Setting An Intention For Meditation (+10 Mins Silence)

In this session we practice "Intention Setting" followed by 10 minutes of silence.

Setting an intention for your session helps to keep you focused on the practice.

For a Mindfulness Practice, "For the next few minutes, I will be mindfully meditating to improve my calm, clarity, and focus. I will gently return my focus back to the breath for the duration of the session."

For a Introspective practice, "I will approach and accept everything that arises with compassionate curiosity and calm confidence."

As a mantra/point of focus/contemplation, "I am hear now"

Intention setting helps you to stay focused and on task. I encourage you to make your own, print it off, and place it where you meditate. A good model to follow is, "What you are doing, why, and for how long."

Transcript

Hello and welcome to the session, I invite you to take a seat or lie down and get yourself comfortable, You can close down the eyes if you wish, And just begin taking some slow deep breaths in through the nose. Today we're going to be talking about intentions for meditation. When we begin to meditate and do a guided session like this one, We sort of rely on the instructor to set the scene, To sort of set the container and get us into the meditation mood. You meditate with me, With a group and you just sort of go along with it, But what do we do when we're on our own? So as you're taking some slow deep calm breaths, We're going to begin this session with a little bit of a discussion about setting an intention. First things first, The best intentions are the ones that you set for yourself, Written for you and by you, Because it will get you what you are after. We all meditate for different reasons. That said, I will offer you a few intentions that I've written and you're more than welcome to use them verbatim or change them for your needs. But why do we set an intention? An intention is a statement. You can say it out loud, You could write it and put it up on your wall, Or for example where you meditate daily, You just sort of repeat it to yourself before you do the sit. It's almost like if you were to go into an exercise session, You're hyping yourself up for the session, You're going to commit to the exercise, You're not going to go on your phone, You're not going to do other stuff, You're going to be there for the lifting. In the same way, An intention with meditation almost sort of primes us to stick with it, To do it, To be there for the duration and if it's written right in front of us, If we go to get distracted or change what we're doing, We're like no, We've committed. A version of myself, The highest version of myself is establishing this meditation habit for these reasons and I'm going to follow along with it. So I'm going to offer you a few intentions here and then we're going to sit and practice for a minute or so of mindfulness using the intentions we set. So this is the first intention, I'm going to read it twice, This one's the longest one. For the next few minutes, I will be mindfully meditating to improve my calm, Clarity and focus. If I notice my mind has wandered, I will gently and lovingly return my focus back to the breath for the duration of the session. So I'm going to use this intention to do two minutes of mindfulness meditation. When your mind wanders, You bring it back to the sensations of the breath at the nose, That's the practice with this intention. For the next few minutes, I'll be mindfully meditating to improve my calm, Clarity and focus. If I notice my mind has wandered, I will gently and lovingly return my focus back to the breath for the duration of the session. So with that intention, Let's sit for two minutes of mindfulness meditation. Your mind wanders, Bring it back to the breath. Let's begin. Okay, So you can maintain that meditation if you would like. We can look at another potential option for an intention. This intention I use more for when I'm doing introspective work, Intuitive guidance work, When I'm doing paths work or inner child or shadow work. A little bit smaller, But once again, We're going to read this twice and then just sit in a space connecting to the paths within with this intention. I will approach and accept everything arises with compassionate curiosity and calm confidence. I will approach and accept everything that arises with compassionate curiosity and calm confidence. Once again, Just a couple of minutes, Sitting in that space, Just allowing what arises and accepting it with compassionate curiosity and calm confidence. So once again, You can maintain that meditation if you like. We can look at the final intention. This one is the smallest. You could also use it as a mantra. That is a phrase to repeat and to focus on either internally with meditation beads, Or just as a statement at the start, Or even perhaps as a written word. You write it down and you look at it, The mind wanders, You bring it back to it, Or you allow yourself to sort of be inspired by it. Very simple, Very simple statement. I am here now. Are you settling in for your meditation for the day? Or written down in front of you are the words, I am here now. That's the statement, You say to yourself, You look at it, You close down the eyes, Your eyes open for whatever reason, And written in front of you is, I am here now. This could be used as a contemplation, A mindfulness reminder, Or a mantra. With that idea of an intention in mind, Let's sit for two more minutes with the intention of I am here now. Let's begin. Okay, So once again, You're more than welcome to maintain the meditation. But for everyone else, This idea of an intention setting is quite useful. Like I said, If you're doing a guided session, Usually the person guiding it will, By their presence, And perhaps by their words, Help you into the intention and keep you meditating for the duration. But if like me, You enjoy meditating on your own, As well as with guided sessions or groups, You will find yourself in need of, Motivation isn't the right word, But just sort of a self imposed container. Why am I doing this? What's the point? What are my goals? And in the same way, You may have an intention for exercise, Or for study, Or for work. We can have an intention for our meditations. So I gave you three today, And I encourage you to use them, Or use them as inspiration, Even better, To write an intention for yourself. What are you going to do? Why are you going to do it? For how long? What are you going to do? Why are you doing it? For how long? So that first one, For the next few minutes, I'll be mindfully meditating to improve my calm, Clarity and focus. If I notice my mind has wandered, I will gently and lovingly return my focus back to the breath for the duration of the session. It's a little bit longer than the other ones, But that one tells us what we're doing, Why we're doing it, For how long. I like that one. For the introspective work, I will approach and accept everything that arises with compassionate curiosity and calm confidence. Why? Because things will arise, They could pull us down different paths, And the best response is compassionate curiosity, Calm confidence and acceptance. The final one, The simple statement, The potential mantra, Point of focus, I am here now. Those four words contain a plethora of insight and instruction that you could just return to again and again and again. I am here now. So thank you for joining me in this session. I hope that it inspired you to create and use your own intentions. I'll see you in the next session. But if you like, We can sit for another 10 minutes of silence, Perhaps using one of those intentions to guide us or one of your own. Just sitting and appreciating the space. Let's begin. So you're welcome to maintain the meditation if you'd like. But for everyone else, Just returning gently back to the day, Back to yourself, Back to the moment. Today we looked at the idea of intention setting. If you were to meditate on your own for any amount of time, And you want it to be quote unquote successful, Useful tool is setting an intention. Just having a preplanned statement of what you're doing, Why, And for how long. I haven't looked into research on intention setting, But in my role as a counsellor and therapist, And when I used to work as a teacher and as a personal trainer, If you just began a session or a class and just sort of started, Things happened. But if you primed the people you're working with at the start, Or got them to sort of highlight what their goals are, What they're trying to do, What they want to accomplish, More happens. I find personally that I'm able to sit and stay for longer periods of time. I meditate every day in the morning, And then I do 10 to 12 minutes ish of Tai Chi. I set the intention beforehand to complete it. I encourage you to do the same. Use the ones that I worked with today, Or ideally make your own that works for you. Thank you for joining me, And I'll see you in the next session.