Ten Years of Choosing a Word

January 5, 2026

🎆 Happy New Year 🎆

Ten years ago, I started choosing a word or phrase to anchor my year. What began as a private experiment became a practice for witnessing my life. I was documenting and reflecting on my decisions, patterns, and consequences. I learned how easily survival can masquerade as success.

What kind of year are you being asked to live in 2026?

Life Before the Words

New Year’s resolutions weren’t something I bought into. Before I chose words, I moved through life by momentum.

I thought my lifelong path was working for and with nonprofits. I was working constantly, without the pay or title to reflect the depth of the work. I went to school in the evenings. And once my program was complete, I was open to the adventure of moving to new cities, new opportunities, and starting over.

I was saying yes before understanding the cost. By the end of 2015, I read Shonda Rhimes's Year of Yes. It gave language to a restlessness I couldn’t yet name. I knew I wanted something different, but didn’t know how to get there.

I mistook endurance for alignment. If I could survive overworking myself, I convinced myself that I must be on the right path.

The Words

These are the words that marked the years that followed:

2016 – 2017 | Be Bold

Looking back, I didn’t choose words to become someone new.

I chose words that named what I was being asked to learn.

2016–2017 | Be Bold

Be Bold wasn’t loud confidence. I was choosing myself repeatedly without applause.

Be Bold looked like continuing to leave jobs, apartments, and relationships. Except now, I was the one widening my net in search of opportunities and no longer limiting myself.

It took discipline and personal sacrifice. They were long days and long nights of focus.

This was the year I worked for Tesla and with Somali-British writer and poet, Warsan Shire. The year I committed to publishing my first book. The year I finished my Stanford Advanced Certification program and began my Executive MBA. I was in constant search of community and my colleagues were leaving left and right. I pitched to Tesla’s HR team to launch Tesla’s Intersectionality Employee Resource Group.

I kept the words "Be Bold" for a second year to test the practice. I was beginning to embody the phrase. This wasn’t expansion without consequence. I was growing at full capacity and confronting my fears.

2018 | Stepping Into the Light

New opportunities came with visibility. I received two offers to join LinkedIn. I traveled internationally for work and it was the first time I took a proper vacation. I was asked to do speaking engagements. And I performed my poetry on stages across the Bay Area.

The light was uncomfortable. I knew it was necessary for my growth.

2019 | Manifestation

The first half of the year was full of achievements, and the second half became my steepest valley.

I graduated from my Executive MBA program. I ran my second half-marathon. I returned to Morocco for the first time in a decade. A couple of months later, my mother experienced medical malpractice in the hospital.

Fear didn’t hold me back. Even then, I practiced bravery everywhere I could.

2020 | Magic

An interesting word for the year that would quickly become a pandemic year.

I moved back to my hometown to be a caregiver. I filled five journals. I became a nurse, advocate, and a witness. Later in the year, my grandfather passed and I took care of all his affairs.

Magic isn’t about sparkle. Magic is endurance with tenderness intact. This year taught me that softness is not the opposite of strength. It’s what makes strength survivable.

i am running into a new year

and the old years blow back

like a wind

that i catch in my hair

like strong fingers like

all my old promises and

it will be hard to let go

of what i said to myself

about myself

when i was sixteen and

twentysix and thirtysix

even thirtysix but

i am running into a new year

and i beg what i love and

i leave to forgive me

—Lucille Clifton, Good Woman: Poems and A Memoir 1969-1980

2021 | Phoenix Rising

I left my dream job and stepped into consulting.

This was the year I stopped proving myself and was open to new opportunities.

2022 | Betting on Myself

I brought an old vision to life through my writing and created products. I relaunched my website. I chose myself as the investment. I moved forward without guarantees.

There was no hype. Only follow-through.

2023 | My Best Self

I became my own blueprint.

I started my coaching certification program. I began facilitating my own writing workshops. Monthly reflections emerged as a way to help me adjust as I identified areas of growth and opportunities. I filled eight journals. I was studying myself.

2024 | Blessing

This year whispered.

The year I revisited the first song I memorized. The first time I journaled. My first mango memory. A library of emotions. The year my old self sat beside my new self. Evolving identity. Roots of my past. Fruits of my labor. Learning that authenticity carries a higher frequency than love. Choosing myself over being chosen.

I published my writing monthly to see where one piece would lead to the next. I formed my LLC. I became a certified executive and leadership coach.

This was the year I stopped writing to process and integrated writing to remember.

2025 | Lock-In

This year asked for experimentation and discernment. It began with disruption that clarified what mattered quickly.

I showed up online more consistently, not to perform, but to practice being present and clear. Lock-in wasn’t about achievement. It was about recommitment. About choosing what to give my energy to and what to let go of.

I revisited running after five years, not as a goal, but as a way to return to my body.

What This Decade Taught Me

I spent years pursuing things I wanted. Once up close, I learned some things I was grateful for, while the cost of others was more damaging. I no longer pursue the things I once believed would guarantee security, safety, and trust. My growth required leaving my support systems behind and starting over in spaces that were never built for my well-being. Now, I’m building a life where I practice listening to my body's signals instead of overriding them. I don’t sacrifice myself for outward success or to keep the peace. I’m grateful to be in a season of choosing how I show up and not auditioning for permission.

I trust myself enough to walk toward what aligns and away from what does not. Becoming is not a destination. It is a practice that includes revisiting tools to ask, "What do I need right now?" Sometimes the answer is familiar. Other times, it’s revealed for the first time.

Looking back, the words weren’t motivational. They were mirrors.

Over time, they traced a progression I couldn’t see while I was living it:

from doing → transforming → being → practicing → to evolving

The Practice

Each year, between Christmas and New Year’s Eve, I get quiet and return to my journals. I study myself and the year that shaped me. I get clear about the word I want to anchor in for the year ahead. I don’t rush to announce it. I give it space to work on me first.

An Invitation

Dear Mango isn’t a destination. It’s a place you return to when you’re ready to listen. If this resonated, you're welcome to stay close.

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