Spiritual Intentionality in 2019
As the New Year approaches, you might want to ask yourself the question, “Am I growing through my life or am I just going through my life?”
There’s a big difference!
We symbolically associate the new year with a time of new beginnings, fresh starts, and new resolve.
It’s true that we can step back and take an overview of our life any time. However, this time of little daylight, colder weather, and post-holiday quiet is an ideal time to go inside, both literally and figuratively.
Spiritual Intentionality
Intentionality is a high spiritual principle.
“How so?” you might ask.
Intention directs our actions. It’s the destination we enter into our GPS when we want to go somewhere.
We can have intention in the physical plane, which is what a lot of our New Year’s resolutions are. We might resolve to lose weight or make more money. Physical intentions are great, but spiritual intentionality goes much deeper than that. When we have spiritual intentionality, it gives meaning to our lives and those other things we want.
What Happens When We DON’T Have Spiritual Intentionality:
I’m sure you’ve heard the term “lost soul,” which refers to someone who is wandering haplessly through their life without purpose.
They are unhappy and out of touch with inner guidance. They lack spiritual intentionality.
Here’s an extreme example:
Alex has a high paying job as an investment banker, a nice home, and a nice car. He’s in great physical shape, and has everything he ever thought he wanted.
However, he has nagging feelings of emptiness. When he isn’t busy, he finds himself tuning out, maybe watching meaningless television shows, drinking too much, having one-night stands, or playing video games.
Alex has been very intentional on the physical plane—getting an education, employment, buying a house and a car, and staying in shape.
However, Alex has a part of him that is a lost soul. He hasn’t been spiritually intentional. He’s bought into the illusion of success without contemplating the underlying meaning of his life. No amount of stuff is going to fill the void he feels.
Until he becomes spiritually intentional, he will feel empty despite his many achievements on the material plane.
To some extent or another we all have parts of ourselves that are lost. Identifying where we have strayed from spiritual intentionality lets us refocus, reprioritize, and move forward
How Do We Become Spiritually Intentional?
Ideally, spiritual underpinnings guide us in our decision making in all areas of our lives.
Without spiritual intention, we are just a rudderless boat.
Without spiritual intention, we have no guiding principles and no direction for our life.
It is only through spiritual intentionality that we tune into our inner guidance to find direction and purpose on our spiritual path.
When we have spiritual intentionality, we know how we want to grow and why. We want to feel fulfilled and purposeful in our lives. We may not know where spiritual intentionality will lead us in our day to day lives but we do know that a quality life lies on that path.
To create spiritual intent, think about WHY you want to do or have something.
If you want to have a family, think about why you want that family, what you want to give to that family, and how you want to be present with that family. It’s easy to take a family for granted or get caught up in the day-to-day activities of caring for that family, but when you remember WHY, you can approach those same day-to-day tasks with a new outlook.
The same applies to a job, a business, a fitness routine, a significant other, and everything else we could want on the material plane.
I know that this can be challenging to remember, especially when you’re in the thick of it. When you’re in the middle of disciplining a child, you might not be thinking very spiritual thoughts. But we learn with practice. Bringing yourself back to your intentionality is a series of corrections. Bringing yourself back to “WHY” and intentionality as soon as you realize you’re not there.
Let this be the year of spiritual intentionality.
Taking time to become more intentional is taking time to tune in and get in touch with our internal GPS. Let this be the year of reminding yourself of your spiritual intent and learning to go back there, again and again.
Remember, this is a learning process, and learning is a series of corrections. You don’t have to do it perfectly. The more you are in intentionality, the happier and more peaceful you will feel!
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