I am loving you back to remembering.

These were the words that flooded into me as I stared into the eyes of the saints and sages whose images rest on my altar.

I sit in intentional silence more frequently at this time of year, waiting for my word, my guidepost for the upcoming new year to reveal itself. This year, the word has already been tapping me on the shoulder for a while, so it was no surprise how instantaneously it confirmed its presence. My word is environment.

I realize I can only hear such a profound transmission once I am committed to sitting in stillness rather than lingering too long in the tension between acceptance and action that many are battling on our political minefields. It is a sobering reminder that being human is sometimes terrifying, yet it can also be wonderful and sublime.

Environment includes not just your physical space, but your emotional, spiritual, and mental space as well. I believe that it can and must be curated, and that once the decision is made that environment is one of your values, the positive products of such are able to be recognized and welcomed.

So, I am committed to being an environment that loves you back to remembering that you are pure essence, oceanic in your potential, and to know, as the poet Walt Whitman wrote, “that the powerful play goes on, and you will contribute a verse.”

I will be an environment that reminds you that every letter of every word of your personal verse has value. I will remind you to write, speak, and live your life with unrelenting willingness to this remembering that who you long to be you already are.

I have no other analysis or instructional discourse that compares to this.

I will be an environment for loving you back to remembering.