This post is part of a series of journaling prompts exploring Chopra's The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success - a book of guidance for mindful living in the modern world. Whatever your level of spiritual practice, I believe there are useful insights to be gained from reflecting on these seven concepts and considering what difference adopting them could make to your life and your self-employed work.
Each of the seven posts in this series will explore one of the spiritual laws further, and then offer writing prompts for you to reflect on your responses.
The law of intention and desire is about two qualities: attention and intention. Firstly, Chopra suggests that whatever we choose to focus our attention on will grow and expand. Whatever we take our attention away from will begin to wither and fade.
If we then set an intention for the object of attention, it is much more likely to happen than if we had no set intention and were not paying attention. Following?!
This reminds me of the saying 'you can't take the first step if you don't know which direction you want to go.' The idea of planning our futures and manifesting has received a lot of 'buzzword' attention recently, and can often be taken out of context. To me, it makes a lot of sense to visualise and gain more clarity about what exactly you would like to achieve - whether that might be material, in work, in relationships, in travel...
Setting an intention and then remembering it (paying attention) is a lot like building a habit. Often, these habits then become fundamental in shaping who we are and how we live. This in turn becomes pretty influential on what we come to achieve.
Deepak Chopra suggests a five-step plan which I have simplified here. Once you have set your intention:
Meditate into the silent space between thoughts.
Release your intentions and desires to the universe.
Stay in self-referral, which may mean keeping your intention private.
Relinquish attachment to the outcome.
Trust in not knowing the details.
Journaling Prompts for the Law of Intention
Are there certain things that you currently give a lot of your attention to?
Consider whether these are things that you would like more of, or less of. Make notes next to each one.
Make a list of things that you would like to have more of in your life.
Describe in clear, sensory detail something that you really want. (The 'thing' can be a situation rather than material.)
Describe how this having this would make you feel.
How would it be to let go of controlling how it will happen?
Enjoy journaling your reflections, and if you have any questions, you can message me on Instagram or email hello@strengthinfeathers.com . The next post and set of journal prompts are for The Law of Detachment and you can find them here.