Intentional Thought
Overthinking is something that I struggle with mightily. Constantly making up stories in my head about what other people are thinking about me and my actions makes it hard to find clarity at times. It is during these battles within my head that intentional thought brings me back to reality. Intentional thought is versatile in the sense that it has the power to give you direction in different facets of your life, saving you both time and energy.
The easiest part of your life to apply intentional thought is in your relationships. Whether it is a relationship with your friend or significant other, intentional thought is the mirror that forces you to ask yourself if the relationships in your life are giving you energy or taking your energy away. Intentional thought in relationships starts with asking yourself what you want in a friend or significant other. The key is to actually take time to think about it, where as most people, myself included, go through life aimlessly, putting up with shit from other people in their life that they can’t deal with for much longer. The people you surround yourself with has such a powerful impact on your energy and well being. After some intentional thought, I realized I want to surround myself with people who are confident in themselves and don’t have to break others down to put themselves up on a pedestal. I realized I want to surround myself with people who hold me accountable when things are going well, and remind me who I am when shit hits the fan. I realized I want to be with someone who will cancel plans last minute to spend time with me, not make up excuses to not see me. Intentional thought gave me clarity around what I want my relationships to look like, setting a bar that needs to be met by both myself and the other person. During this process of intentional thought around relationships, you may feel that ending certain relationships would benefit you the best, and it is okay to prioritize yourself I promise. Intentional thought is a great filter for relationships and brings awareness to the benefits and detriments of different relationships in your life.
The other area of my life where intentional thought has been beneficial is determining how to invest my time. Taking 5 minutes at the beginning of your day to think about how you want to spend your time from now until you go to bed can be the difference between you feeling productive at the end of the day and you beating yourself up for not doing anything with your time. This is easier said than done, and something that I continue to battle with. It truly does only take 5-10 minutes to intentionally think about what the next 12-14 hours should look like in order to be a better version of yourself today than you were yesterday. The best times to practice this tool is either right before you go to bed or right after you wake up. I prefer to take time right after I walk in the morning. I usually write out some of the thoughts I had when I woke up and then I move on to how I want to invest my time. Start out slow, giving yourself only a couple things to complete. For me, I try to do four things everyday: write, meditate, walk, and breathe. As you start to get better at intentionally thought around investing your time, and it becomes easier to actually put those plans into action, add more things, but until then, keep it simple.
Intentional thought is such a powerful tool that doesn’t need a lot of time or energy to sharpen. Intentional thought around relationships only needs one or two 30 minute sessions, with an occasional accountability check here and there. Intentional thought around planning your day only takes 5-10 minutes, and as you start to create a habit of it before you go to bed or after you wake up, it will become a part of your routine, almost like second nature. Good luck.
You got this.
With Love,
Luke
