Intentions for a new year.

What's the point of intentions for a new year?

Intentions allow us to predispose ourselves, to give rise to an attitude that allows us to eventually give rise to what we expect.

Sometimes intentions are thought of as magical. In other words, only by mentioning it would we magically make it happen. But the objective of the intentions is far from this.

On the contrary, setting intentions helps us prepare for the actions necessary to accomplish what we want.

Magical thinking considers that things happen outside of our intervention. And many times we can think that intention has to do with this. But the real power of intention has to do with what happens to us when we do it.

By setting an intention, from this perspective, we position ourselves to make room for it. We prepare ourselves comprehensively to carry out what is necessary for this process. At the same time we take responsibility for what we want, and we make it visible by writing it down or bringing it to light. It is an act of choice since we must select what intentions and priorities we find among all the possible ones. 

Setting intentions at the beginning of the year is a way of taking charge of what we want to happen and making ourselves available to put it into play. It is a way of preparing the ground.

The objectives that we have do not happen by inertia, they require our participation and commitment. And the initial step could be the intention. It is the first symbolic act of inauguration or beginning of that new reality.

Just as skepticism is usually found when making year-end closings or balances, this attitude is also found in many people when talking about intentions. It can be thought that it has no purpose, that it is something trivial or unimportant. Even that it can limit the variety of events that may occur in the future.

Although there are those who may take this activity too inflexibly, if it can be applied broadly and symbolically as we mentioned before, it is a very good tool.

Intentions lay the groundwork for change and connect us with our deepest longings if we do the necessary introspection work. At the beginning of the year, they help us position ourselves in a certain way, reconnecting with the path we have chosen, with what our priorities are, and what attitude we need to assume for them to happen.

Closing the previous year is symbolically a ritual of passage from one year to another.  It helps us to organize our existence cyclically and to establish a rhythm, with stages and passages that give us the opportunity to metabolize what we have experienced in order to project what is to come. The balances of the year allow us to elaborate on what we lived in that period, recognize what we have learned, and have new energy for the coming stage.

This available energy can then be used to start the new year, perhaps starting from the intentions, as a way of establishing a position, and as a ritual to open that new year.

Taking responsibility for what we want, establishing it, visualizing it, is a way of preparing ourselves to put it into action. It is the way to open this new stage and to assume what is necessary to enable it.

 

Thank You