Take action: Define your intent
How to use stories from your own life to find your unique imagined outcome, one that will last a lifetime.
Applying design tools and processes in our lives means:
Being specific about how we want to approach life, not sleepwalking through life and then wondering where the time went.
Taking an approach or framework that helps us to learn by doing, not generating loads of ideas or talking about possibilities without taking any action.
Applying our intent throughout our lives in multiple different ways, learning from each go around, not designing a life on paper and sticking to that version no matter what.
A key piece of the puzzle is having an intent. Your own clear, imagined, desired outcome. A rough signpost that guides your actions and decisions. We covered the thinking behind it last time. And how we find it is through stories. Let’s go.
Intents in the wild.
What does an intent look or sound like?
Here are some examples:
Growing our lives.
Filling cups.
Making sense.
Making rainbows.
Changing minds.
They’re short, they’re to the point, and they could mean different things to different people.
How to choose an intent
One of my favourite ways to uncover an intent is with stories. I’ve chosen to use the word ‘uncover’ rather than the word ‘choose’ here. This is because I find that our intent chooses us, rather than the other way around. Intent is something that is so deeply engrained in who we are and our story so far… It’s the sum of hundreds of experiences. Many of these experiences are outside our awareness.
Our intent can be found in the stories of our life so far.
I found my intent through:
Nick Heap’s Core Process, which uses stories that you tell about yourself. You work with a partner to do this. You can pair up with someone you know to help each other through the process (free), or reach out to Nick to walk you through it (paid). I worked with Nick to find my first core process, many years ago now.
Listening to the stories that people share about me. These gave me clues or in one case a phrase that I could use word for word!
How I used stories from others to inform my intent
Here are a couple of examples of stories that others told to me or about me, and how I used what they said to inform my intent.
“When I talk to you, it’s like a rush of energy… I thought there was a set menu of options to pick from, and then you go and show me that there are all these other possibilities. And the one I want is amongst those - it wasn’t on the menu I had at all.”
A former mentor shared this insight with me and my colleagues. It stuck with me for a long time: this idea of showing someone more options than they think are open to them without overwhelming them. Eventually, when I thought about this phrase, I had the image of a prism.
On one side of the prism we have two options. The beam of light and the surrounding darkness. In contrast, emerging from the other side of the prism are many options - the full spectrum of colours. A rainbow. This led me to the phrase making rainbows. Bringing technicolour to where there is currently black and white, or shades of grey. That’s what I do.
“You know what you are? You’re the sense-maker in chief.”
Someone I worked with said this to me after they had known me for a while. They were visiting our office from the head office and when they left, they went further. They drew a badge on a sticky note with the words ‘sense-maker in chief’ underneath. They left it stuck on my monitor on their last day, while I was out of the office. I kept this sticky note in my notebook for a while. And then I started to notice people using those words in feedback to me, without prompting. ‘That makes sense’ or ‘It makes much more sense now.’
Try it yourself
What are some phrases that people around you and close to you have used about you? Ones that stayed with you for a while?
Sense-check your intent.
Is it clear to you?
Does it sound like an action? Does it describe something you do? Something you try to do - even if you’re not always successful? (And does it bother you, when you’re not?)
Is it general rather than specific? Or does it sound like a SMART objective?
Can it be applied and interpreted in different ways? And to different fields?
Is it aspirational? Something you want to explore and keep playing with?
Want to explore this topic even more?
1) Hear more from me on my intent
I talk more about my intent (including my experience of Nick’s Core Process) on an episode of the Permission to be Human podcast. I’m interviewed by my dear friend (and, for a long time, colleague) Mel Findlater. Note that this podcast is aimed specifically at mothers. Here’s a quote:
I’m a sense-maker. I help people make choices by making the options clearer.
By helping things make sense.
Lou Shackleton on Permission to be Human, Episode 41
If you listen to the whole episode, you might notice that Mel uses the phrase ‘make sense’ about what I do, before I even use it myself! I also talk about experiences that fed my intent, like observing a long-time colleague who was a wizard at creating space around people to enable change to happen.
2) More from Nick on the Core Process approach
Nick Heap has also been featured on the Permission to be Human podcast. He talks about the power of really listening. Reminder - this podcast is aimed specifically at mothers.
Nick draws on his faith and spirituality in his work and it deeply informs his perspective on the world. You can see this in the way he talks about what a Core Process is. I’m not religious and I am not spiritual in the same way as Nick. I still get a lot out of his perspective:
We arrived on the planet to do a job that was necessary. And we were designed exquisitely to do this job. And as we went through life, of course we did it. And it went amazingly well. It was effortless. In fact, it's the sort of job that you can't help doing actually, whether you're paid for it or not. Because it's just who you are.
Nick Heap on Permission to be Human, Episode 31
That’s what an intent is. You can’t help it. It’s just who you are.
Have you tried to get to the heart of your intent? What did you find out? Did you get stuck? I’d love to hear your experiences!
