Setting Intentions: The First Corner

We live in a world riddled with chaos and as much as we try to control our lives, we often feel just the opposite--out of control.  We wonder why certain bad things are happening to us.  Our minds tend to get the best of us, spiraling in circles...lists to check off, people to worry about, bills to pay.  We negative self-talk, berating ourselves for not having done better,  ruminating about events from the past, doubting ourselves in the future.

And so, these are the intentions we have set for ourselves.  Sickness follows the worry, doubt, shame, stress of these repeated intentions.  "I want to help out, but...." "I would feel so much better if..." "How stupid am I! If only I..." and so on.

I always thought I understood what "intentions" meant.  By definition, intentions are determined plans and goals.  Medicinally, an intention is the healing process of a wound.  If you combine these two concepts you get: a determined plan or goal to heal a wound.  Remember, wounds are not always physical.  Each and every one of us has emotional, mental, and spiritual wounds as well.

I've set intentions before, ones I have truly believed, focused on and wrote down to read over.  They were intentions that would make me a better person, add purpose and fulfillment, and hopefully influence other lives in a positive manner.  These intentions came true.

Before that, I also made intentions.  Ones that ridiculed the being that I was, ones that obsessed over the negativity of the past, ones that complained about my health.  These intentions came true, too.  I believed in a life that I found myself stuck in--negative, around toxic people, with poor health and a worsening outlook on life.  It was a dark time in my life.  I lived in a dark place that I found myself cornered into by none other than my own mind.  I swore I deserved every inch of it.  I defended it, I made excuses.  My goal, my plan, my intention was to rip my wounds open every day.  I was not healing myself.

If you've been here, you know how OLD that gets--and fast.  I don't imagine homeless folk enjoy sleeping outside while the storm pours over them, cold and wet and afraid.  And yet, there I was-- there we are-- willingly walking into the throes of the hurricane. 

Setting intentions is easy.  Clearly easy enough, where a single thought--good or bad, is equally answered, and if we believe in it enough, it's answered with a yes.  So why not start asking, intending, for a better life?

I'm big on letter writing.  Write yourself a letter, address yourself by name.  Tell yourself what you truly want in all aspects of your life.  Literally design your life.  How do you want your home to look?  You deserve the best.  Who do you want to enter your life?  You deserve top-quality humans, who will engage you and help you grow.  Your career, your soul, your mental health, your physical health, your love life.  You deserve happiness.

These sentiments, these intentions...I call them my "energy statements"... are so vital and SO powerful.  The way you get there may not be exactly how you "plan" (and this is okay...like I said, life is chaos and we can't be so attached to trivial details), but you will get there.  Your end goal of a fruitful career (maybe different from what you initially, specifically intend) will come.  There is no failure when it comes to the Universe, or Source, or God, or Higher Power (or whatever you ascribe to) providing us with what we hope and wish for.  Along the way of our intentions being delivered, we discover so much about ourselves.

And really...isn't that the truest intention of all?