When I was learning to see energy and use psychic skills, I met with a group once a month for a day or a weekend. This was before there were any acupuncture schools in the United States, let alone any recognition for consciousness work. There was a surge of interest in alternative medicine, eastern religions, and spiritual topics but no structure for them and no acceptance by the culture at large. Back then, we didn’t talk in terms of laws of intention or attraction. In the group, we explored expanding our perceptual abilities, experiencing different states, transmitting them to each other, and checking veracity and accuracy.
One early exercise to learn to affect energy and reality was to create parking spaces. For the month, our homework was to open up parking spaces before we’d arrive at a destination and would need one. Mind you, we were from the greater New York City environs, where many folks don’t own cars, if only so they won’t have to find and pay for parking spaces!
I learned as much from hearing the different ways that people approached it as from the assignment itself. One friend was Sammi, a high-powered and assertive executive in international marketing who was very clear about who she was and comfortable wielding power.
Another group member was Bridget, mother of six children who had just gone through a very nasty divorce. She hated her job because it demanded that she be high-profile and persuasive. She was much more comfortable in roles in which she provided support and advice, and she made amazing things happen from the background.
Then there was me. I was in New York dancing and trying to figure out a structure for using my clairvoyant and healing gifts. I was aware of all this energy and perception that wanted to flow through my system, pressing to be used. Yet at the same time, I was struggling with old abuse issues, so I tended to be harshly self-critical.
When we come back after the month, the leader asked us to describe what we actually did to create the parking places. Sammi said that at first she was sure she could assertively open a space by putting the force of her energy into it, carving out space for her car with her will. It didn’t work. When she asked, ‘If it is in my best interest and in the best interest of world around me, could I please have a parking place?’ – then she’d find one.
I looked at her in amusement and said, “That’s so funny, because I thought I should do the polite thing – ask carefully, be respectful, but it never worked. I drove around for hours and never found one. It wasn’t until I went into my center and toughened up and fiercely demanded it, saying, “I want it, I deserve it, and so show up NOW!” – that I’d find a space. I could even swear. All that mattered was that I be forceful and bingo, there it was. I was so confused by that, because I thought it wasn’t spiritual enough, not the way one should interact with “higher powers.”
Sammi was so assertive that her energy was limited in the ways it could interact, due to the force with which she was planted in herself. She could not take the energy of situations or other people into account until she softened and stepped back. Creating the parking space pushed her to be more aware of her relation to others.
At that time, I, on the other hand, walked through life not taking up enough room. So I had to move into the experience of deserving a parking place in order to open one for myself, rather than unconsciously emitting the intention that there was no room for me.
Bridget’s method still makes me chuckle because it was such an illustration of the nature of her gifts and energy. She psychically sent out a note to whoever was near where she wanted to park. “I’d call to all those people who were hemming and hawing, standing on one foot and then the other, not able to say good-bye, and I’d help them make the decision to leave. I just reassured them that it was okay to go now, told them to get in their cars and stop messing about. Then I could have their parking place.”
This story is a good illustration because intention – clarifying a goal, your desire to achieve it, and marshalling your energy to go for it – is a function that requires that you align yourself, be willing to be precise about what you want, to ask for it clearly, and to open space for the thing to appear. You can learn a lot about yourself by working on your technique. There is a specific area to identify in your body in which your intention consolidates. To become adept at using it successfully, it is helpful to know the energetic steps needed to create through intention.
The reason why I am including a chapter on intention is that, in the skills you will learn other chapters in the book, it will be necessary to focus yourself with intention in order to create a certain energy, or to become aware of some aspect of the skill, or to move into a new area. Intention is not just about creating Maseratis. It is also used in Energy Work to move your awareness to new levels of complexity, to increase your perception, to develop new internal abilities and states. Energy practitioners and intuitives use their intention all the time to ask for information and see the ‘unseeable.’
How do you use intention in your life? What tips would you offer others?
