Clarity of Intention Will Accelerate Your Growth

“Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” / “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat. / “I don’t much care where–” said Alice. / “Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat. / “–so long as I get SOMEWHERE,” Alice added as an explanation. / “Oh, you’re sure to do that,” said the Cat, “if you only walk long enough.”  (Alice in Wonderland)

Leave it to a classic children’s story to embed within this six-line exchange a major key to success:  Knowing where you are headed. 

If you have your sights set on the final destination from the start, you give yourself a significant advantage in mapping the appropriate course to get there. 

It only takes one step at a time. 

If you were driving across country from coast to coast, the GPS wouldn’t bother to tell you where to take the turns in Arizona if you were driving through the middle of Tennessee.  It would only need to tell you the next turn, and then the one after that so that in aggregate you’ve followed a sequence of directions to their final destination. 

Applying this to our daily choices, there will similarly not be a singular, “correct” way to get to where we want to go in life. 

Everyone has a combination of circumstances and paths they all walk.  Some of those routes may be optimized to get you there faster than others.  In whatever journey you choose, though, the road taken will be uniquely your own. 

If you allow yourself to be overwhelmed by countless twists, turns, steps, processes, action items, and checklists you need to fulfill on the road in front of you it is not hard to persuade yourself to stay put right where you are. 

The adventure is lost before it has begun. 

Take a look around you to find examples of this, maybe even some close to you in life. 

How many people do you know personally who are coasting through life aimlessly, taking no focused action, not thinking about where their lives are headed? 

How many of these people play the victim of their circumstances, blame others, and complain about how life just isn’t fair? 

Whether consciously or subconsciously, these individuals are destined to stay stuck in one place because in large part because they have not concentrated their efforts around a clear aim. 

So how does one overcome this paralysis?  Success isn’t easy, and that is why it is uncommon.

If you want to bend the trend line it requires focus, persistence and self-reflection.

One simple first step – put energy in to writing out your script for the days, weeks, months, and years ahead.  Be honest with yourself and don’t be confined by self-imposed limitations.  

It is easy to ignore this exercise because it doesn’t make the intentions seem any more real than if they were just floating around as ideas in your head.   

Don’t underestimate the powerful force that comes with recognizing where you are and knowing where you want to go.  This simple act which may prove to provide you with mental clarity, is like programming the GPS for an exact set of coordinates.

It enables the dominos that need to fall in order to make it a reality in motion.  

It doesn’t matter if you don’t know every step to take.  The only one that matters at all is knowing the next one, which with self-reflection, focus and persistence, will be made with intention.  

Mixing intention with action is a powerful cocktail that will magnify your growth and accelerate your progress.