The Direction of Intention

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I’m writing the workbook chapter for my class and today I’m working on The Relationship with Intention. I revisited and brewed together two older posts: they’re intimately related and belong together: The Hero/Anti-Hero with Split Intentions. Here’s an excerpt from the workbook:

Harald told me that he’d spent much of his life trying to rid himself of his inner Anti Hero. It had consumed much of his life, this powerful inner voice of self-criticism and judgment. It plagued him and the more he resisted the Anti-Hero the stronger it became. One day, exhausted by his inner turmoil he had an epiphany. He realized that the way to rid himself of this Anti-Hero was to stop expecting himself to be a Hero. In fact, his expectation of being a savior, being perfect, being everything to everybody was the very thing that fueled the Anti-Hero. Letting go of the Hero dissipated the power of the Anti-Hero and what was left was…human. Beautiful, flawed, funny and messy, Harald was a human no longer at war with himself.

Internal warfare was the result of a split intention. As Harald discovered, trying to be the Hero in the eyes of everyone else split him into two pieces: the unreal expectation (Hero) and an ever-vigilant judge (Anti-Hero). Harald was attempting to control what he could not control: the expectations and responses of other people. His happiness was contingent upon the happy responses of others so he was constantly measuring his actions for success: The actor and the measurer. The internal warfare was inevitable, the expectation untenable.

The mistake of the young actor on the stage is rooted in trying to control what he or she cannot control; trying to control the wrong thing will split you every time. The work of controlling what you can control begins with rooting out the victim stories and owning your choices. The next step is healing the splits so you can call a truce in the internal warfare.

There is a dynamic between control and power. Power with others becomes available when you surrender the need to attempt to control others – which is to attempt to have power over them. The role of Hero is in practice an attempt to control others: in order to feel powerful heroes need someone to save. To surrender the Hero you have to surrender your need to control the thoughts, feelings, and expectations of others. You will be capable of dropping your internal measuring stick when you set aside your unrealistic expectations and allow yourself to be fully human.

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