Morgann Elyce Davis is our guest blogger today. Morgann is a professional flutist, teacher, writer, and advocate for the mental and physical well-being of musicians (and everyone!). We met more than 20 years ago while singing in Women’s Glee Club at The Ohio State University. Since then, she’s become a trusted voice in my life—someone who shares wisdom and inspiration on performing, mindfulness, work/life balance, and her favorite books. Her monthly emails are always a gift of insight and heart.

Each year, Morgann and I work together to create a custom print for her word of the year. I asked her to reflect on why choosing a word has become a sort of anchor for her. In her own words below, Morgann shares how a single word has helped her navigate life’s greatest joys and most devastating challenges.

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Picking a word of the year has become a great practice for me of forgetting the burden and perfectionism of resolutions and dialing in on what I want to prioritize in my life instead.

In previous years I’ve chosen words like: fluid, consistency, and spirit. Alison and I always work together to get the definitions just right so that they reflect the way I want to frame the upcoming new year.

Typically, I choose a word by thinking about a quality I would like to embrace for what I think the new year holds, but sometimes life shows up in unexpected ways and these words end up taking on a much different meaning than I intended. When I chose release as my word for 2024, I had no idea how much I would need it, or how it might guide me.

Release: to allow, to let life flow, to set free from unnecessary burdens

I have always been a big emotion person. I’m an Enneagram 4, an extroverted introvert, an only child, naive (read: gullible), and sensitive. Crying is my preferred method of dealing with almost all emotions.

As an adult, I’ve found that I need to compartmentalize my feelings or they will completely overtake a situation. I’ve gotten pretty good at compartmentalizing them so they don’t hijack my everyday experiences, in a way that I wouldn’t call avoidance so much as self-preservation. Over time, I became so skilled at it that my emotions felt diffused, almost muted in a way.

That is, until I couldn’t do it anymore.

At the beginning of this summer, we lost one of our cats, Clouseau, unexpectedly to an unavoidable medical emergency. In just an hour, I lost one of my best friends—a daily companion of the last decade. The next morning, I had a headache from crying so much. I loved Clouseau so much and was so full of the conflict of feeling grief that I had lost him and gratitude that I had him at all that I couldn’t force it into my usual emotional compartments.

Later in the year I experienced a different kind of loss. This one pulled the rug out from under my sense that things are generally okay. It was a reminder that no matter how hard we work, how well we care for ourselves or others, or how “good” we are, there are things completely out of our control that will influence every part of our lives. I’m still reconciling my belief that I can manipulate any situation hard enough to make it okay with the knowledge that it’s not possible.

My experiences over the last year reminded me that sometimes life cracks us wide open. My emotions could no longer be compartmentalized or contained. I needed release. Everything was fresh and raw (and also awful and great and overwhelming). I’ve experienced this before, but always found ways to patch the crack, put things back in their place and keep moving. I think we have to do that in some ways to focus forward, but it seems that life always circles back around to remind us that the good is so good precisely because the tough stuff is really, really tough.

Release ended up being the way forward. Not releasing what happened and pretending everything was fine, or releasing the things I wanted for myself. It was release in the sense of not holding everything in, allowing myself to not feel okay for a bit, and acknowledging that I can’t control it all (life or my emotions).

I let myself cry out the tough stuff (you might prefer screaming into a pillow or hitting a punching bag) while celebrating the good: My husband and I love our jobs and our 175-year-old home. We painstakingly updated our kitchen ourselves (so much dust!) in the middle of one of the busiest seasons of our lives. We spent time with our families. I saw friends I haven’t seen in years. I cleansed my soul with live music.

These are my happy places, and the presence of grief or sadness or anger doesn’t make them less so.

So, I’ve released myself to the good and the bad. We are in the thick of it all, but this time I’m not in a hurry to get out and compartmentalize it. I’m seeing the value of swimming in all these emotions and experiences for a while, guided by my sense of release.

As I think about 2025, I’m encouraged by the way one small word can help us look at our lives in fresh ways. Choosing a word of the year is one of the ways we can guide ourselves—a reminder of our inner wisdom and that deep down we know how to carry ourselves through it all.

I’m not totally settled on my word for 2025 yet, but right now I’m leaning toward resonance: the quality of being deep and full; a state of connection; the influence and relationship of internal and external forces; a lasting effect.

Where resolutions have us looking backward (how can I be better?), a word of the year can give us a gentle way to look forward at possibility. How do we want to show up in the world?

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Learn more about Morgann Elyce Davis, sign up for her captivating B-List newsletter, or follow her at @morganndavisflute.

How to Choose Your Word of the Year

Choosing a word of the year is about embracing possibilities, not perfection. If you’re inspired to pick a word, close your eyes and think about your ideal day in 2025. What feeling stands out? Find a word that embodies that feeling. For help, read these other blog posts:

25 Inspiring Word of the Year Ideas for 2025

Choosing a Word of the Year is a Powerful Alternative to a New Year's Resolution

Once you have your word, write it down. Journal about it. Display it somewhere you’ll see it every day. Let it serve as a simple yet profound way to navigate your life.

With love,

Alison Rose

Social media: @alisonrosevintage

Shop: alisonrosevintage.com