The Importance of Living Intentionally

So what exactly do I mean by living intentionally?? I mean living in a way that is of our own design. I mean living in a way that is actually more in our control than we think. More in control than living from a place of expectation and need of certain behaviors from others that 9 times out of 10 do not happen and leave us feeling frustrated and disappointed. When we go through life pinning our happiness, gratification and emotional stability on others' behavior we are setting ourselves up for a life of sadness and emptiness and of truly feeling out of control. And then the more we feel out of control the more we need to feel IN control and the more we expect things that are not of our own design to happen. But I want to talk about living a life that we CAN design. And the first step to doing that is to get in the habit of setting intentions.

Setting intentions is a wonderful tool for helping us to get clear on how we would like things to go for us and for helping us to design cloudless pictures of where we want to be heading through our days and our lives. So often we let things just take us for a ride, not realizing the co-creative power we have over our own lives. But we have within our grasp the power to decide how we want to feel about what goes on in our experiences. So for example when you wake up in the morning  it is your choice whether to set an intention, decide how you want to feel, decide how you would like your day to go, or to get up and start thinking about things that bother you and then just react to everything that goes on around you.

It is within your power to wake up every day and think of a few things you are grateful for and to say I want to have a day filled with calm and ease. Or to say I want my day to be filled with love and laughter or today I want a day filled with productivity. Today I will have a day of working smart and not so hard. This weekend will be one filled with fun and relaxation. Just making these statements of intention puts you in an emotional feeling state of what the essence is of the way you want your day or weekend or activity to make you feel. We can set intentions at work before meetings on how we would like them to go - clear and concise and easy. We can set intentions for how we would like to interact with our children, family and friends-with love and understanding and patience. Whatever way you desire to feel about what you are doing is the way you set an intention for something.

When we are clear on what we want to feel we energetically add to our experiences in ways that draw in the outcomes that we want. That is not to say that you may set an intention for a meeting to be easy and quick and then it still gets a bit sticky and confusing for example... but what if you started that meeting feeling like it was going to be really horrible and you have yourself in an emotional state of dread, perhaps the meeting would have turned out a heck of a lot longer and more stressful for you because that was the energy you went in with. When we can intend on the way we want things to go we start to see changes in our experiences. You can start your day with setting intentions on everything you do from a calming and relaxing shower to an easy flowing commute (even if you are stuck in traffic and you set that intention perhaps then you are more open to fill the time in ways that bring you peace rather than feeling tense and annoyed) to intending on getting a good night sleep every night.

When we give thanks for things turning out the way we intend and when we look for all the things in our lives to be grateful for (and EVERYONE has many things to be grateful for starting with the mere fact that you have woken up to a NEW day and are breathing in possibility) we can make incredible change in our lives with minimal effort. Be grateful for what you have and set intentions for what you want, intend on feeling the way you want to feel and watch what changes around you!