I really was going to use animosity. But Rida beat me to it. I liked it because I play Warhammer – it's a miniatures game, and I'm an addict – and in Warhammer, Animosity is a trait that means your troops might ignore your orders to go bash the enemy and instead fight one another. It's one of those traits that you love to watch happening unless you are the commander watching your well-orchestrated plan break down into a bunch of chaotic scrums. Plus your opponent is probably laughing at you.
But no, she got it first, so I had to find a new one. I considered aggravating, as in, it's AGGRAVATING to come up with a new word, but rejected it. It occurred to me that A really does have a lot of negative words – attack, aggravate, annoy, annihilate, antagonize, atrophy, etc – so it was time for me to take it positive.
A is for ASPIRE.
Courtesy Merriam-Webster:
1 : to seek to attain or accomplish a particular goal <aspired to a career in medicine>
2 : ASCEND, SOAR
We all aspire. Many of you reading this are aspiring authors. But it's not limited to that. We aspire every day, both big goals and small ones.
For some, it's fortune and fame. For some it's less tangible goals, like happiness. Some aspire just to create a world that is a little bit better than the one they visited yesterday.
I'm guessing that latter one is probably the real meaning of ascension, too. Another fine A-word.
–Robert