Setting Intentions: create the 2024 you want
This time of the year presents a valuable opportunity to think more deeply about how we want to live our lives and the changes we can make to ensure we spend our time wisely.
On the first of January every year, I take half a day out to reflect on the past year and set my intentions for the year ahead. While I call it intention setting, the more business focused call it goal setting and the more spiritual call it manifesting. Whatever the phrase, being intentional about how you approach your days is essential to feeling fulfilled and staying productive with purpose. It’s mindfulness in practice. Why? Let’s look at some lessons from neuroscience:
1. Our brain is plastic
Our brain development doesn’t stop at a certain age. We grow new neural connections, strengthen existing ones and weaken others. By setting intentions, we put ourselves in control of the process of neuroplasticity, deciding which neural pathways we want to grow and which we don’t.
2. Our brain doesn’t distinguish imagination from reality
Imagination and perception rely on overlapping neural circuits. For example, a study that asked participants to imagine exercising their biceps found that the act of visualising the exercise led to an increase in muscle size in that area.
3. Our brain can only process limited information
Today’s world is full of sensory information. Our brains aren’t able to compute everything in our environment and so we selectively process only what we’ve learnt to be valuable information and discard the rest. By setting intentions, we are able to fine tune our attention process to recognise and focus on what is valuable to us.
I’ve developed a framework for myself that I use to set my intentions each year. I find it useful to use the same questions each year as it allows me to observe what has changed and what remains constant over the years. Here it is:
Intention Framework (pdf version)
1. Past year
a. Did you meet your intentions for last year? Reflect on why you did and didn’t
b. What were your top milestones of the year across personal, professional and relationships?
c. What were the moments where you felt the most alive & happy?
d. What were the most challenging moments where you felt least in alignment with yourself?
e. When were you most inspired?
2. Reflection
a. If you only had 1 year to live, what would you do? Separate out professional, personal and relationships
b. If you had 1 year off with unlimited money and no constraints, what would you do?
c. If you were at your funeral and wrote your eulogy, how would you like to describe your life?
3. Future year
a. What are your 3-5 goals for your career? These can be milestones e.g. launch a d2c product, soft skills or daily habits e.g. block 1 hour of strategy/ planning time each day
b. What are your 3-5 goals for your relationships?
c. What are your 3-5 goals for your personal development?
Mapping out your goals is fundamental to achieving success. I hope you find this framework as useful as I have to thrive and get closer to our mission of experiencing the wonder of walking on earth.
