Living With Intention
We beckon things to our life through our thoughts, actions and intention. If we set specific intentions for our day, year, career, partnership, or life, think about it and act on it, we are more likely to experience that reality. The late motivational speaker and author Wayne Dyer agreed, “Our intention creates our reality.” Intentional living involves taking focused time to come up with a plan. Living life with intention is a far more satisfying journey. When we begin our day anticipating joy, abundance, and love—that is what we receive.
In college, I began this process of defining my life. After a long line of unambitious boyfriends, who never had money to take me out, I said, “Enough.” I wrote in my journal, “The next man I date will pay for everything, open my doors, and be as passionate about what he does as I am about fashion design.” Sure enough, six months later, I met a man who fit and exceeded that description. We have been married for thirty years. This stuff really works!
Life Requires Planning
Living with intention simply requires planning: designing a life that represents your core values and belief system. We are well served by writing down what we authentically want, our job, significant other, or ideal home—make a list, and then, begin the journey.
Setting intentions
Think about what is most important. What are your “must haves” in a partner, home, career, week, year, or financial/philanthropic plan? Write it down and place the list in an important part of your home, bedroom or office. If you believe in Feng Shui, this would be the furthest left corner of your space, relative to the entrance. Jot it down in your journal. If you are a visual person, make a collage or vision board. Include images that represent the things you are intending, like better health, an inspiring job, more money or a supportive partner. You can pull photos off the Internet or cut them out of a magazine. Post the collage where you can see it frequently.
Be very pure in your intentions. For instance, rather than saying, “I want a million dollars.” Phrase it the following way, “I want to make a good living doing what I love to do.”
Add Some Affirmations
Spend a moment each day devoted to your well-chosen intentions. Many people create affirmations that reinforce the intentions they have set and begin each day reciting these affirmations, like, “I will do my best today, knowing that I will be richly rewarded for my efforts.”
You are welcome to create a list or collage of your intentions, put it away and forget about it. Over time, these aspects show up, sometimes unnoticed, and become our reality. If you stumble upon the list years later, you will be surprised to find most, if not all, have come true.
Having the power to make things happen like this, is a bit scary. As women, we are not raised to strive for power and be successful, like men are. So, this process may be uncomfortable at first. Start with small things and build up to it. Eventually, this will become a daily practice and your life will be much more fulfilling.
Using Intention with Clothing
This very simple, yet profound, idea inspired me to help people through clothing design. By putting inspiring words on our bodies, we are beckoning positive energy into our lives, setting an intention with our clothing choices. Based on the work of Masaru Emoto in his book Messages in Water, each Beckons garment has a discreet intention tag sewn into it. The tags include beautiful words that reflect the yogic lifestyle: joy, strength, wisdom, grace, love, courage, peace, balance, and integrity, beckoning this into the wearer’s life.
Pencil in some time this week to devote to setting intentions and see for yourself how much power you actually have. Take a deep breath and let’s begin with this intention:
“I will authentically define the life that I want for myself, write it down within the next week and then, recognize the wonder of intention.“
Namaste.