Bridget McNulty

Effort vs. intention…

// April 29th, 2009 // Decisions, Life (and the living of it), Time, book launch

I’ll have to be brief this morning, because I’ve got a day of nonstop Things To Do, many of them rather lovely (if you’re in South Africa, tune into SAfm at 1.30pm for an interview I’m taking part in on blogging… should be fun!)

I just wanted to throw an idea at you, and see what you think. It’s about effort vs. intention. Esther Hicks, who I’m rather a fan of (could you guess?) says that why things come to us has less to do with how hard we try, and more to do with how much in alignment our energy is. So, for example, if you really want a new job you obviously have to pitch up to the interview and do your best, but when you go home it would be more valuable to spend some time getting your energy to a good place – feeling happy and inspired and lucky and ready to receive a new job – than it would be calling the secretary every five minutes and hanging up before you say anything!

It’s an interesting idea, I think, because it could have the most extraordinary effects if it turns out to be true… I’m going to experiment with it and let you know how it goes, care to join me?
My experiment involves a long story about how I started applying for my Irish passport renewal in February, but due to me being a dummy and smiling too much in the photos and then having to take and post new photos, and then having them get lost in the mail, I’m now scarily in danger of not getting my passport before I leave for the USA. It takes 4 weeks, I leave in 3 and a half.

Now, apparently sometimes it takes 3 weeks, so there’s hope. And I plan on calling the Irish passport people (in Ireland) today to state my case – my book’s coming out! I need to get there on time! I will make every effort to do as much as I can to get my passport in time. And then I will let go and wait for it to come to me. Because stressing about it and trying to make up things to do to make it arrive won’t work. At all.

I don’t think.

What do you think?

UPDATE: 24 hours later, and I’ve spoken to the charming Irish Embassy people in Dublin (I was stating my sob story for her and she interrupted to ask me what my novel is called and how to spell my name!) All I had to do was supply the South African office with a telephone number, and the passport could be processed. The Irish folks seem to think there’ll be no problem getting it in 3 weeks. *Phew!*