Achieve Your Goals with Intentions - Not Resolutions
If you set a resolution this year, consider setting your intentions instead and you just might achieve your goals.
Resolutions
A New Year’s resolution is something you resolve to do, or change, or start doing. It’s set in stone and it’s a commitment. I personally did not set a resolution this year, but I did want to find out if my Pilates class had. So, not long after the New Year’s holiday, I decided to ask if they anyone had set a resolution. It had been a while since I’d seen them and I was excited to catch up.
After I asked, I was met with silence.
Quite honestly, I was shocked. Not one person spoke up. Not one. I joked with them, “Wow. So I guess nobody is doing resolutions this year.” As I finished speaking, one person muttered something about not doing resolutions anymore because she never keeps them anyway.
I was met with the same silence and response when I asked my next class the same question. So, I decided I would stop asking. However, I suspect several of them did have resolutions, they just didn’t want speak up. There had to be at least one person in the class who set a resolution. Just one. I say that, because these women are dedicated women. They show up each week to class (many of them have been doing this for years). Some of them have booked out their classes for the entire upcoming year! They’ve already accomplished more than most people (myself included!). How could they think they couldn’t keep a resolution?
It’s possible nobody spoke up because resolutions can bring feelings of anxiety and stress to try and accomplish them. Speaking up might have meant they were now accountable and possibly feel additional stress or judgement if they didn’t keep them. Besides, the women that did speak up were actually right; we don’t keep resolutions. According to Psychology Today, 80 percent of our resolutions fail.
Goals
A goal without a plan is just a wish – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Goals are future based, result oriented and have a deadline. You can check them off as you reach them. They are best achieved when they are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time based (S.M.A.R.T). Maybe look at the goals you had already set for the year. Did they originate from a place deep within you? Did they align with your intentions? Because intentions should be the foundation and passion behind goals. Ask yourself why you set the goals that you did. With every answer you give, ask another why. Get to the heart of your goal and you will also be able to see if they identify with your intentions.
The point is to go to a deeper place of discovery with what you hope to achieve. Once you decide on your goals (aligned with your intentions), use the S.M.A.R.T. tool to create a plan.
Intentions
“Intentions create our reality” - Wane Dryer
Intentions are a way of thinking that will dictate how you interact with others. It’s a mental state to carry out an action in the future. Intentions are heart driven and they should inspire you.
I remember being exposed to the concept of intentions for the first time, during a yoga class. We sat in silence as the class began and the instructor asked us to set our intentions for the hour. I sat in that quiet room with my thoughts swirling about as I decided on my intention. I thought to myself, “I want to be more flexible.”
Right about now you might be wondering if my thought was an intention, or if it was actually a goal. I guess it depends on how you look at it. It could have been an intention, if I had meant it to be more of a purpose throughout the class, or even throughout my life. To be flexible with how I interacted with the space, with the people, with myself during that hour…that day…etc. But that wasn’t what I meant. I really just wanted to be able to keep my heels on the floor during downward facing dog and touch my toes during a forward fold. Being more flexible, was not my intention, it was just a goal. An objective. A plan, and I wanted to accomplish it by the end of class. Do you see the difference there?
Thinking back, I had no idea there was a difference. I equated my intention with my goal. They were one in the same. But intentions should be your why, your purpose. Goals should be the “check list” allowing the why to endure.
Consider these things when you think about setting your intentions:
What do you want to put out into the world? What do you want to get back from the world?
Are you able to free write to discover your true intentions?
What has been heavy on your heart recently?
What didn’t work this last year or what has affected you negatively?
Are your intentions positive?
Are your intentions someplace you can see, so you can stay on track?
When you can identify what you truly desire, what your heart wants, then you can reevaluate your resolutions and change “I resolve to…” to “I intend to…”
Intentions, Goals and PILATES
Even in Pilates, there are intentions. Consider the BASI Ten Principles that should be present at all times during your practice. These principles speak to the mental aspect of the work, but also the desire and purpose of how we interact with our bodies (and ultimately our daily lives). They are not goals, but at first glance they may appear to be goals. Things we hope to achieve during Pilates (to check off), but these principles are present tensed and goals are future based, purposed filled, constantly revisited and worked upon. In essence they are intentions. They allow space to be able to reach our goals. These principles are the seeds we plant into our mental space, into our daily lives, into our interactions with the world.
BASI Pilates - 10 Principles
Awareness
Balance
Breath
Concentration
Center
Control
Efficiency
Flow
Precision
Harmony
Consider bringing the Ten Principles into your everyday life as you set your intentions. Maybe you intend to create a more harmonious way of interacting with people you meet. That could be an intention. Then look to set goals around that intention. Maybe you intend to find more ways to create balance with your career and your social life. Then look for ways to set goals around that intention.
So I say…let your resolutions go and instead focus on your intentions and your goals.
