What would your one word for the year be? Forget resolutions. One word does more work than a list you will have abandoned by February.
Mine came out of simplifying. Take away what you do not need and it goes right down to the complicated things. If you love something you accept it rather than trying to change it. Embrace the anxiety, because it is the seven year old saying watch out, last time this was rubbish. My word is curiosity. Open, and asking what is happening now.
One thing to try: Pick your one word for the year. Just the one. Say it out loud and see if it holds.
In this episode
(0:01) Happy New Year, and what this one is about
(2:37) Too much junk television, and it not shifting
(4:52) Simplify. Take away what you do not need
(7:14) If you love something, you accept it as it is
(9:48) Embrace the anxiety. It is telling you something
(11:41) Curiosity, and using it in sentences every day
With gratitude to
Jessica, Laura, Katherine, Joan, Ulysses, Lisa and Audra.
Support the podcast and join the Weekly Calm: stevenwebb.uk
Thank you for listening.
Steven
The question this answers
What would your one word for the year be?
Forget resolutions. One word does more work than a list you will have abandoned by February.
I am recording this after a few weeks off with a chest infection. Because my chest muscles are paralysed my cough is fairly pathetic, so the body helpfully floods the lungs with liquid to help me shift it, which for me is closer to drowning. I had an ambulance out the Sunday before Christmas and a bottle of oxygen in an hour to get my levels back to 90. I asked to stay home, which I have never done before, because in hospital I would have been lying flat all day and I needed to be sat up to cough.
The heart of it
One word, gone deep on, beats a list of resolutions.
Pick an everyday word. There are around 271,000 in English and we use about 3,000. You have plenty.
Mine this year is simplify.
What does it mean in practice? If I am recording a podcast, what is the simplest form of it. If I am going to meditate, just sit down and shut up, as Jun Po would put it. If the folder does not need to be there, delete it. Take away what you do not need, and it goes right down into the complicated things. I do not have to do the whole process. I just have to make the phone call.
You do not spend the year studying the word. You come back to it. In a month or two I will look up where simplify came from and find it means more than I thought.
Some words worth considering. Acceptance, which I prefer to love, because I think ultimate love is acceptance. If you love something you accept it rather than trying to change it. Gentle. Pause. Trust. Enough. Release. Ground. Kindness. Listen. Curiosity, which I like a great deal, because it opens conversations. Somebody says something you disagree with and you say, I am curious, why do you feel that way.
You could even pick overwhelmed. There is nothing wrong with choosing the difficult one and getting to know it.
Embrace your anxiety. It is that seven or eight year old going, hey, watch out for this, last time it was rubbish.
The test for any word is one question. How does this reduce my suffering? That is the whole spiritual journey as far as I am concerned. Less suffering in you, less suffering caused around you.
One small thing to try
Pick your one word for the year. Just the one. Say it out loud and see if it holds.
Then leave it alone. Come back to it in a month and ask what it actually means, where it came from, and what it is asking of you that you did not notice in January.
Questions people ask
What if I pick the wrong word?
There is not much of a wrong one. If it stops being interesting in March, that is information, and picking a second word is allowed.
Is this the same as a resolution?
No. A resolution is a task you either complete or fail. A word is something you keep turning over, and it cannot be failed.
Does it have to be a nice word?
Not at all. Overwhelm, fear, grief. Sometimes the word you need is the one you have been avoiding, and a year is long enough to get to know it properly.
Read along
The transcript
It follows the audio. Press any line to jump there.
values · purpose · change
Read the transcript
Hello, and welcome to Stillness in the Storms.
I'm Stephen Webb, and this is your podcast that helps you through
difficult times.
And happy New Year to you all.
I haven't been recording for the last few weeks because I have
had a dreadful cold cough and, dare I say it, man flu.
Although there's some truth about that, that's a different story.
Because I'm paralyzed and my chest muscles are paralyzed.
I have really struggled to fight off this cold flu thing.
I ended up having to have an ambulance out on the Sunday before
Christmas, and they gave me a whole bottle of oxygen in the space
of an hour just to get my stats level back to 90.
And they wanted to take me in the hospital, but because I was lying
in bed, and if I went into hospital, I would have still been
lying in bed for most of the day waiting for my steroids and antibiotics.
But I wanted to get up.
I wanted to be able to get in my chair so I could lean forward
and cough properly.
Because I only breathe and cough with my diaphragm, this is
turning out a way longer story than I thought it was going to be.
But I'll tell you the story anyway.
And because no chest muscles, so my cough is quite pathetic.
And I find it really hard to cough anything off.
So what the body does so beautifully is it floods the lungs
with liquid in order to help you cough it off.
It has no idea that I'm paralyzed, and it really is not a
good idea.
So it ends up drowning me in it.
So I need to be able to lean forward in the chair to cough.
So I said to the ambulance, paramedics, can I refuse to go in
this time?
And I've never done that in my life.
And if I get out of bed in a space of next hour, because my carers
were then here, the one was here overnight, but the second pair
of hands turned up so they could get me out of bed.
So then I said, look, if I'm still bad in an hour, can I call
you back?
And they said, yep, no problem.
So they wrote up the notes, they got hold of a doctor, they put
out the prescription.
So I got out of bed after a few hours and taking the steroids,
I was feeling better.
I could breathe, I could cough it off my chest.
But I spent the next week taking steroids, sat up in bed.
I spent nearly every night just sat right up in bed because
I couldn't lie down, because if I did, I just coughed all night.
And shallow breathing, just, yeah, not take a deep breath.
And then watching tv, I'VE watched so much junk TV at night,
but yeah, and then after Christmas and all that, it just wouldn't
go.
So I went on to the second.
Lot of antibiotics and steroids, different type this time.
And yeah, it's just gone.
And I forgot what it's like to be.
To have a bit of energy.
So, last couple of days.
So I'm recording this podcast, but this podcast is going to focus
on one thing, One simple thing, one word.
So thank you to so many of you that have donated over Christmas,
and that is Jessica, Laura, Catherine, Joan, Ulysses and Elisa,
and a few more of you and Joan and Ulysses.
40 coffees.
Wow.
Also Carrie.
And I'm trying to think off top of my head.
It's so many of you.
Look, just.
Thank you so much.
And of course there's Laura and Audra and all those that donate
monthly.
And we've got a new person that's just signed up to monthly.
Absolutely incredible.
You're all brilliant.
Thank you so much.
I'm going to put a list of my monthly donators at the bottom of
the page just to say thank you, you are awesome.
And you keep it ad free so we can get on with it.
So I'm going to do that right now.
I want to.
I try to pick a word every year and I'm not very good at sticking
to it and really thinking about it, but I want to do it this
year.
So my word this year is simplify.
Simplify.
And what does that mean to me?
Well, to simplify means to take it down to its simplest form.
So if I'm recording a podcast, how can I do it in the most simplest
form?
That's not complicated.
Let's not set up everything.
Let's not put obstacles in the way.
If I'm going to meditate, what does that look like?
Just a simple meditation.
Just sit down and shut up.
As Jumpo would say, Stuffu Stuff.
I said, what's stuffu mean?
It's S T F U, you know, shut the fuck up.
So I swear, if you haven't got kids in the car while listening to
this and.
But yeah, stuff who just simplify it.
Just take away what don't we need.
And it really goes down to the most complicated things we have to
do.
What do I have to do right now?
I don't have to do the whole process.
I just have to talk.
I just have to recognize that thought as a thought.
I just have to phone somebody.
I just have to book that in or so simplify everything.
You know, if that folder doesn't need to be there.
Delete it.
If the side is busy, get rid of a lava.
So that's what I'm going to try to do this year.
I'm going to simplify as much as possible.
So your job this week is to consider what word you're going to
have this year.
And it seems dramatic to have a whole year with one word, but it
really does work.
And Daicho, one of my teachers, does it every year.
And you can choose anything.
It can be compassion, can be love, it can be overwhelm.
Maybe you want to choose overwhelmed and recognize the overwhelm.
It can be family.
It really doesn't matter.
It's just a word that you're going to go really deep on now.
Then by the end of my year, I'm not going to spend every day
studying the word simplify.
But I will look up where it come from, what it really means,
and what does it mean for me.
So I think I know what it means.
But in a month or two months, I might look up and go, well, yeah,
simplify was way more than I thought it would be.
It's way deeper, it means way more.
What does it give me?
And when you think about things like, I don't know, a compassion,
what does compassion mean?
What does it mean to have compassion for myself?
What does it mean to have compassion for others?
What's the difference between compassion and empathy?
I did a podcast on that if you want to look it up.
Or the word love, what does it really mean?
What does it mean to be loved or to love or acceptance, which I
prefer acceptance than love, because I think ultimate love is
just acceptance.
If you love something, you just accept it.
You don't try to change it in any way.
So what would your word be?
And there's.
So, you know, the English language has got like 271,000 words.
I think we use, on average about 3,000 of them.
So you've got a few words to choose from and you can even go fancy
and go for a Latin word.
But I would suggest just keep it an everyday word and just really
dive deep into how does this word reduce my suffering?
So how does simplify reduce my suffering?
Because that's the whole spiritual journey, the spiritual
journey is about reducing our suffering and reducing the suffering
around us.
You know, Buddha said that the Four Noble Truths is, number one,
to be alive, to be here, to be part of samsara, the thinking mind.
The ego is to suffer, you will always suffer.
Number two, suffering is because of attachments, because what
we want it to be.
It's not because you're attached necessarily to a item or
a friend or a partner.
It's because we're attached anyway and we're attached to what
we want this position to be.
I'm not happy this moment.
How do I change it?
I'm not happy with my weight or my hair lighter.
Why is it gray?
I want to get rid of this virus.
I want deepen my spiritual journey.
Everything is all about wanting an attachment to it.
So, and then number three, there is an answer to attachment.
There is a solution to it.
And the solution is through meditation and the eight, the Eightfold
path, which if you'd like me to please let me know and I'll go
through the Eightfold path with you.
But in amongst the Eightfold path, it's all about just living
a more humble life, simplifying things, doing things
and less suffering.
Every single one of them is about causing less suffering in the
world and less suffering to ourselves inside.
So I look at the whole spiritual journey.
If you've got more peace and your anxiety is more under control
because you won't get rid of it, it's a beautiful emotional emotion
that has evolved over the years to give you absolutely a wonderful
teaching.
You know, if you embrace your anxiety, it's telling you something.
It's that seven, eight year old going, hey, watch out for this.
Last time it sucked.
That's not my anxiety voice.
I don't know where that voice come from, but you get the point.
And whether or not it's, you know, courage or fear or shame or
all of those things, it's about if you're reducing them, not
getting rid of them, just being able to recognize them and
go, hi shame.
Hi fear.
How you doing?
What are you teaching me today?
And you could also go, hey, fear, you're right, I'm not going
to do that because it's dumb.
You know, that's going to be stupid.
I'm going to get hurt doing that.
So sometimes listen to it, sometimes the anxiety is bang on.
You know, it's not about getting rid of these things, it's
about, ah, there's a thought.
I'm not going to spend all day being anxious or being overwhelmed.
I'm going to recognize it and go, ah, hi, thanks for showing up,
good advice, take care.
But I've got this.
So.
So if you can choose a word, you know, some of the words you could
choose acceptance.
Just fighting against the reality creates pain.
So accepting things exactly as they are allows us to find peace
just immediately, just acceptance.
I accept this thought.
I accept this moment.
Gentle.
Just teaching yourself to be gentle with yourself and gentle with
those around you.
Just more healthier judging.
So I'm going to just list the words.
I'm not going to go through every word of what they mean, but
you could use pause, trust enough, release curiosity.
I love curiosity.
Just be open, curious, what's happening now?
What's happening inside?
Why do they think that way?
You can even use it in sentences every day.
When someone comes up and says something you don't necessarily agree
with, just go, I'm curious, why do you feel that way?
And it opens up the depth of conversation ground.
That's a nice word.
Kindness, listen, understanding, compassion.
Any kind of words.
It really doesn't matter what word you want to work on this year.
And this is different than the three words to show up as we'll do
another podcast next month on that one.
But my word is simplify.
What's that mean?
In every single moment of my life, how can I simplify this moment?
How can I close 15 tabs on the computer?
Imagine that.
How can I turn off the notifications on my phone?
How can I just simplify this moment?
So there's my podcast.
I'm going to say thank you so much to everybody that supports everybody.
That's part of the weekly calm that is more like every three weeks.
But maybe simplifying things will make things easier.
And as I said in my weekly calm before Christmas, I'm going
to get some help with my admin side and my editing side, which is
going to make things a whole lot easier.
So I'll be able to release more meditations, more podcasts and.
And that again, it's simplifying things.
So there you go.
I'm just going to.
Your donations help me to do that.
Your donations will pay for some of the things that I struggle
to do in Paralyzed.
So thank you for being there.
Thank you for the donations, thank you for the support, the shares,
all the comments.
I read them all, whether it's on Spotify, anywhere.
If you could leave a review, that would be awesome.
Leave a review and put your word what you can.
But you can always go to stephenweb.uk and message me.
Always like hearing from you.
Sometimes it takes me a few days to get back to you, but it is
what it is.
Inbox.
I don't go there every hour of the day anymore simplifying that.
But I'm just rambling on now.
Take care and happy New Year.
Let's have a peaceful one and let's hear your word.
