Years ago, when I was stay-at-home parent of small children and living at what seemed at times like the edge of nowhere, it was really important to have interesting things to do during the long, lonely winter days. I took care of my kids, read, wrote, listened to music, made baskets, and knit and cooked a lot just to keep busy. After the winter holidays, I also began taking gardening books out of the library and sent away for seed catalogues, just for the luscious color photographs. I noticed that I had a lot of company—those gardening books are in high demand in January and February.

At the time, dreaming over garden plans kept me focused on the future in a good way; I got into it so deeply that sometimes I could catch a whiff of the spring soil. I have to confess that while I like to garden, I’m not naturally gifted at it; I have to work at it. Some folks can stick a thorn bush in sand and get a profusion of gorgeous roses. If I don’t work at it, I just get a dead thorn bush. Sometimes (ok, more often that I like to admit) I get a dead thorn bush even when I do work at it. So even with every good intention, nothing has ever came to fruition in my garden without real preparation and very intentional cultivation.

Though actually, any success I’ve ever had in any garden, past or present also seems to involve an ineffable “something more,” an added dimension of spirit, hope and meaning. I realize that there has been nothing deeply satisfying in my life that didn’t start with deep longing that I acknowledged, then dreamed over and tended with care. But I have to wonder, what is it that enables some dreams and intentions to come to fruition, while others wither on the vine or rot on the ground?

A consult with the dictionary reveals that the word “intention” means to lean toward, to apply one’s efforts in a particular direction. So, what happens when we lean in the direction of our dreams? And what else besides leaning is required to get from vision and dream to a sustaining new reality?

There’s a lot that’s written in modern spiritual literature about intention. A lot of what’s out there says that if we can picture something in our mind, or repeat a positive statement about it as a mantra, our dreams will come true. To which I can say with confidence, save your money if that’s all the book jacket or workshop description offers; it’s a waste of time and your good energy. Fervently wishing, even constantly or obsessively will get you no where except lost in your own illusions.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “A good intention clothes itself with power.” He understood the effort it takes to turn vision into reality. And Henry David Thoreau reminded his readers that while it’s good to build castles in the air, you actually do have to go back and build foundations underneath them. So it seems that at least one important difference between an intention and an idle, wishful dream appears to be in the follow up, the elbow grease, the effort and diligence with which we plan and work toward our vision.

But another important aspect seems to be the depth at which we engage. Wishing, however pleasant or even inspiring, however much we talk about it or lift it up in words, is of limited value when it comes from the more surface parts of ourselves, perhaps because it doesn’t make connections at deep levels of meaning. Intention however, even when it’s quiet and subtle, seems to activate a deeper part of ourselves that is then able to interact with others and the world.

What are some of the things that you find yourself wishing for on a regular basis? I think back to lists I made even as a teenager about the things I wanted to do, places I wanted to go, all the ways I wanted my day-to-day life to be. I have always liked to work with fabric and fibers, and I’ve always been curious about how things are made. I enjoy trips to factories to see how cars are made, or how glass is blown—I used to love that picture window at the car wash where you could see what was happening to your car. I enjoy how-to gardening and home repair shows; I learn better when I watch someone actually take a cutting from a plant or tile a floor, even if it’s on tv or the web, than if I just read about how to do these things in a book.

Anyway, a couple years ago when I was clearing stuff out, I was stunned to look over all my possessions and realize that many of the objects I use every day are the things that I had only dreamed about over thirty years ago. Back then when everything in my life came from discount stores, I dreamed of a life filled with plants and books, with simple, useful everyday objects made by hand from wood, glass, stone and metal. I also envisioned way back then that my furniture would be collected from various sources. Flea markets and yard sales would be fine, but matching sets of anything have never been of any interest to me.

I also recall that wanting these kind of everyday things had a different quality than the fervent wishing for the things my friends and I wanted: front row concert tickets, the latest fashions. The handmade life I was secretly leaning toward made me feel somehow “right” when I thought about it, while the consumer options left me feeling kind of scratchy and agitated.

It seems to me that our intention frames a view; intention shapes our perspective, whether we’re fully aware of it or not. Having an intention causes us to pay attention to particular things that move us in the direction of our vision. At a place deep within we know these occasions when we encounter them; we pick up on opportunities and make connections with others as they arrive in our life.

We might therefore want to be rather selective about what we intend for ourselves, whether for our everyday style or for how we want to furnish our inner life. Spiritual leaders have always taught that our inner lives are shaped by whatever it is we pay attention to. Wayne Muller writes, “All we are, said the Buddha, is a result of what we have thought. He might also have added: all we are is a result of what we have loved. What we love draws us forward and shapes our destiny. Our love teaches us what to look for, where to aim, where to walk. With our every action, word, relationship and commitment, we slowly and inevitably become what we love.”

Guided by our intentions, we become what we love…which might mean that what we focus on we cultivate within ourselves. If we focus on fear we cultivate fearfulness, whether it’s based in reality or not. Remember the scare about child abductions and all those pictures of kids on milk cartons: “Have you seen this child?” It’s sad but true that a small number of children are abducted by strangers each year. It’s also sad but true that the majority of children who are reported missing are actually abducted by their non-custodial parent who loves them, even while acting in misguided ways.

Our fears are easily manipulated, as we’ve experienced in recent years with homeland security alerts, reports of bird flu, and other looming disasters. We would be wise to get the right shots when traveling to exotic places. But as it turns out, medical experts say that if you don’t play with the chickens when traveling in places like Vietnam, at this point you’re probably going to be ok.

We are wise to pay attention to real threats, but just as it’s easy to pull up small weeds whose roots are close to the surface of the soil, I think it’s more effective to figure out how to take small actions on huge problems. Small changes made by billions of people add up to big change, and this can fill us with confidence instead of distress or despair.

I don’t mean this to discount the size of big problems that need our best attention, but this applies even in regard to something as large as global climate change. If we each switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs, eat lower on the food chain and from sources closer to home (that is, if we eat less meat and out of season produce), consume less oil and plastic (make sure the next car we buy gets 40 mpg), buy fewer things in general, make do with what we’ve already got and recycle more, we can significantly contribute to lessening our impact on the earth. We have to go further, much further, but doing these simple, practical things gives us time to more carefully research and consider other things that require more advanced technology and lasting solutions. But in the meantime, we don’t have to be consumed with worry, and we don’t have to wait till we can install geothermal heating, solar panels and a wind turbine in the backyard to make a difference in climate change issues.

If we want to live a life deeply rooted in hope, confidence and meaning we might ask ourselves some big questions. Wayne Muller suggests….”Who am I?”; “What do I love?”; “How shall I live, knowing I will die?”; “What is my gift to the family of the Earth?” If we form intentions based on our answers to these kind of questions, I believe it will lead us to fascinating places. The important thing is to ask questions from the center of our being, from the core and depths of our real self, our soul. It doesn’t do much good to ask these questions only from the surface of our self—our ego. However, when we engage from our depths, a way into a life of depth and meaning begins to open in front of us. We make deep and important connections with others when we are operating out of our core values and beliefs.

If we spend our lives focused on things that are valued by society, we’ll cultivate our social success: the right haircut, shoes, belt, watch, car, clothes, school, drink, menu, club. In moderation those things can be fun, and they even may be unavoidable; it’s how human societies tend to work. However, those surface markers of human life are not really what the world needs most.

I also think it’s not what we need most in our minds, hearts and souls. We’re capable of depth and wisdom. We’re capable of more than surface success. We can love knowledge, but how much more rewarding to love wisdom which rests in knowledge, and then goes so much deeper. We can love competence and achievement in our public life and career, but how much more rewarding to love our family and community and know that our efforts in the world go wider and farther than just to the shallow levels of our own self interest?

We have a good example right here. For a long time, at least for three and a half years, several people have been working in this congregation with intention on our elevator and expansion project. They may have had a vision of a universally accessible building for longer than that, but since the Annual Meeting in 2004, they’ve been leaning toward it with measured, effective planning and action. They’ve kept the rest of us informed all along the way, and they’ve continually invited everyone to join them in this project. Because of their intentions, the plans are coming together. The architect’s design is beautiful and functional. The plans offer a highly effective use of space that can be configured in flexible ways for multiple uses.

In mid-March we can each make the intentional choice to lean forward to help move this project from beautiful drawings on paper to real foundations, walls and beams. This year our annual pledge campaign, in which we each pledge an amount of money to support the regular, ongoing work of the congregation will be combined with a Capital Campaign, in which we pledge an additional amount of money, perhaps given over the course of three years, toward the elevator and building expansion project.

This is a lot to ask, a lot to carefully consider, I know. What I have come to understand is that this Capital Campaign is an opportunity to dig deeply into the garden inside oneself, and intentionally cultivate the questions that move each of us along in our quest for greater depth and meaning, greater connection and quality of life in community.

Gunilla Norris says, “Each one of these seed varieties has its own nature, its own way in the garden. If I want a good crop I have to learn about this. My inner nature, too, has its organic leanings. To go against my self will harm my development. I must acknowledge this in me and in others. To really yield we must respect our own nature.”

We have a nature that is deeper and more capable than we sometimes acknowledge and allow. One of the reasons we gather here in this place, with these companions, is simply to remember that, and then also to find the courage to cultivate the field of our own dreams. If we lean toward the future we envision with attention and the radical expectation of finding something profoundly real, we can expect good results; we can be confident.

As we move through these last cold, bright days of winter, as we dream over the gardens that will flower in both our personal future and our collective future,

let us remember to observe carefully
the local conditions
in the garden plot of our hearts and souls.

Let us select the right seeds
for the right time and place wisely,
weed carefully,
apply water, compost and mulch liberally,
hope for the best,
and maintain our confidence.

And when the results are finally harvested,
may we find a reservoir of joy that enlivens our celebration
as we enter, rejoice and come in together.

Amen.

Gunilla Norris, Turning Soil, Journeying in Place, Crown Publishers, 1994.