Intentions With Impact

Similar to The Law of Attraction, the intentions we have the power to impact ourselves, others, and bring about change in our world. In this talk, we explore the power of intention – exploring what it is, how to work with intention, and its relationship with practices such as prayer, energy healing, and vizualisation. Drawing on research in this field that has been carried out over many years, including from Quantum Physics, the remarkable ability to connect with All That Is is revealed.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to this very brief look at the purpose of intention focus,

Having an intention focus.

Some of you who are listening may be familiar with a very brief session that I offer Monday to Friday.

Each day is when I'm able,

Called Intention Focus for Peace in Our World.

And each day we pick a particular topic,

Usually something that's very current in the news,

In which to focus our desire for some impact,

Some change.

So it's a little bit like a prayer or the kind of request you might make in a prayer,

Specifically in supplication.

In other words,

Wishing something for somebody else or something else.

We don't restrict necessarily our intention focus to people.

It can be for situations,

It can be for animals,

It can be for any aspect of Mother Nature's wonder.

So I thought,

Since usually these sessions are very brief and there's a bit of an assumption about what we're doing,

That it would be useful on Insight Timer to offer just a few words around what inspired me to offer this and to talk a little bit about my understanding of what intention focus is all about.

My inspiration is actually really quite recent.

It all happened quite literally,

I think,

On the very first day of the war in Ukraine,

When the Russian tanks rolled in to Ukraine.

I imagine,

Like many people were very shocked and concerned.

And I decided to hold a vigil that very night,

Lasting a couple of hours and ahead of the vigil and indeed during the vigil.

I had tried to identify topics that came up for me as perhaps here is for what for me at that time was prayer.

And I found I had a very,

Very long list,

Which just kept growing.

This was without really being very specific or knowing very much about what was happening on the ground.

And of course,

That list grew over the coming days.

What struck me was that whilst there was doubtless value in having a vigil like that and in any prayer,

That it was all over the place.

It was kind of like a scatter gun approach.

My attention didn't,

Scarcely knew where to go.

And I was aware of some work which has been advanced particularly by a lady who was a journalist,

I believe originally,

Lynn McTaggart has become incredibly well known in this area on the subject of intention.

And in fact,

Lynn in a number of books now,

One in particular that I have drawn on the intention experiment,

Describes not only her own research and work and collaboration with others in this area,

Which has involved thousands of people over many years and has been evolving.

So trying to answer questions that critics might have for earlier research,

Constantly questioning constantly having an open mind,

Very much taking as it were a scientific approach.

But also she refers to a lot of research that's been carried out in this area by others as well,

Again,

Now building up into quite,

Quite a data set,

If that's the right word over a number of years.

And certainly I felt this was compelling.

I had taken part in a large scale intention exercise that was organised by an organisation called Legacy Labyrinth.

Each year,

There is a day dedicated to celebrating the labyrinth,

Which as many of you may know is a wonderful meditation tool as well to walk or to use as a finger labyrinth.

An invitation on this particular day was for people around the world at a particular time to focus on very specific intentions,

Very specific desires for a change to happen.

So as a result of this feeling that I was going all over the place,

Like this scattergum in my prayers in this vigil that remembering what I'd read and learned about the intention focus and the activity that I'd engaged in with the labyrinth,

And remembering reading Limb Taggett's work as well,

I decided that having very specific focuses for what was going on in Ukraine was really what I could do,

Not trying to take on everything at once.

So that really was my inspiration in recent months for coming back to focus on this particular practice.

I'll give some examples in a short while of what we're talking about here.

But the idea being that rather than being like a firefighter who is trying to put out a forest fire,

You are very focused with the limited equipment you have,

Your hose probably,

Your hose pipe perhaps focused initially on putting out a single tree or what is right in front of you.

And with this intense,

Focused and very clear direction,

It's usually the case that you're going to be much more effective than trying to hose the whole area and put out the entire forest fire in one go.

So what is intention?

Well,

I guess we probably can start by thinking about the idea of the law of attraction that you may have heard of.

And I think there's a similarity there,

This idea that we attract or tend to attract from the universe around us,

From individuals,

From situations,

Based on what we give out,

What vibes we give out.

So if we're very clear about what we want and are communicating that,

Albeit often in an unspoken way,

In the way that we are in terms of,

If you like,

The vibration we are emitting,

Then we will attract like for like.

It works the other way as well,

Of course,

That if you're putting out negative vibes into the world,

Then you can also attract the negative.

So that's something,

Generally speaking,

I would suggest to avoid.

Intention is something similar,

I think,

Although perhaps that link has never really been fully explored and proven,

As it were,

In that we are desiring something,

We're putting out a message to,

Let's say,

The universe,

Or if you prefer,

To the targets,

The people,

The situations that will receive this,

Or if you prefer,

If you have a faith tradition to God or the divine.

We are asking,

And not just in an unfeeling way,

But we are asking with real conviction,

Desiring,

Yearning is the word that I tend to use for something to happen.

And if you start to look at all the amazing research that's been carried out by the Intention project and more,

It really is quite extraordinary,

The effects.

And equally exciting when you start to do this yourself,

And there are results that really do seem to be strongly related to this practice.

I'll only mention just a few really,

Just to give some idea.

And this actually wasn't one in the Intention experiment.

This is quite a well-known study,

And there have been a whole series of studies conducted by the Transcendental Meditation movement,

Which,

As you may know,

Was a movement started really by Maharishi Yogi,

Who popularized,

Brought,

At least in modern years,

The practice of Transcendental Meditation into the West.

And Maharishi strongly believed that if you had sufficient people meditating and meditating sufficiently strongly,

That it would really bring about peace in a situation.

It would actually affect the atmosphere,

The air of a place,

And the people that would visit or live there.

So quite a famous experiment that was carried out by the TM organization back in 1993,

Quite a long while ago now,

And this was so-called scientifically controlled.

So they were applying a method known in science which can be replicated and which tries to weed out,

As it were,

Factors that could be influencing this.

It's not entirely successful in this,

But it's generally going to go quite a long way to weeding out factors that,

Other than those,

In other words,

In this case,

The power of meditation might be having an impact.

And they looked at the decline of serious crime.

So this was things like homicide,

Violent crime,

Rape,

And so on.

In Washington DC,

Over a certain period,

There were at one point up to 4,

000 meditators involved in the trial.

And at the peak,

There was a recognized drop of more than 23% in the crime trend compared with a similar period the previous year.

So looking at the same season,

For example.

And that was one example of this.

In fact,

The chief of police of Washington DC said at the time that the only thing that would create a 20% drop in crime would be 20 inches of snow.

And this exercise was carried out in July.

So not in the middle of winter.

There were some critics of that from the scientific communities.

They always are suggesting refinements and so on,

But quite a compelling story.

So I don't want to go into too much detail about listing lots of experiments.

There are very,

Very many that have been conducted and reported on,

But just give you a little bit of a sense of one or two more of the kind of areas that have been looked into.

Quite another famous one was conducted by Masuro Emoto when he was studying the properties of water and the way that we can actually influence the structure of water,

Believe it or not.

He showed that water that had been exposed to music,

Talked to kindly or shown positive affirmations like,

Thank you,

I love you,

That sort of thing,

Grew into the most beautiful crystals,

Snowflake-like crystal patterns.

Whereas those that were exposed to negative sounds demonstrated a structure of real disharmony.

I love that particular example.

Another well-known researcher in this area,

Charles T.

Tartt,

Who is an American psychologist and parapsychologist who's done a lot of work on the paranormal and things that kind of fall out the realm of normal,

Easy to prove,

Perhaps not easy is the right word,

But something you can take into a laboratory very easily and he's done his best here.

So he's looked at things like subliminal perception,

How someone reacts when someone else is feeling a particular emotion.

And he subjected himself to periodic shocks of electric shocks while an observer was sitting in another room not knowing what he was doing and being asked to report on anything that they felt during this time.

And unsurprisingly,

There were responses that this observer felt showing that they could detect changes in brainwaves and heart rate measurements.

So they were wired up to monitor these sorts of things,

Strongly suggesting that we are or can be influenced by senses,

Things going on,

Perceptions,

Thoughts of other people,

Feelings of other people,

Even when we're not aware of this.

There's another wonderful area that we could go into here,

But I won't because it's not my area of specialism,

But there have been quite a lot of associations made between these at times quite strange effects,

Surprising effects,

And some of the discoveries in the field of quantum physics now are well over a century old.

But quantum physics has wrestled with ideas like non-locality.

And even Einstein described some of what was happening in quantum physics as being what he called spooky at a distance.

So non-locality describes the ability of objects to at the same time know about each other's state even when they are separated by distance.

Einstein was one of the first to observe this very strange effect.

There have been continued discoveries in this area,

But it's still an area that is very little understood.

So a principle of what's called non-locality occurs due to another phenomenon called entanglement,

Where it's shown that individual particles,

These very,

Very small parts of an asin that have interacted with each other,

Can become permanently correlated.

So they respond in kind if there's a positive and a negative reaction,

For example.

They will both respond in the same way.

And this happens even when they are separated by very long distances.

And it's postulated actually that this can happen almost instantaneously.

So unlike the classical Newtonian physics,

That was the physics that I remember learning at school,

Boyle's law,

Looking at things like temperature and electricity and velocity,

The science of matter.

Quantum physics is very much interested in what's going on at the atomic and subatomic level.

And there's a lot of very curious,

Seemingly impossible things happening at this level like non-locality.

One of the main ideas in quantum physics is that subatomic elements such as photons and electrons possess not only the property of a particle but also of a wave,

And that both the particle and the wave attributes cannot be separated,

But in fact they complement each other.

Lynn described a lot of the concepts of quantum physics in layman's terms very clearly in her work.

And there are many others too who have brought this into the popular domain.

I've also been interested in the work of the HeartMath Institute,

Which has been active now for quite some time,

Looking at the intelligence of the human heart and its ability,

For example,

To radiate,

To emit an electromagnetism that is vastly more powerful than the brain.

And I might also mention the work of the biologist Rupert Sheldrake,

Who describes what he calls morphic resonance,

A kind of invisible field that forms a collective memory between the members of a particular organism,

So all humans for example,

Having a connection with this field.

And in turn this field determines how an organism grows.

It seems to be,

In Sheldrake's thinking,

More important than biochemistry itself.

He's also conducted some very interesting studies,

For example,

Involving owners and their pets.

So one study looked at the ability of owners to influence what their dogs left at home would do when they created,

Sent out the intention that they were coming home.

Dogs were filmed when this was happened,

There was a little video being taken,

And almost 60% of the dogs that were filmed in one study at least rushed to the door well before their owners returned,

Just at that point when the intention was sent to come home.

So again,

Another beautiful example of the power of intention,

In this case not between human and human,

But between human and an animal.

We could of course go on to look at what some spiritual traditions will describe as spiritual bodies,

At auras,

At the idea of the energy of the chakras,

And many similar areas,

Not to mention some theories from psychology as well,

But perhaps one of the better known ones being that of Carl Jung and the collective unconscious,

And the idea of archetypes,

The idea that all humans are able to draw on a collective memory.

So possibly there is quite a lot of overlap between these different areas of research,

I find them fascinating.

For me they just underline the fact that there is so much we don't understand,

And of course these are all exciting frontiers in research of different kinds.

We might also mention remote viewing and telepathy,

And other similar concepts perhaps that may be explained possibly by the strange phenomena that quantum physics is uncovering,

And may be related to all of the other themes that we have been talking about.

However,

I don't think we need answers on those things,

And to know whether or not they are related.

What seems important to me,

And this very much will depend on your personal worldview,

But beyond our ego selves,

This is at least my belief,

And also the belief of many faith traditions,

Beyond the perception we create,

Our experience of what we call reality,

When we come down at a very deep level and can really connect,

As it were,

At our source,

Go beyond our bodies,

Transcend our ego selves,

I believe at that level we are all connected.

That is a personal view,

And it may be your view if you have a particular faith tradition,

But I just offer that as an observation really,

Not something that you have to believe in,

In order to practice intention work.

So,

The intention experiment has done lots of very well designed experiments,

And example after example of the effectiveness of having a strong intention.

And when we begin to see through countless results that have been reported that there really is an effect,

Intention sending is something I believe to take very seriously.

So,

What is involved in sending an intention?

Really it's about tuning in to what it is you want to focus on,

What that particular desire,

That particular yearning is.

I describe this usually with a language of what we will,

We want something very strongly to change.

So,

For example,

In the kind of news stories we pick up on,

It might be we're looking at a situation where there's a drought at the moment,

And our desire is for rainfall to replenish the rivers and the reservoirs and to enable people to survive very often.

That's quite a simple,

Very direct example.

Or it may be a desire for peaceable and compromising debates where there is a very difficult mediation,

Perhaps between two sides that are in the midst of a conflict going on.

It doesn't of course have to be related to big things,

Lots of people or whole countries or situations.

It can be anything,

Any particular situation.

So,

Sometimes an intention focus may well be very much directed at an individual,

For an individual,

Perhaps for their healing.

And even in my own experience,

There have been quite a number now of examples of remarkable turnarounds in health following this practice.

Tuning in will be something where I think everybody finds their own way.

There are some suggested practices around this.

Limmataget certainly refers to some.

I think as a meditator,

If you are a meditator,

You should find this much easier to drop into.

Essentially,

We are trying to go typically from a mental space into a heart space or even,

If not the heart,

Into the gut essentially,

Into that place where you might feel yearning,

Desire and then,

As it were,

Through the heart wanting to radiate,

Send out this message to bring about a particular change.

So,

For me,

Meditation,

Even if it's quite brief,

As a settling,

As a grounding process,

Is important to come to this particular place.

We all will have different ways and different world views about how to work with intention.

So,

If you have a faith tradition,

Then,

As it were,

Asking God or the universe or a particular deity,

An intermediary,

An angel,

Whoever or whatever it is,

To act on this as a real desire is one obvious way.

You may prefer to communicate directly,

So focusing very much on perhaps the individuals involved.

They may not be known to you,

So it may be an image that comes to mind,

An idea of who these people are,

Just something that comes into mind.

Very often the case,

Desiring that they will be influenced,

They will be touched by this message that we are sending in their direction.

Sometimes that's for a change of mind or heart,

Sometimes it's for an opening for them,

For inspiration,

For healing or for some other direct intervention of that kind.

So,

Just sending a thought,

Having a powerful thought,

Is itself a form of energy that will have a vibration,

It will communicate.

Probably the sharper you can bring that thought into a picture,

Into a vision of a desired outcome,

Then that's likely,

I would think,

To have more effect.

If you work with a healing practice such as Reiki,

Then this too will be another modality that you may want to use and typically with such practices you will have your own way for settling,

For invoking that healing energy and for clearing space,

Offering this particular healing in a way that you are familiar with.

It may just be if you really can connect into a deep yearning just to let that feeling,

That desire go.

I like to use a bit of a body gesture,

It's almost as though I'm helping on its way,

I'm sort of holding out my hand,

My arms,

Pushing this desire in the direction of the individuals or situation that I'm setting the intention for.

That just gives me a little bit of help to feel into this energy and to feel that it is moving on its way,

As it were.

So,

There's no one way or necessarily right way.

It's a case of finding what works for you,

Even just speaking the words aloud,

Repeating an intention again creates an energy and can and will have an effect.

There's no particular time that you need to spend on actually willing the intention.

Actually,

Most of the work for me normally is preparing,

Coming to the place where I feel able to connect with the subject,

And have really felt into my own self actually,

So I can send that message,

I can communicate very clearly.

So,

The meditation,

The grounding,

The affirmations that come before the actual work of sending the intention are most important.

Indeed,

I believe that this work essentially happens outside of time and space,

Whether we see this as the divine or God or the universe,

Or in terms of communicating from soul to soul or higher self to higher self,

What is happening is happening in a way and a time and over distance that are actually again beyond the realms of Newtonian physics,

That idea of there being neat boundaries such as time.

What really does seem to matter though is the intensity,

How convicted you are,

How serious you are,

How genuine,

Authentic is your desire for change,

How strong it is.

You might think of it a little bit like,

And this is a fairly common image perhaps of something that has impact,

But if you imagine dropping a stone into a pond and seeing the ripples spread out from the point where the stone has impact,

It's at the point of impact initially where those ripples are immediately spreading.

It all happens in an instant.

Now,

Of course,

Over time we see ripples slowly,

Much more slowly,

Much more gently at the periphery as it were of those rings that have been formed continuing to spread,

But the real impact happens at the moment of dropping the stone and the stone rather actually coming into contact with the water.

And of course the harder the stone or if you had a rock and perhaps the higher you drop the stone from,

You would expect more of an impact,

More of an impact right at that moment of contact with the water.

So perhaps that might help to illustrate what seems to be happening with impact work.

It's about the moment,

It's about the intensity of those waves that we are able to send out,

The strength of our rock as it hits the water as it were.

If you come from the Christian tradition,

You probably will know that Jesus spoke about if you have enough faith being able to move mountains.

I'm sure there are similar teachings in other faith traditions,

And I think this is something like that.

It's more about how strongly you believe,

How strongly you are connected with this work of sending the message,

Sending the intention rather than the amount of time that you actually give to that.

During the intention it may be that you find something a little bit like in a meditation,

Something that's useful to sustain attention because really the key here is not so much about how long we are sending this intention.

In fact it can be in a split second.

I actually believe,

And we won't go into this here,

But I actually believe that intention work can happen almost outside of time and space.

But in an instant if your desire is strong enough,

If that wave as it were,

The energy you're putting out is strong enough,

That can have a very powerful effect.

So typically in our daily Insight sessions,

We are only setting a minute or two aside for this exercise,

Which itself can be quite long to sustain attention,

Particularly if this is a relatively new practice.

But like in meditation,

It may well be that you find yourself being distracted.

Often the distractions may be related to the particular focus you have,

But actually taking you away a bit from the focus.

You're thinking a little bit wider around the theme.

So being mindful.

Again meditation practice,

As you likely will know,

Is very valuable in developing greater mindfulness,

Being aware of when you are being distracted and when you are aware,

Coming back as quickly as you can to focus on the task in hand.

So I like to go into intention with a number of affirmations around reminding myself to be present and reminding myself that this is important work,

That I can connect with the higher selves of others and really dedicating myself for a very short period of time normally to be present,

Totally present with the activity,

With the particular focus.

So some of the sorts of affirmations that I use myself are a desire to focus my mind.

I focus my mind,

I say,

Body and spirit on the intention I desire,

Leaving aside all thoughts,

Feelings,

Doubts and other distractions that don't serve my focus or purpose of the moment.

I open myself to connecting with the higher selves of those embraced by my intention,

Being present with them.

I breathe into my heart,

Allowing myself to be filled with love and light.

And I exhale from my heart,

Knowing that as I do so,

I direct the gift of heart energy to anyone,

Anywhere,

Making myself then a vessel of loving kindness,

A conduit or channel for peace,

Focusing very fully on the intention,

Tuning in and fully aligning myself with the vibration of the intention as I feel into and visualize its impact.

The affirmations that I use and have just mentioned are adapted from words offered by Global Healing Response.

So a process of preparing yourself,

Settling,

Centering,

Grounding,

Taking a little bit of time to do that,

Whatever time you feel is necessary to find that connection,

That point where you are tuned in and able to really be present with the intention,

That is really what matters.

I've also found,

And again,

There will be different approaches that different individuals will find helpful.

I personally find drawing,

Actually pen strokes,

Usually with different colors on paper,

Helps me very often to maintain a focus.

It's a little bit like someone might do some knitting to help with their meditation or perhaps use a rosary bead or something of that nature,

Something actually that isn't really the focus of your attention.

It's giving your hands something to do,

Distracting them,

But it's helping because there is something energetically going on there and it's reminding you to keep your focus on the intention.

Particularly if you are intending on extending the practice for some time over many minutes,

Perhaps 10 minutes or more,

You might like to experiment with using something of this nature that can help with sustaining the practice.

Energy work,

You may know,

Can be exhausting and it can also bring up things for ourselves,

Particularly when you are dealing with quite distressing situations.

So again,

Particularly if you've been focused on a longer period,

On a particular topic which has been particularly distressing,

A useful practice,

Which will be the case especially if you are involved in a healing practice like Reiki,

Is to come out gently and perhaps to offer a prayer or an affirmation again to release yourself from the energy that you've engaged with and to commit to your own self-care.

Perhaps if you can,

Taking a short break afterwards just to allow yourself to re-energise and not to be drained by this process.

It can be quite heavy work at times.

A particular prayer that we use in the group that I'm involved in to close out has the following words,

I stand before you,

Divine power of all I am,

Grateful for all we have blessed and healed together.

Now we let go of the energy you have sent us.

We fold back our wings,

Put away our symbols of healing light.

May anything that doesn't benefit us leave all that we are.

May we feel refreshed and uplifted from anything draining,

Remembering to self-care and rest once this prayer is said.

Closing all portals and anything that was opened,

Expectedly and unexpectedly,

Allowing our energy levels to contract to normal settings,

Knowing that we are at peace and blessed and so it is.

So that's one form of words that may be appropriate,

Particularly if you are more familiar with working with healing energy and channelling energy,

This idea of closing out in a healthy way that looks after your own self-care.

But you will find your own form of words,

An own way of doing this and again there is no right way or has to be a way necessarily.

It is really a case of feeling into what feels right for you.

Now another important aspect of this which I have learned and still have a long way to go in getting right is to be as specific as possible in defining the intention.

So usually it is a good idea,

Well I suggest it is essential to be clear about the intention before you go into the practice.

Probably you'll find that defining a clear intention becomes easier the more you do it and like everything you have to start somewhere so don't be too concerned if you don't get it right initially,

If you find intentions are quite vague and broad.

At the end of the day you are offering a will,

A desire that doesn't necessarily even need to be put into words,

It is more about a feeling,

A desire,

An outcome.

But it is going to help you connect with that energy if you can define it as well as possible.

And I like to think of this a little bit like asking the universe as you would ask another person,

Giving instructions to them if you like,

Please will you do this.

So in other words not being ambiguous,

Making clear typically the time frame,

Where,

Who,

How,

If not necessarily the how but the outcome,

Very specifically the outcome and perhaps bounding this quite clearly.

So it might be if we are looking at a situation for example,

A lot of my intention focus has been around what is happening in Ukraine,

It may be focused on a specific hospital or a specific area within a town rather than trying to take on the entire country or an entire region.

So again this idea of being a firefighter who has got a single hose to use and to make sure that is used most effectively,

That the energy as it were is going in a very focused way to a particular target even if there are many many others around who would need that help as well.

So I don't like talking necessarily in terms of smart objectives,

The idea of being specific and measured and action based,

Realistic and timely but this kind,

Because that speaks a lot of corporate objective setting to me,

But these kind of ideas really being as focused as you can be when you come to define what it is you want.

I also,

And this is a personal matter of ethics if you like,

It's not a strict rule but I personally don't generally frame intentions that might interfere with somebody else's free will.

So in other words if I wanted there to be an end,

This is a broad objective on the very specific one,

But if I wanted there to be an end to the war in Ukraine and I thought that that was best brought about by sending fire and brimstone on the Kremlin,

That would not fit well with my own ethics as it were because it would interfere.

Firstly it would be willing destruction,

It would be a negative will,

But secondly also it would be interfering with free will,

Even though the free will of people that may make decisions that I don't like and which may themselves lead to an exacerbation of the war.

So as an alternative my focus would be on bringing to light the humanity of changing heart and mindset for those individuals.

It's then left with them whether they do or not,

But sending the strong message that perhaps is going to give them that real inspiration to make a change.

My own focus in setting an intention is to aim to be fairly brief.

It's not my natural way very often but I found that intentions that are quite cumbersome to describe are hard to transmit.

They make it more difficult for me to tune into that energy so that might be a principle you want to think about,

Aiming for clarity and precision but using as few words and caveats as possible.

Making sure,

As we've said,

That the intention is bounded and is clear is very,

Very important and again the smart approach,

Specific,

Measurable,

Achievable,

Relevant and time-based might be helpful here in actually thinking about how to frame a particular intention.

Again,

An ethical point for me is not to take sides.

Essentially this means not making the intention overtly political,

For example,

In its focus.

Arguably any intention for peace is political to a degree but what seems important to me is to avoid being overly polarised in supporting a particular course of action,

Ideology,

Camp if you like,

Or an idea of how a solution will be achieved.

And indeed it's a recommended practice of Lynne Taggart to actually wish for an outcome that is equal to or better than that which we imagine,

Allowing God,

Source,

The Universe,

Spirit,

Whoever or whatever you see as being the intermediary,

As it were,

To manifest what is needed,

What is desired in this situation.

Very important too to frame the intention with conviction.

So rather than the popular way of introducing an intention which might be something like,

We intend that or our intention is that,

I prefer to reframe using words like,

We will that.

And for me this is more active in tone than the alternative way of framing and so engaging and urgent in its effect.

It is more a focus of,

It will be or is already or already has been done rather than may it be done.

Words have power as we know and this applies to the notion of what an intention is as much as to anything else,

I believe.

In the daily intention for peace sessions that we have on Insight,

I will often troll quite a number of different news sites to pick up on different stories and there will often be a specific human story that actually really creates an image or impression,

Actually brings me into the situation even though when we're talking about situations like war or famine,

They aren't situations that I have personally been affected with and so can empathise with fully.

But at least this is a way of beginning to have just a glimpse of what it may be to be in the shoes of another.

Often there will be images,

Pictures on websites that help support that or perhaps sometimes some video footage as well to really give as it were some texture to make real the situation that it is not just as it were a news headline.

So don't worry as I say if you don't get the focus clear enough initially,

It's another thing which is very much a learning experience and again you will find that quite quickly you are able to create as it were intention frame intentions without too much thought.

So intention work can be carried out individually on your own of course or within a group and actually even though studies like the TM,

The Transcendental Meditation experience in Washington suggests that having this sort of critical mass of meditators makes a difference,

Perhaps it does on a very grand scale,

I believe it's much more about the strength of intention that matters and research particularly work done by Limmert Taggart again involving thousands of people over quite a long period of time has actually found that relatively small groups of people can have as much impact indeed perhaps if not more than much larger groups.

So she describes this as the idea of the power of eight,

The idea of around about eight people in a small group give or take two or three is often if you were going to be practicing this in a regular forum with another group of people quite an ideal number.

I myself am a member of such a group and a part of what we value I think is the fact that we get to know each other,

We bond with each other,

We can actually focus on any particular needs for intention that people within the group have as well.

So there's a real connection of the people within the group that you might not get if you were in a much larger group and perhaps with people you're not meeting so regularly.

And the group that meets on Inside Timer tends to be quite a regular,

Stable,

Relatively small group.

So again,

We have this sense of community sharing,

Understanding,

The sort of common purpose that we have with the intention.

Of course,

You are very welcome to join us there.

So the power of eight is quite an important concept that Lynne discovered.

And again,

If you read another of her wonderful books,

Power of Eight,

Called The Power of Eight,

She describes that in wonderful detail.

So I think the simplest way to understand what intention work is all about is to engage with it and certainly when you do find,

I'm not personally monitoring most of the time what happens after the intentions that I offer.

I kind of assume,

I believe that I have had an effect.

I played my part along probably with many other people through different means,

Through prayers and healing and other approaches as well as others who are sending an intention focus.

But sometimes there is some feedback and when you do get some feedback,

Even if your part was perhaps a small one,

You will never perhaps really know that,

You feel overjoyed.

I do.

I feel overjoyed.

You feel really a part of that celebration that a change has come around and that itself is a kind of proof for me that this works,

That you are connected.

You are,

If we use that word from the realm of the quantum physicist,

Entangled with the situation.

I do recommend trying this,

Inviting that you have a go,

Practicing.

If you have an intention that you are ready to work with and already have defined this as well as you feel you can at the moment,

You might like to join me for a guided intention meditation here on Inside Timer,

A pre-recorded guidance that I have put together outlining the basic framework that will help you settle into and work with your intention.

Alternatively,

I hope that you might join me and others for our regular intention for peace in our world every Monday to Friday at 8am Eastern Time here on Inside Timer.

Reviews

Excellent! So clear, so inspiring. Much of what you covered has been on my radar for quite some time (Lynne McTaggart books unread on my shelf!) and I feel energized to move forward and connect in, purposely, with fuller awareness. Thank you. And I’ll check out your group on IT and other offerings.
And I have a labyrinth in my backyard and did facilitator training with Lauren a few years back!
Happy to make your acquaintance 🙏☀️💫 🌀