“When we have done our best, we should await the results in peace.” Naturalist John Lubbock

The New Year is here again. It’s time for a fresh start, new outlook, new goals. It’s always exciting to start something new, even if only just a new calendar. Most of us likely have plans about things we want to accomplish in 2024. Whether you call them goals or resolutions, your plans and intentions for the upcoming year are important to living your best life.

Susan wrote that creating intentions helps the Universe to help us. “Knowing what you want, what you

really want, sends radio waves to the Universal Energy, which helps get you where you need to be. A strong intention can have amazing results.” Intentions are a powerful way to create what you want in life.

Whatever you call them—resolutions, goals, or intentions—they are about purposefully stating what you intend to achieve through your actions. You are consciously directing your thoughts and energy towards accomplishing what you have set your mind to. Setting your intentions is working with your Higher Self to make positive changes in your life.

Whether you want to start eating healthier or pursue a new career, setting your intentions can be a powerful way to help you actively achieve your goals. However, when you set your intentions, it’s important that you don’t set your heart on your goal. Set your mind, yes, set your heart, no.

Setting your heart on something means that you want it very much. You put your hope and trust into it happening. You become attached to the expectation that it should happen. You become attached to the outcome. It is a Lower Self type of feeling. Like when a child desperately wants a puppy. Or a teenager who wants more than anything for their crush to like them back. Or an older person hoping for their friends to call. There is a different type of want involved. It’s a want for the Universe to deliver, and a broken heart when it doesn’t.

As Susan wrote in End the Struggle and Dance With Life, “Setting your heart on something is entering into a state of rigidity. Un-setting your heart is entering a state of flow.”

And what are intentions for if not changing the flow of our lives? “When we let go of our expectations about events in our life being a certain way, we can allow ourselves the peaceful thought that ‘It’s all happening perfectly’ no matter how it turns out,” Susan said.

New Year’s intentions, like all intentions, are meant to light a fire under us to take action. But sometimes, no matter how hard we work, we can’t achieve what we wanted. When we set our heart on something happening, we are putting enormous stress on ourselves based on what we think the outcome should be. “It is an act of self-love to stop hanging on to the way it is supposed to be. It is this hanging on that causes us to be buffeted about by the unwelcome surprises in our life.”

If we uncouple our intentions from our hopes, we will be able to leave ourselves open to any and all blessings. When what we intend for ourselves doesn’t happen, but that doesn’t mean that those different results will not bring benefits, or blessings.

“Sometimes when things don’t turn out as we want them to, we are later shown how they really did turn out perfectly for our highest good,” Susan said. “Either we learned a valuable lesson or a better opportunity presented itself.”

Susan was convinced, through her own life experiences, that things often happen for very good reasons. It’s our limited ability to see the expansive picture of the Universe that limits our understanding. However, our spiritual side, our Higher Self, understands. She said, “If I don’t remind myself of this higher possibility, I suffer much unnecessary pain when things don’t work out as I had planned.”

As you pursue your intentions for 2024, remember that when doubt starts creeping in, when things aren’t going as you had hoped, that you must unset your heart. You need to release any expectations about how things will turn out. To help keep your mind at peace when things aren’t turning out as you intended use Susan’s affirmation, “It’s all happening perfectly!” This is a wonderful affirmation that reminds us that, while we may not be in control, the Universe has so many blessings in store for us.

When we can turn it over to our Higher Self we give ourselves a sense of peace. As Susan said so eloquently, “You relax into the flow of life’s adventure knowing that in the grand scheme of things…life truly is happening perfectly.”