The Chinese symbol for representing intention is made of two different characters. One meaning present and the other meaning heart.
The outcomes and results of intentions may be beneficial, harmful, or neutral. Intentions are literally the seeds you plant during your day that produce the eventual results in your life. When you repeat an intention over and over, the impressions – the marks you leave from repetition created by your intention turn into a habit. Habits then actually shape your brain, your thoughts, your actions, your character, and life.
Problems arise when an intention is unconscious, not done specifically understanding the power of your intent and as a result you are not mastering the power of intentionality. The most practical way to create intentionality is to simply practice it. And as the quote goes – Perfect practice makes perfect. You can begin setting seemingly easy and unimportant intentions throughout the day for actions that you really have no emotional attachment to the outcome for. Such as breathing, walking, sitting, standing, driving, and talking. Although you definitely have an emotional attachment to continue breathing and living! Yet if you set an intention of breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth – the best way possible and you find yourself losing attention and not doing it intently – you will not be upset with yourself for that. Bring your intention and attention back to your breathing, doing it the way you desire and after enough practice your intention will bring you the consistent desired result of proper breathing consistently.
Intention is desire without attachment to the outcome.
–Deepak Chopra
Identify the action you are consciously beginning and the way in which you will do it and the expected outcome. Bringing your conscious attention onto what are to date things you do unconsciously allows you to mast the practice of intention with your attention.
So why did I put the idea of intention and baby boomers together in this post? This goes out to my baby boomer entrepreneur readers and baby boomers looking for success in their businesses because as a group so many of us have had contact with the metaphysical movement, with even now the practices of meditation. All practices and ways of being that we have touched some in our life. Many of us chose to embrace those practices in our lives in some way. Many of us chose not to. Yet the essence of the issue is – The popular definition of insanity is doing things the same way over and over – expecting different results. I will come back to this.
I lived in Boulder Colorado for almost 20 years and quite frankly Boulder, CO and Berkley, CA were probably the two biggest centers of the metaphysical movement of the 70’s and 80’s. I found that the movement generated untold numbers of Gurus – who many times could shape and bend a foundational concept to the movement to meet their own view of the concept. People oftentimes followed like lemmings to the sea – based upon their belief in that Guru. The outcome – many times disrupted their families and their lives extensively.
So back to insanity – The idea of persistence is identified as a key to success. And yet for me – what I want to share with you all is my practical definition of insanity.
Doing what we do, how we do it and why we do it, without advancing our success is insanity.
So my idea for my fellow baby boomers and other readers is to approach what you do – without quitting or giving up – with different intention, maybe for some of us doing what we do with intention is enough as we currently do it mindlessly. Bring a conscious intention to it, emotionally detach from the results focusing more on your intention and the success will come.
Author Bio: Aly Chiman, the creative mind behind AlyChi Designs, is a Graduate from Arizona State University. His attention to detail and strive for perfection is what makes his work so creative. He writes about marketing, innovation, and entrepreneurship on his personal blog http://www.alychidesigns.com
