What's my word for 2012?

My friend and fellow artist, Joyce Wycoff, writes such wonderful posts on her blog. Recently she posted about choosing her word or word for the year. I've done it in the past but not for the last few years. Her post got me thinking about it again and I decided to pick 3 words. They were:

AWARENESS

ACCEPTANCE

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

My thought was to spend 2012 being more aware of things around me, more aware of my needs and wants, more aware of my family and friends' needs and wants, just more aware in general. I wanted to be more able to show acceptance of my talents and the talents of others and to be better about acknowledging and encouraging other artists in their pursuits. All worthy and respectable thoughts, right? But the more I thought about these "A Words", the less excited I became about following my first inclination regarding the words for 2012. Maybe because I wasn't sure I could and would expend energy on them or maybe because I already naturally expend energy on them.

So, I ABANDONED them--another "A word"! I decided to ACTIVELY ASSERT myself in finding a better word or words. I obviously and APPARENTLY needed ASSISTANCE because the next words were not much more ACCEPTABLE. I settled on these 2:

Exuberant Extravagance. Very interesting, and a lot more exciting, but when I looked up the meanings this is what I found: Exuberant means "filled with or characterized by a lively energy and excitement" or "Full of unrestrained enthusiasm or joy" or "Lavish/extravagant". Sounding a bit redundant to use in conjunction with Extravagance, isn't it? Since extravagance means "lacking in moderation, balance, and restraint" or "extremely or excessively elaborate". And I have heard people's subconsious thoughts as well as verbally expressed beliefs that my paintings are already exuberantly extravagant and out of control and so am I! LOL Perhaps it's my unrestrained enthusiasm and joy that does me in every time!? So, I continued to flounder around for a while in my search for the perfect word or words. And it came to me in the middle of the night--the answer to my quest--

 

This needs to be my year to focus. 

I will focus on the business of running the gallery and working hard in the studio and 

teaching exciting, interesting, and engaging classes to groups of artists and non-artists alike. 

So, there you have it--my word for 2012 (my last and final word for 2012!) is

FOCUS!

I'll close with a paraphrased quote that I used to use a lot and I don't remember who said it:

"You can hit any target as long as you know what it looks like and it doesn't keep moving." 

Onward and upward, let's "Sparkle and Shine" into 2012!