“The best way to ensure you achieve the greatest satisfaction out of life is to behave intentionally.”— Deborah Day, Canadian film director and writer
There are none of us that has not changed over the last three years. We are in constant flux, physically, intellectually, emotionally and spiritually. We know, or mostly know, who we were in the past, and we might guess at who we are today, but there is no way to know who we will be in the future, in any of the quadrants. All we can do is set some intentions and aim for some of that.
Setting intentions actually helps us with our decision-making. We are able to have compassion for ourselves. An we will have a sense of what matters to us now and will magnify in the future if we keep those intentions in mind.
Oh, we have all set goals and we worked like dervishes towards them only to have the limelight fade off them and the goals we set simply wafted away or we changed our minds. Oh, we had such hope and motivation, for a while. Inevitably, life got in the way. Abd, our Evil Inner Witch/Ego/Critical Inner voice had lots to say about it all. And we end up beating ourselves up over being so ridiculous as to think up such lofty ideals. We procrastinate. We self-sabotage. Oh, we have so many ways to get out of not making a goal and we almost love the feeling of failure, sometimes. Setting goals, for me, became a minefield and I finally gave up even trying t set them and I simply let life happen. Of, course, I had some guides I lived by, some moral codes, some boundaries, and I was thrilled when something worked out, but IU refused to set goals and then bet myself up over not reaching them. In fact, no matter how closely I came to reaching a goal, I could always see a lack of something in the reach. I was whipping a dead horse as far as trying to be really set on what a goal might be. I was beat before I began.
So, I set my tasks as, not goal-setting, but setting intentions. Now, I am not one to sticky note my bathroom mirror up with all sorts of fluffy little quotes. They never went further than the paper they were written on.
All of us are a work in constant progress. We will never be at a state of ‘being finished’. What a shallow, self-centred life we will have if we do not open ourselves up to what might be. We have know our body will change. That is a given. We have to know our mind will change, that is inevitable. Our emotional self is always ebbing and flowing. Our spiritual health will change. Besides that, our social aspects change. Our relationships change. Our passions even change. The things that bring us joy change. We need wild dreams and fantasies. We need to find ways to be gentle to our heart and soul. And, the most important of all…intentions are not to be whipping points, not disciplinary, not guilt or shame-driven. Intentions should fill you with joy, with energetic love for self. Intentions should not be centred around “want”. As well, a good intention is not all abut self, but how it might ripple out and affect others with the joy and passions that it inspires. Loving Motivation, spiritually-infused and selfless, is what it must be.
Note that spiritual intentions influence all other intentions. As well, do not expect your life happiness to totally hinge on achieving an intention… in fact, you can never achieve an intention... it goes on and on and on because it causes a ripple affect like waves in the ocean that comes and comes and comes again.
If you want peace of mind, you have to INTEND to find ways to have peace of mind. We cannot stagnate. We have to live more mindfully, with more love, and from a place of peace, in ways that bring you joy. This takes courage. Do not think it just happens. Be motivated by love that truly sinks to the “within”. We can do this. We can be someone new every moment of our life. What is the new you might aspire to be? Set that intention.
©Carok Desjarlais 10.6.22
No comments:
Post a Comment