Last week Friday, I was sitting with my boss at a VISA application centre waiting to be served & we observed how some of the staffs were not proactive in the sense that while one cubicle was fully booked with people on the line, the others were empty & they were not bothered about the queue & the slow pace of the entire process.
He had a meeting to attend & was running late,he needed this process completed on-time so he reached out to one of the back-end staff to see how things can be fast tracked.
Immediately, the back-end staff moved into action & called up someone to start to attend to us & in a few minutes our bio-metrics were taken & all required processes completed in a quick fashion that ensured that he left on-time for his meeting.
In between this time, we started talking & drifted to talking about living intentionally & how you can actually set your focus on a goal & map out strategies to getting there.
You see, he was able to take intentional actions to ensure that he could hit his goal of getting to his meeting. He didn’t say ” Well this is the process here, let’s just accept our fate & wait” he took steps.This resonated with me instantly as I’ve been thinking about those words for the whole week prior to the discussion, LIVING INTENTIONALLY.
John C. Maxwell has been a mentor of mine for many years now & I watched a message he preached in December 2014 where he talked about how God gave him a word for the year 2015 & that word was INTENTIONAL LIVING & by Oct 2015 he released a book by that title. In the same year, I was exposed to the music & ministry of Travis Greene & I listened to his hit single Intentional & I just got hooked. So when my boss mentioned that again last week, it all connected & has been on my mind to share with you all.
What is an Intentional life?
It’s a deliberate,consistent & wilful life. You see,good intentions will never get you anywhere, rather intentional living moves you forward.Good intentions are not enough to make a difference. Like John said in one of his presentation on this topic “Most people don’t live their life, they accept their life” & I’ve heard this quote once & again that ” Life doesn’t give you what you want/desire, it gives you what you demand.
Do you have a plan for your life? Where do you want to be in the next 5, 10, 15 20 years? Are there goals you want to achieve in your family life, career,spirituality, health & fitness?Intentional living is the best way achieve it & improve your life, it moves your life from good intentions to good actions.
Enough of you telling people what you want to do this year, the things you want to achieve, instead take actions & show them!!
Why an intentional life?
Living intentionally moves you from desire to action, from passive to active, from
dreaming to doing. I like a BBM status I saw a while ago it says “When you wake up in the morning you have 2 choices – you can go back to sleep & dream your dreams or you can wake up & chase those dreams”
When I was a teenager, I had dreams about my wife & kids, how my home will be, what structure we will have in place, how we will raise our kids, etc & it was totally different from what my reality was at the time. But living intentionally in that area ( with the aid of mentors & by God’s grace & mercy), I achieved that dream. I have shared my story before with details of actions I took, please check the post. I’ve been happily married to my soulmate for close to 12 years ( we feel like newly weds), blessed with 2 kids & a home filled with peace & praise. I’ve done the same in other areas of my life like purpose, career, relationships, health & fitness, etc. I’ve not achieved all of them 100%, but I’ve surely moved along the path to achieving them.
Living intentionally gives you the value of front-end thinking. Intentional living, starts with intentional thinking. Front-end thinking is about having a PLAN AHEAD.
According to Maxwell’s Law of Navigation,“Anyone can steer the ship, but it takes a leader to chart the course.”
P.L.A.N A.H.E.A.D stands for:
Predetermine your course of action
Lay out your goals
Adjust your priorities ( your priorities must fit into your goals)
Notify key personnel
Allow time for discussion & acceptance
Head into action
Expect problems ( motion causes friction) when you start to rise above average, average people don’t like it.
Always point to the success & wins along the way.
Daily review your plan
Are you living intentionally or just drifting by? I’ll continue in the next post.
This is my snippet, I AM SHALOMESQ!!!
Shalomesq Snippet 