November 5, 2001
The
Action of Intention
Intention,
like genetics, directs and focuses energy to attain life’s purposes.
Clarity of
intention comes from finding our deepest goals – leaving aside the things that
interfere with or divert us from what we truly seek in life.
All our
surroundings reflect back to us the intention gone into their making.
Rightness of intention brings life force energy into a place and into our
lives.
--Tom
Bender
I think we all go through times
when we are not certain what it is that we want to do with our life. Finding
our passion is a great thing to say, but for some, a very difficult thing to
identify. To live a life of
intention requires us to have an intended purpose or passion.
Jan and I went to a local bookstore this Sunday to have
coffee, discuss Christmas lists, and browse.
After getting our coffee of choice, which is no longer a simple decision,
we headed for the over-stuffed chairs. As we rounded the corner, we saw a young woman already
occupying one of the chairs. I
asked if she minded us joining her and she politely shook her head in approval.
We began to talk and I shared
with Jan that the journal I brought along had exactly two entries.
The first was from June 1997 and was all of a page and a half reflecting
on the start of a trip to Madrid, Spain. It
was to be the starting entry of a travel expose, but alas, I never wrote another
word after the first leg of our flight.
The second entry was dated
January 1, 1999 and went like this: “Happy New Year! This is our year and my year.
It will be a year of unlimited prosperity coming from many areas.
It will be a year of giving, forgiving, and receiving.
I will publish, speak, and love. ‘To love and be loved using the gifts
God has blessed me with.’ I also
see it will be a year of reconciliation with people.
I must once and for all put my talents to good use.”
I read this to Jan and we
laughed about the fact that it had only taken another two years before I put
into action what I thought about one New Year’s day. So much for resolutions!
Then we started a conversation
with the woman seated next to us. As
we talked about everything from the book she was looking at to the Christmas
list we were having trouble assembling, our souls began to connect.
By that I mean we felt a connection to what each of us had to say and
what we said came from a deeper part of each of us.
She shared that she had just decided to leave her position with a
software company without a new place to go.
Now she was beginning to investigate career options that would align with
her inner calling.
What an interesting and very
familiar place to be in. I have
heard many people say lately that they were just going through the motions until
September 11th. Now they
were reevaluating what they were doing with their life. It may not be feasible
or responsible for many people to leave a job while evaluating their life path,
but we can still take steps to change course.
The words above by Tom Bender
come from a Feng Shui calendar that hangs in our kitchen.
I read them upon our return today and thought they tied in well to this
day’s spiritual journey. If you
read the second sentence first, it gives direction to discovering clarity of our
intention or the passion in our life. Then,
going back to the first sentence, the intention we discover becomes action
oriented (unlike my writing about, but not fulfilling, my intention…until
now).
Try to find any writings you
have done that involve your intentions from prior years. Have you put into action those intentions, and if not why?
Perhaps you are like me and waiting a few years before you finally
understand that there is no finer soul work you can do than to identify your
purpose and then live each and every day with intention. Even if that intention
leads you to just have coffee and open your soul to a total stranger.
With respect, acceptance, and love,
Richard
©
Richard D. Olson and Awaken The Soul, 2001; Edited by Janice E. Olson