This month's issue of "Guideposts" magazine has an article by author Debbie Macomber. Each year, she chooses one word to concentrate on for the year. Or rather, a word picks her - she just has to keep her eyes and ears open while deciding. I decided to follow her lead and picked "hunger" as my word for 2012. So much of who I am deals with hunger - the overeating, the hunger for knowledge, for love, for serenity, for solitude, for peace. Debbie has chosen such words as faith, trust, and even hunger (it was her first, too, back in the 1990s somewhere, I think). I am going to try to listen: to my body, my thoughts, my feelings, and try to discern just what it is I am hungry for at that moment. I know I often eat when it's the last thing I really want or need. Maybe I can change that. I especially need to work on feelings - I spend so much time and energy trying not to feel anything.

I once read a book by Geneen Roth titled "When Food is Love". It took so many attempts before I was able to read it all. I'd get into the first chapter or two and just start sobbing. It would be months before I could pick it up again, then I'd start over. For two whole years after I was finally able to read it through, I was working so hard on being healthier, until yet another disillusionment came along. Maybe this is a way I can get back on track and stay there.

So, in 2012: I hunger for strength, discernment, good food within healthy limits (both quality and quantity), knowledge of new things, the ability to recognize & appreciate special moments, a stronger (and smaller) body, and a closer relationship with God. Not necessarily in that order, though. :-)

Til next time,

L