2022 Word Of The Year Is Cancelled
To all those wondering about the origins of the Word of the Year (WOTY), it began in December 1990 when the American Dialect Society selected “bushlips” as their first ever WOTY entry. (For those wondering, this comes from President Bush stating ‘Read my lips, no new taxes’ and now means insincere political rhetoric.
By 2003, Merriam-Webster released its first WOTY, “democracy”. Then, not long after, Oxford University Press joined in on the concept in 2004, announcing their Word of the Year, “chav”.
And now fast forward to 2021, any guesses what the Word of the Year in the Oxford English Dictionary might have been?
It was “vax”, of course!
Which brings me round to why I’ve decided not to choose a 2022 word of the year.
Do you usually pick a word of the year? I do.
But this year, for me, it felt like the wrong thing to do.
Photo credit: Anna Moffat Photography
Let me explain, I was a huge fan of picking a word of the year. I’ve been doing it for years! But as I reflected back on how 2021 went for us all, I was at a loss for words (pun intended).
I found it hard to pick just one word because it felt like every single month (or more like every single minute) something unexpected could happen - things change, plans fall through and the long term goal you planned so carefully at the start of the year ends up long forgotten – which makes it hard to imagine picking just one word to sums up the whole year ahead, doesn’t it?
If there’s one thing this pandemic has taught us, it’s that things can change at any moment. We now know first-hand that things don’t always turn out as planned. We need to be agile. It’s no longer probable that we can maintain such a long-term focus or be as rigid in our thinking as we could pre-pandemic.
We need to be :
Flexible with our plans
Open-minded in our thinking
Accepting of sudden changes
Reactive to current situations
Aware of possible opportunities, and
Anticipatory of potential situations we could be put in.
So instead of trying to sum up my year in one word, I’ll be choosing a word for each month.
And my word for January is “CONSOLIDATING”.
To me, consolidating means firming up my plans for 2022, not trying to forecast too far into the future, but making sure plans are in place for the year I want to have, quarter by quarter.
So far this month I’ve been making decisions about my offerings and how to improve them further. This is the month that I also look into what I want to do more of in my business, what I need to do less of and what to get rid of altogether.
Having a word of the month will keep me on track with the things I want to focus on, while still providing some leeway to flex in line with any potential changes in the future. Plus, it eases the pressure of having to stick with just one thing for a whole year which feels great.
So … how about you? Will you be choosing a word of the month with me? Or will you be sticking with a Word of the Year? Let me know!
If you already know that your focus this year is to grow your audience, make sure you download my free resource, the Audience Growth Checklist.