How is your Word of the Year going?

UNAPOLOGETIC is working for me

As I write this, we have 72 days left in 2025.

We are neck deep in the Fall craziness of sports and school events and retreats and birthdays. The holidays loom. And, of course, every day the headlines (and the reality) seem more insane.

Staying grounded and centered should be a priority, but more often than not I’m speeding through the day and the To Do list, though I am managing really beautiful moments of connection with my people, and self-reflection in my Morning Pages.

Also, it’s somehow easier to practice presence at night. Have you noticed this? I’m much more magnanimous in my evening meditations that I am in the real world with people around. Curious!

Anyway, now that we’re in the final quarter of the year, it feels appropriate to ask:

How’s your word of the year going?

Did you even choose a word of the year for 2025?

Was it optimistically chosen and needs a reroute now that the future is upon us?

Or if you didn’t choose a word of the year, do you think it would be helpful to choose one now - to orient around how you want to finish the year?

My word for 2025 is UNAPOLOGETIC.

I chose it in December of 2024 for a variety of personal and professional reasons. Actually, even the professional reasons were personal when you’re looking at a word like this.

2024 was a year that held a lot of personal growth for me. I feel like I got on a roller coaster in the summer of 2021 and it took me three years to step off. And when I stepped off, I was on steadier ground in every way. And that made me want to walk with the confidence I felt instead of defaulting to the uncertainty I’d been projecting. It’d become a habit for me to apologize openly or covertly for everything.

I’m sorry this response is delayed

I’m sorry I’m bringing up this topic on the podcast

I’m sorry I talked so much at dinner

I’m sorry I’ve posted so many times today

I’m sorry I’m not over this thing that really traumatized me and I’m sorry I’m still talking about it years later and I’m extra sorry that you have to listen to me

These are all things I was actually sorry about and so my apologies were sincere. They were also often pretty misguided. I was apologizing that the other person wasn’t entirely comfortable. I was apologizing because I wasn’t entirely comfortable.

The high highs and low lows of the last few years led to blanket statements that I hoped covered a lot of missteps or made people like me more. I hated that I was overwhelmed with constant communication, so I just apologized at the start of every email or text, without actually thinking through what type or timeframe the recipient was actually entitled to or how I could address my own habits. I was itchy about some of the topics I was (or wasn’t) bringing to my work online so I threw a bunch of ideas at the wall and apologized for each one of them to an audience who couldn’t quite follow (and probably didn’t care about) my creative angst. I apologized when I didn’t want to do things and once I apologized to someone who was actually trying to bully me into something. That might have been the tipping point.

By mid-2024 I was over it. I didn’t want to feel like this anymore - like I was a mess, like I talked too much, like I took up too much space, like I didn’t know what I was doing, like I needed to explain my every action. I’m not a mess, I (mostly) know what I’m doing, I don’t need to explain everything, and while I do talk too much and probably take up too much space in a room sometimes, I’m just not sorry about it.

Hence: UNAPOLOGETIC became my word for the year 2025.

I got some gentle pushback and questions when I announced it as my word of the year on Instagram. Aggression is not really my vibe and I can see how UNAPOLOGETIC can read that way.

But the thing is, our personal words and mantras aren’t for other people. They’re for ourselves to orient around. I needed some sort of a rallying cry.

And you know what? It has worked! I whisper the word UNAPOLOGETIC to myself almost every day about all kinds of things. When I’m replying to someone, when I’m crafting something to post online, when I’m weighing my answer to a request, when I’m leaving a social event and overthinking everything I did or didn’t say.

When I’m cringing about how I messed up or making wild assumptions about how other people are receiving my words or very presence, I remind myself that I don’t need to apologize for being me. I don’t need to apologize for my personality or my opinions. I don’t need to apologize for my time or schedule or priorities. It took months of practice, but I am now significantly less apologetic in my spirit, actions, and words and this has made me stronger. I also feel like it’s straightened my spine a little.

Sometimes you don’t even realize how stooped you’ve become until you stand up straight.

And in small ways I can see respect mirrored back where before there might have been skepticism or side eye. At least that’s how it feels. And in a year like 2025, which has held so much heartbreak and loss in my immediate community, finding bits of strength where everything else has softened has been an immeasurable gift.

Of course, there are things to apologize for. Sometimes my response to someone is inappropriately timed and I need to acknowledge that. Several times I have said something I wish I’d worded differently (or refrained from saying at all) and I’ve apologized and meant it. But forcing myself not to default towards apology has helped me figure out when I really am sorry and need to express that, or when I’m just reaching for an apology out of habit, insecurity, or outdated etiquette.

And also, being in an UNAPOLOGETIC pose has had some drawbacks. People can perceive a strong stance as aggression. Or unkindness. That has taken some discernment on my end, too, as to whether I’m holding myself steady or if something else is behind it.

Overall, UNAPOLOGETIC is really working for me as a Word of the Year. I needed to put a stake in the ground for myself, and I needed it to be strong. I am rediscovering my center after a season of wobbly-ness and this word has been helpful. I have not a single idea if anyone in my life has noticed a shift, but I have, and that’s what matters.

It’s interesting what we continue to learn about ourselves if we’re paying attention. A younger version of myself would be confused by this whole concept. I was not born a people-pleaser. My inner self does not bend towards apology. This is learned behavior, developed slowly. Becoming more UNAPOLOGETIC this year has returned a piece of myself that had gone a bit dormant.

I’m curious to hear how your word of the year is going. Have you leaned on it heavily? Did you abandon it completely when the year took a turn?

And if you didn’t choose a word of the year but think you might like one for the next few months as we finish 2025, I’d like to hear that, too. Comments on Substack are open to all.

Speaking of finishing 2025, save the date for a Secret Stuff Journal Party on Sunday, November 2 @ 4pm PT / 6pm CT / 7pm ET where the theme is naming who we want to be through the holiday season. More info on that to come.

Unapologetically yours,

PS - Sharing a few things you might have missed on the Secret Stuff Substack lately:

We had a fabulous community Symposium on Friendship Breakups (truly one of the best Symposiums we’ve ever had. We cried, we cringed, we laughed, we learned)

REPLAY + Discussion Thread: Friendship Breakups

Another post that sparked good conversation:

She doesn't have time to text you back, but does post on Instagram

And if you want to jump in last minute to discuss Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara this Thursday for Book Club, we’d love to have you! (It’s great on audio.) And In November we’ll be reading and discussing The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara (BOOK CLUB October 2025)