Intention

When I think about it, I've lived a lot of my life without intention. Instead, I focused on wants, and sadly, many of those wants were not even my own--they were what my parents and grandparents wanted for me. Of course, what they wanted most was for me was to be happy, and they had an image in their respective minds as to what that such happiness should look like. From my grandmother's point of view, it was marriage to a rich man. "It's just as easy to marry a rich man as a poor one," she would always say. My mother was a little more specific. In my early twenties, she wanted me to graduate from college as a lawyer and marry a "nice Jewish boy," but when I was in my mid-thirties and still single, she just wanted me to get married. "Find a nice boy, settle down." This was her ways of saying, I sure would like some photos of grandchildren to show my friends. My father didn't let his vision for me be known until after I graduated from college with a degree in English Literature with no teaching credential. "Now What?" my father asked arms folded across his chest, foot tapping. Four years of college, no marriage prospects, and a worthless degree." I told him I liked waiting tables, which at the time was the truth.

After graduation I had moved back home with the intention of working until I saved enough money to buy a car. Then, I was going to drive West, with San Francisco being my final destination. I wanted to see City Lights Bookstore and live by the water. To preserve his sanity, my father offered to co-sign for a Volkswagen and under a full October moon I left home and spent a year going wherever the wind blew me. Eventually, I did end up in San Francisco and I spent several years there, but I wasn't living my life with any real intentions. I wanted various "things" (I'm using that word to include everything from friends to furniture) and I got some of them, but until quite recently, I didn't understand how to apply the concept behind the word. What was missing was my attention to the details or the steps required to actually attain the desired result. As a Leo with Virgo rising, you'd think this would just come naturally, and to be honest, most of what I have acquired in my life has come because of my personality, but with this latest insight, I am now stating intentions and backing them up with my undivided attention. Basically, I'm taking the guess-work out of my life.

This means I will complete many of the projects I have started--particularly those that are meaningful to me, like my adoption book and the E-book about PTSD. It means that for the first time ever, I have the tools to control the quality of my life. Maybe I'm a slow learner and this is common sense to the rest of you, but this recent insight has already made a significant improvement in my life. For example, I don't just want to become fluent in Spanish, I'm actually spending an hour studying it each day. I don't want to be part of a community of life-minded people, instead, I'm actively seeking them out--picking up the phone, making plans to visit, participating in social networking and writing this Blog. Same goes for the list of little things I wanted in the past, but didn't seem to be able to get--things like losing the last 10 pounds, cleaning out the garage, and meditating daily. It all comes down to setting the intention and following it up with my undivided attention.

As this year began, I intentionally did not make my usual list of new year's resolutions. I knew I'd never keep them, so why bother. But then, while reading the Presence Process by Michael Brown, I read, "The quality of our life experience at any given moment is determined by how consciously we wield our attention and intention," and I had the final piece of the puzzle. I hope the clarity this simple sentence has give me, can be as helpful to you--whether your intention is to clean out your closet, finish the screenplay that is stuffed in your bottom drawer, or acquire the courage to act on your beliefs.