The Art Of Setting Intentions

I think it’s good to be stubborn and headstrong when it comes to your mindset and how you intend to live your life. Especially if you can do it without obnoxious about it, this relisience and determination can be really good for you. After all, Besides the 24-hour circadian rhythm you’re in, you are the single most constant determining factor of your life. Nothing wrong with holding onto what you want, what’s good for you and how you want to live your life.

An easy way to exercise that headstrongness and determination is by setting intentions.  Of course I am encouraging you to do that; I am your self help fairy godmother that you never even asked for — because let’s be serious who would. Anyway.

Whether on paper or in your mind, setting an intention is basically making a premature assumption about something; In advance, you put in words how you want something to be, feel or turn out.

I set intentions all the time. Sometimes in a good-natured, mellow kind of way (especially when it comes to far-fetched-for-now and future dreams), sometimes with a lot of power and immediate energy behind it. It’s all intention-setting and you can just figure out as you go along what feels good.

I am convinced our minds can be used to our advantage, and intention setting is a definite way to do that. Most likely you’re already doing it, sometimes without realizing and other times with a lot of conviction. Starting to play around with Active Intention Setting can really help you.

For example, when you tell yourself “I am going to have a great day”, you make a couple of (awesome) things happen.

• You start the process of assocation, where you think of great days you had before, things that make a great day happen for ouy and things you’d like to see on great days. Hello, Awesome Thing #1:  You’re thinking about the right things! 

• Also, you engage your epic ability to plan and organize and create: You suddenly realize you still have a gift card to spend, you realize you could use that hour before work to exercise, you know your friend would be available for lunch. Cue Awesome Thing #2: You start to mentally plan and organize around your intention to make it come true.

• Next, with all this awesome sauce imagery and organizing going on, you will spot that ray of sunshine that makes your day extra bright, because it is in line with your expectations. You will find your lunch more enjoyble and that text from your lover even cuter. Things that make days good are now highlighted because your mental spotlight is on them. That’s Awesome Thing #3. 

• Awesome Thing #4: The spotlight is automatically off the negative. You will also be a lot less likely to spend a lot of time and energy on things that ruin your day, because they are not compatible with your idea of how this day should be.

Basically you will be more inclined to make the effort (go somewhere you love to be like the beach), let something negative go (boyfriend’s socks lying around the house), and focus on the right thing (sunshine and such). You’ll start behaving according to the intention you have set, and make it come true this way.

You can set intentions for a day like “I am going to have a great day” but also “I will be loving and fearless today” or “I will be calm during that meeting with client John” or “I intend to take good care of my health today”

You can also go a little bigger by extending or (even removing!) the time frame in terms of “I am loving and fearless”, “I intend to treat my body with respect and great care this week (at least until the weekend)” and “I will be calm and peaceful during this stressful seminar” or “I will have a wonderful year”, whatever you like.

They’re like kind of affirmations that include you taking a specific path or being a certain way, I like the active part that’s involved in them. I intend to have a healthy, happy day today. Hope you are too. Kisses!