Future Perfect
To create the perfect future we have to set goals of course… at least that’s what we’re taught. Everywhere you turn there are books, authors, speakers and trainings urging us to set goals, goals and more goals if we want to succeed and find happiness. They say that setting goals is a powerful process for thinking about your ideal future and motivating yourself to turn this vision of the future into reality, after all, if you don’t know where you are going, how can you get there? They say that it’s best to make your goals SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timed) so you can up the chances that they become reality.
But I don’t buy it. How many times have you set a goal that didn’t turn into reality? We set goals, struggle and strive to make them happen, and sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t. At other times we change what we want completely in the middle of the whole process. Is that progress? The way I see it, setting goals is not the way to success and self-actualization. Simply put, goal setting doesn’t cut it.
A goal is something you want, something you set your sites on, work towards and that may or may not become reality. Often we set goals without factoring in that with time goals and desires change. The flexibility factor is missing. In my view, the whole idea of goal setting needs to evolve.
I suggest we all forget about setting goals. If the purpose of setting a goal is to create your future, we can replace goal setting with something that is much more effective at bringing desires into reality. It’s the yellow brick road of achievement. It’s time to take a step up from setting goals to programming our minds with intention.
A goal is just a goal. Goals lack power and pizzazz. A goal is something you have to labour towards. But an intention is none of this. When you set an intention, energy is activated to take you in the direction of your intention. Intending is like fixing your sights on something with laser-like vision and pursuing it with the unrelenting focus of a predator pursuing its prey. The doubts, worries and fears involved in setting a goal disappear. When you set a goal, you want it, desire it and wish for it. When you set an intention, you enter into a state of knowingness- you know with every fibre of your being that it will come to pass.
I have set goals and failed to achieve them, but when I intend, failure ceases to exist. When I intend, my intentions always manifest. Setting an intention is like making an appointment with the future you want. You just put it in your calendar and you know it`s going to take place right on time. You wouldn’t want to be late for your appointment with your future!
To manifest an intention, struggle is not required. Intentions come into reality with ease. An intention programs your mind to watch out for possibilities, events and people that can support you in making your intention reality. It’s not some mystical force in the universe, it’s the power of your own mind.
Here’s why. If you have brain, you have what is called a Reticular Activating System. The RAS is an automatic intention fulfilling mechanism. It functions like an antenna, set to detect… whatever it has been programmed to detect. It’s like your own personal radar system. Have you ever decided you were going to buy a certain model and colour of car, and then all of a sudden you start to see that particular car everywhere? That’s the RAS. Ever listened to a compulsive complainer? Their RAS is simply set to detect what’s wrong with things. When you set an intention, you reconfigure the RAS to detect opportunity and resources to help you make your intention a reality.
When thinking about the future, many look to the past. On some level they think the past equals the future. But if you have had a less than inspiring past, that’s the wrong place to look if you want to create a compelling future. There is nothing in the future, there is only what you put out there. And you can’t be happy in the now without a compelling future.
With all this focus on the future, what about the now? In The Power of Now, recognized as one of the most influential spiritual books of our time, Eckhart Tolle teaches that the way to spiritual enlightenment is to become wholly immersed in the now and surrender to what is. But for some of us, spiritual enlightenment might be a goal better left for later. Living in a now that you have created yet are unsatisfied with doesn’t seem very pleasant. Creating a better future sounds more enlightening to me. Sure, there’s a time to surrender to the now and just accept what is, and there’s a time to plan a better future. And when that future arrives, it will be a much better now to immerse yourself in.
I didn’t used to believe in magic words, but words do have a certain power. They have the power to make us cry, laugh or scream, to move us to action, to awaken and inspire. And they have the power to activate the energy of intention. In Wayne Dyer’s book Manifest Your Destiny is the following sentence: I know beyond anything resembling a doubt that [place intention here]. Choose and intention and say this with conviction out loud. Notice how you feel. Merely saying these words creates a state of knowingness, far more powerful that wishing and wanting.
I decided to test this out. I chose an intention and stated it as above, and in front of two friends. What I intended simply fell into place that evening in a bizarre set of synchronicities. With this state of knowingness, I have literally seen incredible things occur. Try it and see!
The future is like a blank canvas waiting to be transformed into something compelling. Will yours be a masterpiece? Because the best way to predict the future is to create it.
