The Power of Intention Part 3 of 10: Beauty
March 4, 2009 by dr. lam · 26 Comments
Of course, as a plastic surgeon I must comment on this one. Obviously, Dyer was more focused on inner beauty than outer beauty but he does comment about how we should look at the creation around us as beautiful. He made reference to an encounter he had with the famed concentration camp survivor and psychiatrist Viktor Frankl who during his time in the camps was given a bowl of filthy water with a fish head floating in it. Frankl saw the beauty in the food provided to him rather than the ugliness of it all. Frankl in fact states that the way that he was able to attain meaning in life is that he saw only beauty in everything. What a profound thought!
For me, I am fascinated with beauty in every facet. As you can see, my blogs focus more on attaining inner beauty whereas the rest of my website discusses how to attain outer beauty. To those who look at beauty as a vain, self-centered thing will not be in alignment with me since I have dedicated my life to creating outer beauty as much as inner beauty for others. I truly believe that when I create a beautiful result and especially when I fix an ugly one, I am able to help you co-create your future so that you have congruity between your inner and outer worlds.
Here are a few small examples of what I am talking about. I had a lady for whom I did fat grafting and a facelift 2 years ago and had not seen her for over a year. Her wrinkles had progressed despite a great result for her face. I asked her what had happened and she explained (without going into details here) that she had put herself in a bad relationship. I talked to her that perhaps my blogs would help her and gave her some of my thoughts on the subject. She said, “Wow, you really inspire me and I forgot about that.” I said, “There is no coincidence that you decided to come back into my life again, and Botox was only a small part of the reason.” I hope I made a difference in her life besides just wrinkles. However, I believe that her coming back to me more consistently will help me heal her skin while I heal her heart. I am filled with positive energy and I think I can make a difference in someone’s life both by affecting their spirit and their appearance. To me, they go hand in hand.
I had another lady that was going through a divorce and really wanted her nose fixed because it was a legacy that she carried of her past and her previous bad rhinoplasty. I knew that a few drops of silicone would restore her appearance. When I was done, she started to cry and said, “That is what I wanted for over 10 years.” I have now freed her from her past and given her the opportunity to move forward with her future. Now when she looks in the mirror she will see a beautiful nose and her heart will have been healed by her short time with me. I am very proud of helping people fulfill their objectives toward beauty, both inner and outer, so that they can become a glowing example of true beauty.
The Power of Intention Part 1 of 10: Defining Intention
March 2, 2009 by dr. lam · 6 Comments
I think we are naturally drawn to a subject by what might appear to be happenstance or in fact might reflect a need in our lives. I was talking with Carl Reynolds, a member in my EO forum group, a few months ago about an exercise in which his wife and he attained great meaning in their life called “Intentionality” and which we actually performed in my EO retreat last week (and I will present this exercise for your consideration at the conclusion of this series). It coincided with my reading Wayne Dyer’s book, The Power of Intention, and it got me to start understanding the power of intention and what it can do in our lives. My first reading of Dyer’s book (I have now covered the book 3 times) was a somewhat limited response, as the topic seemed simply too amorphous for me. The more I thought about it and started to implement it into my life and clinical practice, the more that I thought it was simply amazing. Accordingly, I shall be doing an extensive 2-week blog series on Dyer’s thoughts with a lot of my perceptions thrown in. As all my blogs, this is not a rehashing of his book. You need to read his book if you want all of his thoughts. This represents how I perceive the key elements of his book as it relates to me and perhaps that would rub off on you, the reader, as you explore your own ways for self development.
I like to think of an athlete whose pent-up energy can be pushed in one direction or another depending on which way his feet are planted and ready to be launched. If one’s feet are planted in one direction, it takes more energy to switch and move in an opposite direction. Similarly, if our intention is aimed toward a certain direction, we might more easily carry ourselves toward the path of least resistance and move toward that direction. For example, “I will certainly get sick this weekend because there is a flu going around.” Is that not a self-fulfilling prophecy? How about, “I am physically fit and will withstand all illnesses.” The power of intention allows us to create our world the way that we want to and not be dictated by external circumstances.
As Dyer opens his book, he uses the conventional definition of intention (just to get that out of the way): ”My research reveals a fairly common definition of intention as a strong purpose or aim, accompanied by a determination to produce a desired result.” He further imagines someone with great will and determination to overcome insurmountable obstacles. In short, an overachiever. In fact, this is not what he is talking about in his book. He is focused more on what Patanjali suggested more than 20 centuries ago: ”Dormant forces, faculties, and talents come alive, and you discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be.” The idea is more focused on this concept that it is an energy state (more about that next week) than anything else. That energy state resides in you and resides all around you. I love his idea of energy states and it will be important to understand this idea in bringing to life one’s own power of intention.
Dyer aims to move ourselves out of being isolated life forces but into a connection through a larger life force, or “universal spirit” or “universal mind” of intention. Thanks Paul P last week for your insightful comments to my blogs. As promised, here is our “coincidence”, which does not mean happenstance, but a “fitting together perfectly”, i.e., we are harmonizing on the same wavelength or energy state. As the idea of intention unravels in front of you this week, repeat almost as a mantra the words “intention” and “intent” today to get you moving toward the spirit of intention. When you enter a state of anxiety or fear, repeat those words and start to connect with a universal life force and enter a peaceful state.