I want to write about intention here, even though it scares me half to death. HAHA! I think knowing what your intentions are is one of the most important and helpful things in life. It is something that I would almost love to teach people. However, the thing that scares me so much about teaching people about intention is that I would also be held accountable for my own intentions. I would be scared out of my mind of doing something hypocritical, like teaching one way and then doing the opposite.
For now, I just want to write about it in this blog. The reason that I think intention is so important is that it affects your entire life experience. The problem that I see with intention though is that many different intentions could be operating simultaneously inside of you. And each intention has its own agenda, and they sometimes conflict with each other.
I have heard Gary Zukav talk about this in terms of being called splintered parts of your personality. I also have heard him say that they are frightened parts of your personality. I also like the term “wounded” parts of your personality. Gary Zukav says that one of the purposes of this life experience is to heal those wounded, or splintered, parts of your personality.
This is one of the main problems that I had with that movie, The Secret. I think they failed to mention how different parts of your personality could be operating inside of you. I think if you are not aware of these splintered aspects of yourself, then they can take over and sabotage your more positive intentions. For example, you could have an intention to start a business or quit an addiction or begin a healthy relationship or start an exercise program. However, if you are not aware of all the forces operating inside you, I think wounded parts of yourself that are rooted in the past can creep up and sabotage your efforts to do those “positive” things.
I’m pretty sure it was Carl Jung who called those wounded parts of your personality “the shadow” (well, that is just how I interpreted it). For example, maybe a parent told you that you weren’t good enough when you were a child. Or maybe you were teased at school by your peers for not dressing the “right” way. Or some other person who you thought had authority or power over you might have convinced you that you were somehow inadequate or unlovable. I think so many factors go into shaping how each individual is brought up as a child. And I think so many faulty belief systems can be implanted into your brain and conditioned into your psyche.
I think so many of those childhood wounds, if they are not dealt with, become stored inside the actual cell tissue of the body. If they continue to be repressed long into adulthood, I think they can become disease processes and they can actually kill you over time. And I think these wounds are essentially your “shadow” aspects. They come to the surface when you are trying to “do good” in your current life.
Like I mentioned above, let’s say you wanted to do something positive for yourself, like start a business. But if you have some old memory from childhood where your mother or father told you that you aren’t good enough, I think that memory can take over your mind and find a way to sabotage your efforts. This is what I mean by competing intentions. On one hand, you have an intention to start a business. But that old wound that was never fully addressed or acknowledged also has its own intention, which is to prove that you are not good enough. So, right when you are about to make some important business transaction with a client, you might get set off and lash out at the client, resulting in the business deal to fall through. That would be an example of how an old wound can sabotage your current life.
Similarly, let’s say you are trying to lose weight. But at the same time you have some old wound from childhood where your mother or father said to you, “Oh, you are always going to be fat. You have fat genes! You come from a family of fat people. Just get used to it.” I think a wound like that, if it is not fully looked at, acknowledged, felt, and then released, can interfere with your intention to lose weight.
So, yeah. This aspect of intention, and how old wounds can sabotage your efforts to create a happy life for yourself, is something that I wish was more discussed. I think you can have all the intention in the world to get rich, find true love, get a great job, eat healthy, exercise, etc. But if you have not fully dealt with wounds from the past, I think those wounds will definitely come to the surface at those very moments when you are on the cusp of a breakthrough, or right when you are about to succeed. This is why I think it is so important and helpful to be aware of old wounds, and challenge them before their intentions can interfere with your current plans for yourself.
Lastly, I just want to say that I think those “shadow” intentions are almost always rooted in issues of feeling unworthy, unlovable, inferior, flawed, or somehow inadequate as a human being. I don’t think you can ever truly succeed until those feelings are fully dealt with.
–Kelly Magovern
