Living Intentionally

By Viterose Van Huis

From an early age, we are influenced by many different voices that constantly suggest how to be more beautiful, healthy, and wealthy, making it challenging for us to set clear intentions for ourselves. Living intentionally means living a life of knowing who we are. We don’t have a life; we are life. All we need to do is trust our intentions and the enabling force that powers our intentions.

In an inspiring guide, Elaine Van Huis shares insight into a multitude of life experiences both in Barbados and the United States as she learned the value of setting intentions and maintaining a positive mindset to achieve her goals—even during challenging times. As she reveals how she transformed into a wife, mother, and more, Elaine leads others through her lessons learned on her evolutionary journey as she attempted to stay present, visualize the best possible outcome to every situation, intentionally grow old, and move away from misguided and negative intentions.

Living Intentionally shares the personal experiences of a lifelong learner who has navigated the twists and turns of life with purpose, grace, and peace to help others do the same.

“This easily digested read is so important since it makes clear how this power we have in our own minds answers our collective human failure to reduce conflict and achieve more harmony in our world today.”
—Richard Harrison

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Aug 29, 2023
• ISBN: 9798369405093

Book preview

Copyright © 2023 by Viterose Van Huis.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Rev. date: 11/07/2023

Xlibris

844-714-8691

www.Xlibris.com

854088

Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1 A Wife with Intention

Chapter 2 A Mother with Intention

Chapter 3 Intentionally Growing Old

Chapter 4 Misguided Intention

Chapter 5 Negative Intentions

Chapter 6 Intentionally Living

Epilogue

Review

To my amazing husband, Harry Andrew Van Huis,

who left this dimension on June 30, 2022.

Introduction

Being unaware or unclear of your intentions for your life allows the random winds of whim to govern your steps.

—Mary Anne Radmacher

As I reflected on writing about living intentionally, I wondered, What do I know about the topic? Then it dawned on me that, unconsciously, in many ways, I have been living intentionally since I was a teenager. Only when I was researching for this book did I grasp the breadth and depth of what it means to live intentionally.

We are shaped by our childhood experiences. The pain of my childhood caused me to mature early. By eighteen, I was married and a mother of two. Since very few believed in me, I had something to prove—my goodness. Therefore, I determined in my heart that I was going to be the best wife and mother. The word intention meant nothing to me then, but I was purposeful. I now know that I was setting intentions to at least succeed at those two things and, as I later experienced, set the stage for much more.

The dictionary defines intention as a mental commitment to one certain action or many actions. It often involves planning and forethought. But so often, we find ourselves just going along with the status quo, the path that was laid out for us by our parents, teachers, and ministers. Yes, there is some intention here, particularly if we have some measure of success. But discomfort and a sense of unease often accompany this success. Many people wake up years later, as Tom Harpur the successful Canadian Anglican priest and journalist did. He realized that his push to become an Anglican bishop was not his but his father’s intention. Most humans die as victims of their circumstances. They never realize the power of their intentions—the power of their beingness.

Circumstances in life determine the measure of our intentions. Nevertheless, we must set them. I was a poor, uneducated teenager when I set my intention to be the best mother and wife I knew how to be at that time. However, I needed exposure to something other than the cultural norms of Barbados, at least what was my cultural norm. Joining the Seventh-Day Adventist Church provided that exposure. As a result of my affiliation with that organization and one of its elders who recognized my potential, I learned to set many more intentions. I was only eighteen when I set my intention not to grow old and decrepit but to grow old gracefully. The memory of that day and time when I set that intention is still vivid in my mind. Fifty-three years later, as a result of that intention, I still fervently practice healthful eating and living.

Additionally, Adventism fostered in me a love for reading and books. Today I will tell you that books contributed significantly to who I am. Not that I could not read, but I wanted to read and comprehend at a higher level. I also wanted to have informed conversations. I particularly wanted to comprehend the content of magazines like National Geographic and the Smithsonian. Therefore, I set an intention of learning. Today, I have an MA in history from Howard University, a spectacular feat for me, considering that my primary education stopped at twelve years old. Those magazines I once could not understand became the tools of my Howard education.

My lofty intentions, as I was often reminded that they were, would not have been possible if I did not migrate to the United States at the age of twenty-one. Leaving my birth country gave my intentions wings. My perspective broadened. I became exposed to even greater possibilities. And as Wayne Dyer expresses in his book The Power of Intention, when one sets intentions, one automatically enters into the spirit of intention, and one’s desires become manifest. Intentions are powerful in that they demonstrate the power of thought—thought that is acted upon. According to Lynne Taggart in The Intention Experiment, Human thought and intentions are an actual physical ‘something’ with the astonishing power to change our world.

One does not always have to set lofty and long-term intentions like acquiring that certain degree or becoming rich and famous. As we greet each day, we can set intentions for that day. Intentions such as being kind, loving, compassionate, nonjudgmental, and empathetic. Sometimes we must set an intention for the moment by not letting what arises at that moment get the better of us. How tempting it is to rant and rave when, on the highway, an unthinking motorist cuts in front of you. I learned from Eckhart Tolle to set the intention of gratitude at that moment instead of anger; I become grateful that I didn’t have an accident.

Often, a chance encounter in life can motivate us to set