For three years now I’ve used an approach I first read about by Chris Brogan that said to choose three words for the coming year that will guide you in what you do, personally and professionally instead of making a New Year’s resolution.

The basic concept is that you view things you do and the way you live through these three words which are like guiding principles.

My three words for 2012 are:

Construct

I want to work on a taking disparate elements and pulling them together into some coherent entity that has new meaning. My partner and I are having a house built across the lane from us that we will move into in 2012. Watching its construction is fascinating. All kinds of little and big pieces of wood, concrete, glass and metal that are meaningless on their own come together to create a meaningful structure for us to live in.

The graphic design work I do is similar. A blank page with components added turns it into a meaningful communication piece. Beyond that, I want to find out from other artists and those working in the arts how they pull together what they do and communicate it and with that, see a bigger, more meaningful picture.

Campfire

Since hearing Laurie Anderson say in the 1990s that “technology is the campfire around which we tell our stories,” I’ve been fascinated by how tools at our disposal can be used to do something that goes back to the earliest parts of human history: tell stories. My online endeavours will keep the notion of “campfire” at the core. Offline, I now live in a new and small community on a little island on the West coast of Canada. The stories of the people around me are fascinating and I hope to hear more of them as I meet and get to know people.

Celebrate

Celebrating what we have in our lives—personal and professional—seems like a good approach to take with our adventures. It’s very easy to be cynical and snide about so many things but it makes more sense to celebrate what’s good about our lives. Personally, I’ll be celebrating moving into my new, custom-designed and built house in 2012 and professionally, I’d like to celebrate people who work in the arts doing amazing things.

Do you have three words for 2012 that you’d like to share?