Helping You Love Yourself into Success and Less Stress! Helpful Hints for Meditation Part IV: Meditation and Intention by Ilenya Marrin, DSS HOME FREE NEWSLETTER PRODUCTS SERVICES ABOUT ME TESTIMONIALS RESOURCES CONTACT Meditation Part IV: Meditation and Intention Once you are comfortable with your general practice of meditation, you might want to set an intention at the beginning of your meditation, such as expanding your health, increasing relaxation or creating upliftment. Or your meditation intention might be to achieve a greater attunement with God or Spirit, however you understand that spiritual essence of life. To me, setting and holding an intention means setting an inwardly guided direction for yourself. Within the framework of meditation, you might choose intentions such as, "I'd like to be more loving with myself and others." "I'd like to experience more loving and learn more about it." "I'd like to practice living in loving on a daily basis." "I'd like more joy in my life." "I'd like to learn to meditate for relaxation and stress reduction." It doesn't mean gritting your teeth and saying, "I will by gosh be 100% loving no matter what." We're human. My experience is that most of our deepest growth and change comes in tiny, even microscopic steps, with gentle practice. Specific Intentions for Your Dilemmas or Stressful Situations You might also choose a very specific intention. Let's say you are trying to decide whether to start your family now, or what's the wisest choice of how to handle a complex situation with your child or spouse. Or you're contemplating a job change, major move, wedding plans, etc. This list could be a lot longer, but you get the idea. Whenever you experience a dilemma, you can "take it into your meditation" and ask for clarity, understanding and creative solutions. You might state your intention to yourself as you begin your meditation time. For instance, you could say, "I'd like clarity and understanding and any solutions that are in the Light for the highest good of all concerned to be brought to my awareness now." Then you let go of these concerns. Just let them go and focus on your meditation! Watch your breath, repeat your word or mantra, or turn on your guided meditation CD, or go for a meditative walk in your neighborhood, the woods, or in your own backyard, and see what shows up. What next? Once you've set your direction for your meditation, either with a broad intention for your life, or with a specific intention for particular guidance, what next? Sometimes while you are meditating, new awareness or new perspectives on the problem will come to mind. As with any other thoughts, just let them be, or jot them down in your journal and resume your meditation. Then do your best to honor the new awareness brought up through your creative consciousness in meditation. It's nice to write the ideas down so you remember them. Check them out. Does one or more of these thoughts seem really worth trying? Check It Out Use your common sense. If something popping into your mind during meditation seems physically dangerous, have the wit to be safe. But if following a suggestion from your inner self would merely create mild emotional discomfort in a conversation, it might be worth a shot to see if having that "heart to heart clearing" talk would open some new doors for you. The idea is that you give authentic consideration to ideas arising in meditation. If you tell yourself, "Yeah, yeah," and ignore these messages, my experience is that the flow of inner information will tend to shut itself off. When you meditate with intention, you have access to a deep level of your own inner wisdom. Use that inner wisdom and respect it if you want it to grow into one of your great inner assets! Answers to Intention in the Flow of Life At other times, you'll enjoy your meditation but won't notice any particular new awareness or answer showing up. In this case, just relax. The answers will turn up in the course of your life. You'll be driving, see a billboard and one word will trigger a whole scenario in your mind that contains the solutions you need. Or you'll be showering or washing dishes or mowing the lawn and you'll "just know" the next steps you need to take to resolve your challenging situation. Again, respect these flashes of intuition that are answers to your stated intention in meditation. At least give some sincere thought to them, or check them out in whatever ways seem appropriate. In other words, the meditation process plus your intention can start to unlock the doors to your creative inner consciousness. But you are not in control of how and when those answers appear. Tracking and Intention This suggestion is for the larger intentions, the qualities you want to enhance or expand in your daily living. In my research, I've noted that simply tracking an item (using a rating scale similar to that discussed in Part III) once a day is a good way to anchor your process of holding an intention. It's as if by paying attention, watching and observing a particular area, you let your heart and mind know this is an important area of life. Lo and behold, you begin to have experiences in this area, and to notice the changes, small and large. For instance, I tracked my intention of "Living in Loving" with a daily rating for almost five years. Making a simple observation of "How'd I do today on Living in Loving?" I was able to assign a score from 1-10, and over time, watched my numbers climb. Paying attention, reflecting, for 10-15 seconds every evening, gently strengthened my intention to be more loving. When I'd ask for guidance on this area at the beginning of my meditation time, sometimes I'd hear inwardly some simple suggestions for practical steps, like "Call Brenda and clear up any misunderstanding from yesterday." Or a few words of a quote about loving would float through my awareness as I sank deeper into my meditation, and perhaps later that day, the same words would cross my mind as I dealt with a stressed out staff member. And I'd remember to extend my loving consciousness to that person and their situation. I invite you to simply be open to your process, do your best to honor the awareness and ideas that spring from the core of your being, and enjoy using these suggestons to blend intention with your meditation practices. Go to Part V: Meditation and Light Prayer Back to Welcome Page and List of Recent Articles Meditation

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