It’s the second half of January, and the time we start feeling our enthusiasm for New Year’s resolutions starting to wane. Even if we’re using a lovely Leatherpress journal (!), change is difficult, and our goals may be losing their luster.
It might be time to let go of goal-setting and gutting it out with those resolutions. Is there another way? Can we get a second take on this process?
That’s where intention journaling comes in. Even if you make a list of goals and resolutions, you’ve got to consider the why and how to effectively reach them. Setting an intention can not only provide an effective way to meet your goals, but also shift your mindset to change beyond our goals. After all, when we make a resolution, aren’t we hoping for a change?
If you look up the word intention, you’ll find its Latin root to be “intendere” or “Intentio”, which means a stretching toward a purpose, or turning one’s attention toward something.
Clearly, intention setting means steering our mindset toward the why and how behind a goal or desire, not just the what. For example, we set a goal to save more money each month because we want to spend more time with family abroad and we’ve got to purchase airline tickets.
Intention can also involve the “how.” In this case, our intention to spend more time with family involves attention to how we spend our finances
That may sound more complicated than a checklist of goals, but is it? If setting an intention means recalibrating your mindset, this means you’ve got the positive power of attitude and enthusiasm turned in the direction of your goals. Your checklist becomes a tool and not a dictator. In fact, you’ll find your checklist to be more pliable, more accurate, even more inspiring and enjoyable.
But living into our intentions isn’t only a mind game. It’s a wholistic approach to goals or desires. We’ll need to take action. We’ll need to cultivate habits—or break them—in order to move forward. For example, if we need airline tickets to see family, we might need to curb a dinner-out habit and eat in to save money.
Our initial challenge at the top of this blog post was slogging through to meet our resolutions. Looking deeper at our intentions gives context around our resolutions and goals, getting to “why” we want to see change as well as putting the “hows” in place to get us there.
If intention setting seems far more satisfying for you than goal setting, grab a journal. We, of course, prefer our Leatherpress journals, but we’ll leave that to you. Here are some questions to think about as you journal your intentions.
Remember that intention setting is intentionally holistic. It’s not one-and-done goal setting. It’s not about productivity as much as it’s about setting regular practices. And it’s not about a race, but about routines that orient your mind and body toward meaningful change over time.
Use your journal on a regular basis, perhaps daily or weekly to evaluate how you are doing with your intentions. What’s working and what isn’t? What life events or situations have changed, and do you need to reevaluate what’s possible?
Give those resolutions a rewrite. Harness your “why”, set realistic expectations and use your intention to move you forward toward your dreams.
And, if you need a lovely journaling companion, choose from colors and styles here at Leatherpress.
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