The Wall of Intention

When I’m driving and listening to CBC radio, I always hear the most interesting conversations. Today, I listened to an interview with Candy Chang, the creator of the Before I Die Wall. There are now such walls in over 26 countries. And there are variations on this wall. And I felt called to send this out to all the people in my life. As we move into 2014, consider what Candy herself has said:

“In our age of increasing distractions, it’s more important than ever to find ways to maintain perspective and remember that life is brief and tender. It’s easy to go with the flow and postpone our deepest needs. It’s easy to take the people we love for granted and leave things unsaid. And it’s far too easy to neglect our relationship with ourselves. The mythologist Joseph Campbell once said, “The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are.” To be true to ourselves, we need to take the time to step back, pause, be quiet, and reflect.

Our public spaces are as profound as we allow them to be. The historian Lewis Mumford
once wrote that the origins of society were not just for physical survival but for sacred things that offer “a more valuable and meaningful kind of life.” At their greatest, our public spaces can nourish our well-being not just as residents but as humans at this moment in civilization. They can help us grieve together and celebrate together and console one another and make sense of our lives together. Each passerby is another person full of longing, anxiety, fear, and wonder. With more ways to share in public space, the people around us can not only help us make better places, they can help us become our best selves.”

It struck me that this blog would be an appropriate space of the creation of a ‘wall’. For me, it seems that this wall should be about what each of us is seeking to create, explore, learn, discover about ourselves and our world in the next year. You might think of this as a sort of New Year’s Resolution with a more directed focus. And I hope that you will consider sharing your thoughts and ideas and add them as comments to this blog. So, take time to pause, and reflect and listen to yourSelf and add to this wall.

I’ll start with my intention for the next year…

In 2014, I intend to…

• complete my first book and help in the development of a book created by the members of ACES 2012 and 2013
• enrol in the Creative Arts Therapy programme at Sir Sanford Fleming College and begin the programme
• go to Whidbey Island and experience my first writer’s refuge
• continue to create programmes in areas of deep personal interest i.e. Finding Our Voice and Being Heard, and Educating for a Quantum Age

AND what feels like the greatest intention of all — I intend to lose ‘because’ not only in speaking with others but also in my self talk.

So…who’s next?