2024's Word of The Year? Phoenixing

The bad times are the ashes. You are the bird.

2024's Word of The Year? Phoenixing

Crushes! You know we j'adore a new word here at SYSCA. It's actually kind of how Luce and I met (more on that below! although by now you probably already know the story). Over the last couple of years, we've received SO MANY messages from people in random moments of their lives about to enter full-flight phoenixing.

It's so fucking special.

You can probably also guess there's a whole damn section about this in our book, but while we wait for that to get out in the world, we thought it was of cute importance to fully explain what Phoenixing is, why you NEED it and why it's the word for 2024. Especially when so much feels like it's wooshing away in an endless, permaweird crisis scroll.

K cool, but what actually is Phoenxing?

It’s that phase - and if you don’t know it, you’re lucky - after everything in your life has burnt down, and things feel like they will never be good again. But then something happens - you enter the most powerful flight of your life. Those hard times? They’re the ashes. But you? You’re the bird rising out of them.

How it came to be

The year is 2022, and Luce and I have just met, and unbeknownst to both of us, we were both phoenixing. We obviously became friends (one of the best parts of rising from the ashes of something bleak - the life-giving people you meet), which is how I ended up here! 

The word itself came (lol, laughing in my mind as though I’m talking about Phoenixing as though it has a Latin root) from being a heartbroken broken bird sitting on my living room floor binge-watching Harry Potter on a rainy Sunday afternoon. It was that scene where Dumbledore's bird Fawkes bursts into flames, and Harry's all like 'Oh my god, accidentally killed your bird!' and Dumbledore's like 'No, honestly, he needed that. He's going to come back way better.' 

I was like, ugh, that's it. I’m the ashes. And one day, I’ll be the bird again. One day, I'll get to Phoenix out of this Dido White Flag Mess and this will all become a funny/poignant story to tell instead of the only one. 

And one thing led to another and now... we're here.

Present day phoenixing

We've had DMs from strangers sending photos of them Phoenixing on a dance floor in a foreign city. Or voice notes from people on their first solo trip being like, Holy shit, I can’t believe I’m here and doing this, I feel so alive! I'm Phoenxing!. Or even lol conversations with strangers on public transport being like 'Omg that explains exactly where I'm at now!'.

I’m not saying this to overstate our role in people's lives, but more to highlight the power of a word to transform a feeling. In bad times, it's like... naming the ghost. And in those bad times, at the bottom of the well, you need something to latch on to and believe in and this... well, we think this is it. 

Phoenixing is everything because it's something to aim for. It’s something to help make sense of bad things that have happened to you and the time that will come after it. It’s the reward for the ache of being alive sometimes, and it’s something we wish for all of you.

So, in that way, Phoenixing is this one tiny word. But also, it's everything.

Let us know when you feel it x

PS PREORDER OUR BOOK HERE!!

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This newsy is written by the refreshing-as-a-house-chardonnay-on-a-steamy-day (and co-author of our debut book Make It Make Sense) Bel Hawkins. Each week Bel comes here to chime in about the things she’s been loling at, yearning for, or totally mystified by. Luckily for us, she also writes our Sunday advice column ‘Wait, But What?’ for all our paying supporters who want to make sense of the world!! Upgrade your plan to get her newsy here!