Setting Intentions for 2019

02/01/2019

Setting Intentions for 2019

How do you approach a New Year?

It feels so shiny and fresh, doesn’t it! A clean slate to paint a new masterpiece.

I’m not a fan of making new year’s resolutions, I kind of see them like I see marriage ceremonies in the modern world, a “promise” that can easily be broken. There is something powerful about our words, our vows, and when they become watered down and meaningless a little piece of that power dies. As I look about the world I see a lot of dying power and meaningless promises. So, instead of making another promise that I may break, I start my new year by setting intentions.

An intention is something you come back to over and over, so that if you drift off track, or ‘fail to stay true’ there is no loss of power, just a little refocus back to your intention and away you go again.

Before I share my intentions for 2019, a little backstory…

The past 4 years have exploded for me in my calling and gifts. Something about my time in Africa opened up my faith to levels that I felt even my biggest most unfathomable dreams were somehow possible. So, I took some time out from writing my novel (a promise I made to God 20 years ago), and began the task to create and open Sanctuary Stretch. Since then I have been overwhelmed with an abundance of ideas of how I can build this ministry/business, which has kept my focus from returning completely back to my promised novel.

By the last half of 2018 I was at the end of my tether. I had created this amazing program and was running a few classes and workshops, and yet I felt defeated. By having so much inspiration, and starting a dozen new mini-projects, none of which came to completion, I was just so sick of wasting precious time. God was showing me in every direction that time was fleeting and the final round was upon us and yet I felt if I held onto these alluring mini-goals I could still reach the finish line before time runs out.

So as this new year dawned, I didn’t want to drag the frustration of last year into this shiny new year. I decided to take some time on my favourite beach to reflect on the past year, pray, quieten the noise of my mind and the world, and listen for what God was trying to tell me.

The intentions that came out of that time on the beach were 3 fold:

1. To deny my own will and give God the floor to bring His Will into fruition (or in other words, to see the eternal rewards, rather than looking for mini ‘worldly’ rewards).
2. To spend more time practicing what God has taught me, instead of always trying to teach it to others (especially those who may not have asked for it).
3. To be more relaxed with myself and my family over our mistakes and missteps. (I am hyper-responsible sometimes and need to practice more tolerance and learn to laugh at myself more).

I took some time to journal out these intentions, and as a way to ensure I had denied my own will, I sat at God’s feet and cast lots, (this is a great way to discover how God wants to proceed) I held up every one of my projects and asked which ones I was meant to push forward with, which to throw out and which to put aside for the time being.

Some were a deadest NO, others were WAIT, but wouldn’t you know it.. I got the go ahead on only one project.

The Novel.

I’m so grateful that God prompted me to wake up and smell the urgency of keeping my promise. Now I can enter 2019 with my intentions set and one goal to focus on, turning the 55,107 word, 89 page document into a fully-fledged book. Wow that’s scary to say out loud!!

ARGH! I’m going to need so much help!

Good job “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me!” (Philippians 4:13)

Mini goals are so much easier, tempting us with small rewards, and yet the big stuff, the stuff that requires a heap more faith, that is where the real and lasting rewards lie.

What are your intentions for this blank canvas, 2019? Are you sick of wasting precious time as well and ready to keep that big promise?

 

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