Setting an Intention For Our Intention
We sometimes find ourselves off course in life. For me this stems from being off course with my mindfulness practice. If I’m not paying attention now, I’m likely not on track down the line. Without mindfulness intentions will to come and go.
Without grounding in Mindfulness successful outcomes are a statistical improbability.
Some of us have very … um … creative minds. Minds that move in many directions simultaneously and wanders back to the point whenever it gets there. Minds that avoid structure like some kids avoid broccoli. You might call this attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. My therapist for instance.
But, our mind is what we have to work with. And I’ve found it rewarding to do the work. To that end mindfulness became very important to me. I had been ashamed of the way my mind didn’t easily conform to social convention. In time, I found my way into the practice by learning that I needn’t force myself into a boxlike arbitrary stillness in order to be present. While my version of present experience might be more fluid than someone else’s both myself and those theoretical someones need to each find our way to working with our minds.
Working with my mind I realized the importance of being present in order to be present in my life. However, I need to find a way to stay present without feeling as though I’m being tied down or forced into someone else’s brain. The truth is, despite years of meditation training, encouraging my mind to rest in the present remains an ongoing practice. It’s less an accomplishment than an application. A daily manual application.
One technique I find helpful is to encourage my mind the time to have my brain feel its way into the present. Not necessarily emotionally. I mean literally feel. Making mindfulness less a mental exercise than an embodied experience. Through repeated practice, presence becomes less something I remember to do and more something my body begins to recognize and remember. Mindfulness in muscle memory, you might say.
This applies throughout the day as it occurs to us. When opening a door, I can feel my hand on the doorknob. Walking across a room, I can feel my feet making contact with the ground. These small moments of embodiment gently interrupt the momentum of distraction and restore a sense of presence. And presence is reassuring. It reminds the fearful part of the brain not to worry because we’re here.
However, it’s not practical to be locked into this. Mindful presence isn’t something we force or hold onto. It is more a place we can return to. We learn to move naturally through our day while remaining grounded in our experience, by coming back as we need to our feet, our hands, our intention.
Until the mind wanders again, that is.
That’s not failure. That’s what minds do. And we can see it as an opportunity to further embed mindfulness into our neuro-stream. In this case we’re embedding full body purpose. The practice is to recognize when we’ve drifted, accept that and remember to return. With patience with our brain we’ll rewire it to recognize, remember, and return. Then our mind can rest more easily where it is placed.
At this point, I should mention that I’m designating our neurological experience its wiring at the “brain” and our ability to establish a purpose in life and experience a spiritual and creative fullness as “mind.” The brain needs to be rewired to remember to return to the tactile present so thye mind can feel calm and clear.
Over time, this embodied mindfulness begins to translate into everyday living. We don’t have to meditate every waking moment. We simply touch base from time to time by reconnecting with the body in throughout our daily life. Lifting our head from the laptop. Feeling our feet in the earth. Remember we’re human and need encouragement as well as purpose.
I’m referring to this as applied intermittent mindfulness. Or, you might say AIM. And the AIM is to flowing through life with ease. Therefore, just as we are seated in our experience, we can be seated in our purpose. You see, the qualities of unconvention make it easy to drift astray for our purpose. How often do we wake up as if out of a dream wondering, as David Byrne notable asked “how did I get here? … Is this my beautiful life?
Our intentions, no matter how noble, are surprisingly fickle when they exist only as thoughts. We think we can do it. Hahaha the “road to hell” and all that. One reason why we can’t keep on track, go off the diet, or forget to get to the meditation cushion is that it’s only an idea. And an idea without a corresponding action is just a thought. If our intentions are only thinking, no matter how well intended, they will change.
Our intentions become reliable when they’re more deeply rooted in the body. Feeling the breath, the feet, the hands, even for a few seconds, gives our purpose somewhere to land. Instead of chasing lofty ideals, we inhabit them. Mind, body, and intention begin working together, and our aspirations become less theoretical and more lived.
We don’t simply intend to be present, compassionate, or wise—we embody those qualities, grounded in one ordinary moment at a time.
In that way, we build a mindful life.
