Stop Drifting, Start Steering; The Power of Intention
- Mar 28
- 5 min read
Have you ever promised yourself you would change a habit… only to slip back into old patterns a few weeks later?
You’re not alone. Many of us know what we want to change, yet struggle to make those changes stick. The missing ingredient may not be willpower or discipline. It may be intention. What if your intention can shape your health, your habits, even the world around you?
Imagine you are home one night when the power goes out. Fortunately, you have a flashlight within easy reach. As you move through your home, your attention is drawn to whatever falls inside the beam of light. Everything else disappears into darkness.
Our attention works the same way. It focuses on one thing, then another. Right now your attention is on these words. In a moment, it may swing to the roar of an airplane overhead, a tickle on the tip of your nose, and then back to these words.
Where attention goes, energy flows.
That phrase may sound like a woo-woo platitude, well-suited to one of those syrupy motivational posters. But, a growing body of research suggests our focused intention may indeed influence the material world in measurable ways. In this article, we’ll explore what intention is, the science behind it, and how you can use it to create meaningful change in your life.
Intention and the Material World
One of the pioneers studying intention is journalist and bestselling author, Lynne McTaggart. Working with scientists around the world, she has led experiments using rigorous scientific protocols to test whether focused intention can produce measurable effects.
Across multiple studies, McTaggert’s research has demonstrated that intention can influence biological and physical systems—healing leaves, accelerating seed growth, and even purifying water.
McTaggart later expanded this work to explore whether intention could heal communities. She organized peace intention experiments in Sri Lanka (2008), Afghanistan and Washington, D.C. (2012), and St. Louis (2017).
In the 2017 experiment, participants focused on reducing violent crime in the Fairground neighborhood of St. Louis, which at the time had the highest rate of violent crime in the United States. For six consecutive days, tens of thousands of people directed focused intention toward this desired outcome for ten minutes each day.
After three years of steadily rising violence, the trend dropped immediately following the intention experiment. Over the next six months, violent crime fell by 43 percent in Fairground, while rates in other neighborhoods of St. Louis remained steady.
Of the 42 intention experiments that McTaggert has conducted to date, 38 demonstrated measurable influence. Whether one views these results as proof or as an invitation to further research, they raise a fascinating question: What happens when human attention becomes focused and unified?
Why Intention Matters in Everyday Life
Every day we are bombarded with more information than our brains can possibly process. To cope, we develop filters to decide what deserves our attention—and what does not.
But are we choosing those filters consciously?
Are we focused on a fulfilling our life purpose? Or, are we allowing our attention to scatter across mind-numbing distractions and endless streams of alarming headlines?
Intention acts as a filter. It determines where we shine the flashlight of our focus.
If you are uncertain about your deeper purpose (as many people are), consider this thought experiment from Stephen Covey, author of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Imagine what people will say about you at your funeral. How do you want to be remembered? For your creativity? Your service? Your compassion? Your courage?
When we reflect on what we want our life to mean, we gain clarity about how to invest the time we have left.
Intention as a Compass, Not a Scorecard
My book, Eight Intentions for Self-Healing, was written for people who want to improve their physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing. The eight intentions are:
I intend to cultivate resilience to stress.
I intend to elevate my vibrational frequency.
I intend to focus my attention on what is important.
I intend to embrace a growth mindset.
I intend to release energetic blockages.
I intend to nourish my body.
I intend to move my body every day.
I intend to connect with other people.
Readers focus on each intention until it becomes habitual before moving to the next, periodically using the Intend Well Wheel to ensure balanced attention across all eight areas.
This approach is powerful because intentions are not rigid pass-fail goals. Instead, they function as a north star. Intentions empower us to make choices aligned with what we want out of life.
Goals say: Did you succeed or fail today?
Intentions say: Are you moving in the right direction?
When we fall short of a goal, we often give up. When we drift off course from an intention, we simply adjust course and continue the journey.
The Role of Emotion
Research with random number generators (RNGs)—devices that simulate a computerized coin toss—has produced mixed results when scientists try to influence the outcome through intention alone. Because the findings are inconsistent, skeptics often dismiss positive results to researcher bias.
But this raises an important question: where is the emotional connection to influencing a machine?
Since 1998, the Global Consciousness Project has monitored RNGs around the world. Over decades of data collection, researchers have observed that during major global events that evoke strong shared emotions, these devices appear to synchronize and lose some of their randomness.
Emotion may be a crucial ingredient.
This aligns with my own experience participating in a HeartMath Institute experiment, where participants focused on sending love to a specific tree for four days. Sensors attached to the tree detected measurable changes during the experiment.
As I explain in my book, the effectiveness of intention appears closely tied to emotional engagement. If we pursue healthy habits only because we know they are good for us, our results may be limited. Intention becomes powerful when it resonates deeply within our heart. If you've struggled to change a habit in the past, ask yourself--were you guided by your head, or your heart?
Taking the Oar in Your Hands
Without intention, life can feel like drifting in a canoe—moving wherever the current carries us.
Intention is the oar. It allows us to choose direction, adjust course, and move forward with purpose.
When we learn to harness intention, we stop drifting and start steering.
Today, you might pause and ask yourself a simple question: What do I intend to do with my life?
Not what do I hope.
Not what do I wish.
Not what do I fear.
What do I intend?
Choose one intention. Write it down. Return to it tomorrow. Let it set the direction your attention follows.
Life rarely changes overnight but through myriad, micro adjustments every day. The power has always been in your hands. Intention simply reminds you to use it.
References
“Evidence.” Accessed Mar 28, 2026. https://lynnemctaggart.com/evidence/
“The Results of the American Peace Intention Experiment.” Accessed Mar 28, 2026. https://lynnemctaggart.com/the-results-of-the-american-peace-intention-experiment/
Utz, Jessica. Data analysis from St. Louis Peace Experiment. https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2320149145021325
Roger Nelson, Peter Bancel. “Effects of Mass Consciousness: Changes in Random Data during Global Events.” EXPLORE, Volume 7, Issue 6, Nov-Dec, 2011. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.explore.2011.08.003
Plomka, Nachum, et al. “The Path to Global Coherence: The Role of the Global Consciousness Project 2.0.” Journal of Management, Spirituality & Religion. 2025, Vol. 22, No. 6. DOI: https://doi.org/10.51327/UDIY4331
“Unveiling the Global Consciousness Project 2.0.” HeartMath Institute. Feb 15, 2024. https://www.heartmath.org/articles-of-the-heart/global-consciousness-project-2/#:~:text=In%20one%20study%2C%20Next%20Gen,positively%20affect%20the%20global%20field
“Tree Response to Love: A non-local experiment.” HeartMath Institute. https://treerhythms.net/trees
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