The Power of Setting Intention

Hi, I'm Dan Cunningham. I'm a life coach and a professional organizer, and I'm an expert in the field of organizing as it relates to our mental health, our mind, body and spirit. Organizing is always about clearing a dresser or tightening up the closet. Sometimes it's about how we're feeling, thinking how we're presenting ourself in the world. So today I wanted to talk to you about a really powerful exercise that I use at the beginning of every session. And it's something I think a, a lot of us should use in our day to day.

It's lot, really powerful. It's setting our intention. I'm going to tell you a personal story about how I use setting my intention for positive impact. And it's lasted. I had a relationship with a member of my family that wasn't good. And every time I showed up at the house, the visit was negative and I left feeling worse than I did when I got there. And so every time I showed up at the house, I was anxious. I was expecting a negative experience because they all had been and they all were until I used setting the intention.

I'd learned that in a session with my therapist. And so this visit, I pulled up in the driveway and I sat in the car and I thought, I'm going to set my intention. I'm going to set a different intention. And so I went through the steps. I've verbalized my intention. This visit is going to be a positive visit. It's going to make me feel good and I'm going to feel better than I did when I got here. And then I pictured that experience in my mind's eye and I ran through the experience and I thought about how it was going to feel, and I brought every sense I could into the equation.

And then I opened the door and I walked up to the house. And the visit was one of the best we had ever had. I set the intention for a positive visit, and that's what I had. After I left, I realized that I wasn't showing up alone to the previous visits. I was bringing along all of the negative energy that I had accumulated from the visits before walking in the door with shields up and brick walls all over the place because I was anticipating a negative time. This time I set my intention. The walls were down.

I wasn't expecting negativity. I was intending to have a nice visit, and that's what I had. Try setting the intention in your day to day life, whether it's before you go into the grocery store or before it's a new day on a new job. Whatever the case may be, get clear about what it is you want. Set your intention. You're going to have a much more positive experience.