5 Steps to Living Life with Intention

What are your dreams?
Your goals?
What does your heart hope for?
Take a second. Look for answers within. Get intentional.

What does it mean to live intentionally? Intentional living happens when we adopt a mindful attitude towards the choices and situations we are presented with each day. Most of us would agree that we are awake when we go through our daily routine. But how conscious are we? It is so easy to set ourselves to auto-pilot when we wake up each morning and go through the entire day mindlessly going through the motions of living. We sit blindly in the passenger seat of our own lives, allowing moments, experiences and feelings to just pass us by. When we live life with intention we perform every action with conscious intent and a desire to fulfill our core values.

We do have basic intent behind most of our daily activities (washing the dishes so they don’t start to pile up and mold, taking the bus to work in order to earn a living, etc.), however after repeating these mundane tasks day after day the intent behind them fades into the background until we perform them completely unconsciously. By bringing a level of awareness back to every task we perform in our day to day we can begin to live our life with intention, transforming our actions and injecting our lives with purpose, peace and joy.

What about if the next time you are waiting for the bus to work you mentally set an intention to help someone move forward at work that day, or to make someone smile, or to reach a certain work goal for yourself? Your bus ride will be a lot happier knowing you are heading off to complete a positive intention. Or perhaps before you next wash the dishes you affirm to yourself that you are performing this task as a service to your family, to keep them happy, or intend it as an opportunity for yourself to stand in mindful meditation. This is intentional living.

5 STEPS TO LIVING LIFE WITH INTENTION

|| Go Inward ||
Living intentionally only works if you know what it is you really want. Two crucial questions you must ask your heart when setting intentions are:
What do I want?
How do I want to feel?

Consider these two questions with regards to the following aspects of your life:

Spirituality & Sense of Purpose
Relationships, Family, Friends (Community)
Work & Financial Career
Nutrition & Exercise
Intellectual Stimulation
Rest & Sleep
Creativity & Play

Use your feelings as a compass when crafting intentions; start getting really clear in your mind about what it is you want and how it is you want to feel.

|| Get Writing ||
Once you have realized and visualized your intentions for various aspects of your life, write them down in a dedicated notebook or journal. Make this a sacred practice by writing in a place where you are most comfortable, putting on a calming playlist and lighting your favorite scented candle. Only write positive and affirming sentences. Putting your thoughts down on paper helps you get clear about what you really want. When we write our intentions down we make them real, we give them power.

|| Reach Out ||
Open your heart and raise your voice; don’t be afraid to share your intentions with the world. When we feel supported, we become empowered and radiant. You never know who is listening that can help you manifest your dreams. There’s strength in numbers. Don’t be shy.

|| Release + Trust ||
Once you’ve written your intentions down and shared them, surrender them to fate. Let them go. Check-in with your intentions frequently, but don’t obsess over the specifics or the hows, whys and whens. Trust that the universe has got your back.

|| Check in ||
Remind yourself daily of your intentions by developing a spiritual ritual for yourself. This could be through morning meditation, reflective prayer or an evening yoga practice. Use this time to count your blessings and align with your higher intentions.