OK, let’s dive into Week 3 of our Sacred Bow Challenge!
If you haven’t started, no worries — start today. If you’re behind, don’t stress — just take the next step today, and carve out time each day from now on for this process.
Here’s what we’re going to do this week, just 15 minutes a day:
- Spend 2 days just thinking about (and making notes on) what you’d like your life to be like, and what you’d like to create, in the next year.
- Spend 1 day reflecting on who you would like to be, if you could (continue to) let go of all that you’ve been holding on to.
- Spend 2 days making a list of intentions for the next year.
- Spend 1 day revising that list of intentions.
This is about being fully intentional and whole-hearted in the coming year, about being conscious about how we want to spend that year.
If we could create any life we wanted, how would it look? If we weren’t burdened by our usual baggage, who would we be? If we could create anything, what might it be?
In this week, we get to be intentional and open our minds to possibilities.
Then we curate that on the last day, so that we’re not doing too much.
Treat yourself to this intentional process. Again, set aside 20 minutes in your calendar every day for this month. Block it off. You only need to use 10-15 minutes, but set aside 20 minutes on your calendar. This will be your block of time for this challenge.
Two Days: Think About Your Next Year
In these two days, open your mind and let yourself think beyond what you normally think about. Think of your life as a blank canvas.
What would you like your life to be like? If you could create it from scratch, how would you design it? What would you do in the morning? During the day? In the evening? Every week?
What do you want to create in the next year? A business, a book, a great relationship, a great friendship, a daily yoga practice, a loving relationship with yourself, a daily art practice?
Reflect on these questions, and write down some notes. Walk around thinking about it, and see if anything new comes up, and add that to the notes.
One Day: Reflect on Who You’d Like to Be
Today, spend some time reflecting on who you would like to be … imagining that you let go of everything on your Let Go List. Maybe there’s still some of it left in you, but what would it be like if you let go of it all? Who would you like to be then?
Would you change the way you are with your loved ones? With coworkers? With friends? With strangers?
Would you change how you are with yourself? Would you regularly do acts of self care, such as meditation, yoga, solitude, baths, a quiet cup of tea, time for reading, time for being creative?
Would you push into your meaningful work, with devotion to the people you’d like to serve?
Would you volunteer? Would you take care of people? Educate? Coach? Write? Create music or films to open up the world?
How would you walk through the world?
Write down some notes.
Two Days: Make a List of Intentions for the Coming Year
Over the next two days, take some time to make a list of intentions for the next year. Base this list on the notes you’ve made the last few days … but if anything else comes up for you, feel free to put it on the list.
Right now, you’re not eliminating … you’ll do that on the last day of this week’s process (curate). Right now, you are allowed to make the list longer than you can actually do. What would you like to do in the next year? Who would you like to be? How would you like to show up?
Make a list.
One Day: Curate That List
Today, you’re going to take a little care curating the list you made yesterday. Look over the list with love. It’s beautiful!
Now pick the ones that seem most important — to your work, to your relationships, to your growth, to your life as a whole. Mark those as “must haves.”
Move as many of the others as you can to a “Later List.” That means you’re going to let go of them for now, and bookmark them as possibilities for later. You don’t have to cancel them from your dreams and schemes, just put them aside, so that you can fully focus on your must haves.
Look at the remaining list — it has some “must haves” but maybe a few others you are struggling to move to the Later List. Can you let go of those for now? What if only for 6 months? Remember, the more things on your curated list, the harder it will be to focus … and the less likely you are to actually hold these intentions.
Whittle your final curated list down to as few things as you can stand. Can it be 10 things? 8? 5? 3?
This is your curated Intentions List. Next week, we’ll work on creating structure so that these intentions will actually be held.