Words Create Worlds
Every January, my friend Ed challenges everyone he knows to choose two words to guide your year ahead.
Not resolutions. Not a five-year plan. Just two words.
The words are not meant to be perfect or impressive. The words are more like markers on the trail—something to come back to when our world gets noisy or complicated.
For 2026, Ed chose allow and innovate.
I chose beauty and devotion.
Ed’s crash course in allow and innovate started en route to meet me for our first business trip of the year. His flight started with a tiny delay, then kept changing unpredictably—boarding, unboarding, rescheduling—until three full hours had passed. He had no choice but to fully allow the madness and get seriously innovative about how he would react to the airport chaos.
I’m fairly certain airport delays were not in the grand, poetic vision Ed had in mind when he chose his words. But honestly, it’s an example of how words create our worlds.
While waiting for Ed, I passed the time with scrolling and people watching. I saw and heard ugly words everywhere.
Harsh words. Divisive words. Fear-based words. Dehumanizing words.
The ugly words are spoken loudly, casually, constantly — malicious words in headlines, in comment sections, in politics, in everyday conversations. Overwhelmed by the cruelty, I used Ed’s two-word game to center myself. I remembered:
Words don’t just describe our world. They build it, they create it.
I am unable to find meaning in the hate, but I am able to bring more beauty and devotion to our world. I chose the word beauty to counterbalance the ugliness I see.
Not the shallow kind of beauty. Not the filtered, polished, curated kind of superficial beauty. But the deeper beauty:
The beauty of truth
The beauty of decency
The beauty of courage
The beauty of kindness
The beauty of dignity
The beauty that still exists even in broken places
Choosing beauty is not ignoring reality. It’s responding to the events of the world with intention. It is saying:
I will not have ugliness and hate be the final words.
Choosing beauty is my quiet act of rebellion. But it must come with devotion.
Devotion requires attention.
Devotion requires discipline.
Devotion requires us to show up when it would be easier to check out, scroll past, or say nothing.
Devotion turns beauty into behavior.
I started the year thinking my words of beauty and devotion were part of a simple game. Now I know my words are a call to action.
Words shape our beliefs.
Words start wars.
Words heal families.
Words create worlds.
The Greek Philosopher Epictetus once said:
First learn the meaning of what you say, and then speak.
I am learning how much our words create our worlds.
The time is now to speak.
