.

I find myself wondering if I was able to do all that while I was sleepwalking, what is possible for me now that I’m more fully awake?

The thought literally makes my skull feel like it might crack apart. It’s exciting and terrifying, and it feels like a big responsibility that will require a lot of thoughtfulness and intention.

And…in a responsible, thoughtful, and intentional way, I’m totally ready to fuck around and find out. Let’s goooooooo!

So many parts of me are coming back online that I didn’t know were even still there. Parts of me that I suppressed for a million different reasons. Parts of me that I forgot about. Parts of me that didn’t feel safe to be seen.

And especially the part of me that didn’t feel safe to feel safe. ⇐ UUUUUUGH. This one has been the hardest one to deal with. Absolute nightmare. But with patience and compassion, we’ve been slowly and gently building a lovely relationship.

And so it is that from here, I commit my attention to exploring what’s possible.

To support this exploration, I am also committed to:

• Bringing discipline and consistency to the practices that keep me connected to presence and aliveness.

• Acknowledging and showing gratitude toward all that is possible for me now or has been possible for me before, whether I could recognize it at the time or not.

• Courageously putting myself in the path of possibility and aligned opportunity.

• Using my voice in whatever ways I can to help others expand and elevate their ideas about what’s possible for them.

• Directing my curiosity and willpower toward using the concept of ‘possible’ as a tool for creating positive and sustainable change in my life and the world around me.

Now it’s your turn. 🙂

Do you have a word for the year?

If so, what structures, commitments, or practices do you have in place to support you in exploring and embracing that word?

I’d love to hear what you’re working on in your life right now. Feel free to share in the comments, or reply directly to this email.

As ever, I’m here for support as a friend and a coach. If you want to explore how coaching can help you, book a 100% no-obligation call here. If you just need to chat with a friend and get a second set of eyes or ears on something, book a call here.

Happy New Year!

I’m very much looking forward to seeing how all of our journeys unfold in 2025.

Let’s goooooooo!